Anybody watching the Under 21 Euro Championships?
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Anybody watching the Under 21 Euro Championships?
yeah, its been alright so far.....lita has done well for england, and drenthe for holland looks a player
great drama in the england game tonight, tough on any team to go out like that
I had to laugh when Marwood and co kept banging on about how good Carson is when it comes to saving penalties.......15 or so penalties later and he had only saved one!!!!
They played well tho. Was farly exciting i have to say. Would have loved it Taylor missed they would never have shut up bout it.
You have to give a lot of credit to the England players. It was a horrible way to go out. Overall, I thought it was a very enjoyable game. England deserved to win it in the 90 mins though.
THEM!! ha England sorry.
going by them stats england were lucky to take it to penos.
Them stats from the 90 or 120??
****ing hell those are some stats
Still though i felt that England were more dangerous but with the injuries and so on the hole of extra time was spent in there (England) own half so the 90 stats wouldnt be as dramatic.
England played the extra time with 9 players in essence. As said by a previous poster, the 90 mins stats would tell a completely different story. It was basically defense v attack in extra time. The ball was rarely out of the England half.
why would you give them credit for losing on penalties.... again!
i think it further goes to show that english teams lack the mental strength that other teams possess.
loosing a lead in the last minutes and then getting knocked out on penalties... nothing to be proud of there methinks.... wouldn't happen to the italians or germans. should dispel the myth that english football is up there with the best. the premiership is one of the top leagues alright but the english national teams are still well behind.
Doesnt sound like you watched the game, i'm anything but a fan of English national teams but by god they had alot to be proud of, see Milner Noble etc.. on there last legs and not stopping until the last minute, Taylor tryin to run on a b0ll0xed ankle for all of E.T. and if scoring 12 penos shows a lack of mental strength i dunno what shows proper mental strength, sure Hoyte scored his second after missing the first and their keeper scored too.
I didn't see much of the game proper but the bull like "no other nation would show so much courage" really got my wick up. Yes, they were brave but again short on the quality required. They love nothing more than a bloodied Butcher or Ince on the pitch. English reports I read admitted the Dutch were better & Lita's goal was against run of play. That said, what I did see was the Dutch passing and pressing but getting nowhere near the English goal. I felt a bit sorry for England, but I don't like them so I'm glad they didn't win. Serbia would have beaten them anyway.
I don't think you can angle an accusation of lacking mental toughness. The quality of the shoot out was phenomenal. Some of the Dutch pressure kicks were amazing, but almost all of England's were good too. Anyway, if there's one country in the world worse at shoot-outs than England it's the Netherlands!
Portugal 0-0 Italy, extra time, good match
Watched most of the tournament and felt it was tough on England going out in that manner. What annoyed me as much as anything watching the penalties was how inept Carson was at even guessing the right way! Surely if he had stayed on his feet for a split second to see where each penalty was going he'd have given himself a fighting chance of stopping a few more. Its a real blood boiler of mine watching keepers in shootouts trying to guess. Anything down the middle or badly hit should be saved if you wait to see what direction the ball goes. Anyway.....got that off my chest:mad:
All in all a few players have stood out; mostly those who few had heard of or seen prior to the tournament, namely Drenthe, