UEFA EURO 2024

[zephonic]

The European Championship started yesterday, host country Germany predictably crushed underdog Scotland 5-1. Today Spain beat Croatia 3-0, Switzerland beat Hungary 3-1, and Italy beat Albania 2-1.

Tomorrow my beloved team Orange will play Poland. I'm not really up to speed anymore with how the team has been doing, a lot of new players I don't know. But it doesn't matter, it was 36 years ago in Germany that we won our first and only cup, I was only a kid then but I'll never forget the wave of euphoria that swept over the country. Let's do it again this year!

 

HUP HOLLAND!

[Jose EB5AGV]

I am not really interested on football but, well, just to participate...

 

GO SPAIN! 😉

 

[zephonic]

Eish, tougher than expected but a win is a win!

[J.F.N.]

Our lousy team 🇸🇪 didn't make it (to nobody's surprise), so I will wait until the group plays are done before diving into it.

[YashN]

Not up to date with Football, but I do remember the past glory days of the Netherlands with Van Basten and Gulllit.

 

I usually watch England, France, and Germany. Great start for Germany, playing home.

 

Not sure if the English National team is in form these days, but my favourite League team in the League is Liverpool

[Wrrtyuuiioop]

England 1 Serbia 0

 

A tough match, England best in first half and Serbia best in the second.

 

England never do things the easy way.

[zephonic]

13 minutes ago, Biggles said:

England 1 Serbia 0

 

A tough match, England best in first half and Serbia best in the second.

 

England never do things the easy way.

Yeah, they got a little lucky there. If Serbia had a world-class striker it would have been a different game

[ElmerJFudd]

[Doerfler]

Big News

 

 

[zephonic]

Yeah, that was terrible, but weirdly karmic. First he totally dove to draw the yellow for Laimer, grabbing his face like it was badly hurt, and moments later it happens for real. Scary stuff.

 

He's probably the best striker in the world right now, so if he has to sit out the next game(s) it will be a relief for team Orange!

Still, the French team has so much depth and talent they should be able to compensate for his absence somehow. I have no illusions about our chances, but I hope our team will give them a hell of a fight!

 

[zephonic]

Turkey-Georgia, that last goal is every goalkeeper’s worst nightmare!

[Chummy]

I was rooting for Hungary but obviously there is no chance after this loss and now the match against Germany tomorrow is 99% a second loss.

[Jose EB5AGV]

Go Spain!. See some of you on next phase 😬

[zephonic]

Tough match for the Dutch, at one point I felt Lady Luck favored us and was hopeful for a win, but alas. Xavi Simons scored a beautiful goal, but alas.

All in all, I guess we should be happy with a point against a team like France, but I can’t help but feel that maybe we could have pushed for victory today.

[YashN]

I think it was even tougher for the French, seeing the squandered killer opportunity to score in the first half...

[Doerfler]

2 hours ago, zephonic said:

Tough match for the Dutch ...

well, the Oranje are currently leading Group D.  Tuesday's game against Austria is now the focus, Austria looked excellent today against Poland. 

[zephonic]

24 minutes ago, Doerfler said:

well, the Oranje are currently leading Group D.  Tuesday's game against Austria is now the focus, Austria looked excellent today against Poland. 

 

No doubt! They actually looked pretty good against France, too. Their team spirit is strong, more so than us, I'd say. But I think today's match may give Oranje a mental lift.

[mobi]

The two best teams so far are Germany and Spain, the rest play in a rather dull way.

[Wrrtyuuiioop]

On 6/22/2024 at 12:13 PM, mobi said:

The two best teams so far are Germany and Spain, the rest play in a rather dull way.

The Swiss would probably disagree with you.

[mobi]

4 minutes ago, Biggles said:

The Swiss would probably disagree with you.

  Germany was already classified, so even losing this match they go to next round,

 

The Euro really begins in the quarterfinals, where whoever loses goes back home 

[zephonic]

pff, what a disaster…

 

We went from zero own goals ever to two in one game. 
 

Austria deserved the win, they played their hearts out today and excellent team spirit and discipline.

 

[zephonic]

On to the next round! This was more like the team Orange we know and love. Of course, Romania allowed us to play our game, something stronger opponents will not let happen. Next up either Turkey or Austria again!

 

In 1988, we lost our first match to the Soviet Union only to beat them in the finals and take victory. Would be nice if history would somehow repeat itself 😉

[analogika]

Wow, the last ten minutes of Austria-Turkey were WILD! 

[Stokely]

I love football (er, soccer).  Relatively few rules especially compared to American handegg (which I know very well and grew up watching).

But man.... it's pa-the-tic the faking of injuries to draw cards.   There are fake fouls/flopping in every sport, but writhing around like you got shot and the replay shows that you were not even touched?  They should retroactively go and ban anyone doing that for two games IMO.  If it happens in the first half, do a halftime review and give the faking fool a red card.    Saw a bad one today with a high boot that missed the dude but he pretended it hit him.  Some teams are worse about it than others.  I have rooted against South American teams for years due to this nonsense, not that they give a hoot about my rooting or not for them.  Italy used to be bad too.    I thought VAR had helped to limit what is a really awful part of the game but its still there.  They have the tech to at least retroactively punish the worst abusers, I'd love to see them use it.

[Doerfler]

save of the tournament, IMO

 

 

[Wrrtyuuiioop]

13 hours ago, Stokely said:

I love football (er, soccer).  Relatively few rules especially compared to American handegg (which I know very well and grew up watching).

But man.... it's pa-the-tic the faking of injuries to draw cards.   There are fake fouls/flopping in every sport, but writhing around like you got shot and the replay shows that you were not even touched?  They should retroactively go and ban anyone doing that for two games IMO.  If it happens in the first half, do a halftime review and give the faking fool a red card.    Saw a bad one today with a high boot that missed the dude but he pretended it hit him.  Some teams are worse about it than others.  I have rooted against South American teams for years due to this nonsense, not that they give a hoot about my rooting or not for them.  Italy used to be bad too.    I thought VAR had helped to limit what is a really awful part of the game but its still there.  They have the tech to at least retroactively punish the worst abusers, I'd love to see them use it.

You are so right with your comments.

 

Totally agree VAR should retrospectively review suspect “fouls” for what is termed Simulation and Cards issued.

 

There is to much pushing, shoving and holding.

 

To much arguing with officials.

 

VAR itself should be limited in duration, 30 seconds to give a decision is more than enough.

[J.F.N.]

15 hours ago, analogika said:

Wow, the last ten minutes of Austria-Turkey were WILD! 

 

That last one was a seriously close call!!!

[zephonic]

8 hours ago, Biggles said:

Totally agree VAR should retrospectively review suspect “fouls” for what is termed Simulation and Cards issued.

 

Well, if we're gonna talk about that, my bigger beef is that the offside rule is being over-implemented. The rule was instated ages ago to stop teams from having a striker camping out by the opponent's goal waiting for a long ball. Now they are calling offside for guys that are a less than a toenail's width behind the last man, ridiculous.

 

I think the rule should be revised somehow. And while we're at it, I would love to cancel offside altogether when everybody is already in the box, but it's hard to codify that. It's really off-putting to have them scramble in front of the goal with seven or eight guys and when the ball finally goes in it is disallowed because offside. 

[Stokely]

Offsides is tough.  I'd be good with doing away with it to some degree.   

But I'll give soccer (just calling it that since we have so many Americans on here, avoiding confusion!) credit.  Fouls and offsides are it.   American football rules are bananas.  They have to keep tweaking them every year, have replay, and it's still a morass of uncertainty.  Did the guy catch it, make a "football move", was his hand moving forward, and now of course all the stuff that's trying to prevent injuries.  You can't lead with your head, but you can't take out their knees, and make sure you don't mess that up while you and the other guy are running 100 mph and he's juking and/or beginning to slide, in which case you can't hit him at all.    You can only line up in certain ways, you can only move in certain ways before the snap, and so on.   If anyone ever gets confused at a stadium why everyone is standing around all the time, well that is commercials for the folks back home...   I grew up with the sport, and still love watching it at times, but it's the definition of "poor design".   

Back to ragging on soccer just to try to be a bit fair     Yeah the players crowding the ref is dumb.  NBA and NFL refs put up with very little of that.  You say the wrong thing or even give a certain look to some NBA refs and it's a T.    At least hockey has it beat for "most asinine" refereeing, where they are literally wrestling with the brawling goons to try to stop the fight.   Can't stand the fighting aspect in hockey.

I'll also say there has been some truly awful reffing in a few games I've watched.  In several cases the refs didn't have a ton of experience, which is ???? when you are talking about important games in a big tourney.   

[Wrrtyuuiioop]

13 hours ago, zephonic said:

 

Well, if we're gonna talk about that, my bigger beef is that the offside rule is being over-implemented. The rule was instated ages ago to stop teams from having a striker camping out by the opponent's goal waiting for a long ball. Now they are calling offside for guys that are a less than a toenail's width behind the last man, ridiculous.

 

I think the rule should be revised somehow. And while we're at it, I would love to cancel offside altogether when everybody is already in the box, but it's hard to codify that. It's really off-putting to have them scramble in front of the goal with seven or eight guys and when the ball finally goes in it is disallowed because offside. 

 

What we are seeing in the Euros by all teams are the defender players lined up across the field, then a few yards in front there are the midfielders then the token forward.

They then move en-masse forward and backward, it is stifling the game.

Move the offside line away from the halfway line to the edge of the opponents penalty area or make it so there is no offside, lets get the players spread out and some movement.

Most of the guys on the field are on well over £100,000 a week with the likes of Kane, Mbappe, Ronaldo etc on vastly more and so many just cannot pass or kick the ball accurately.

These whimps get cramp, how does that happen?  In the 90 minutes they have only covered 4-6 miles so barely more than walking pace.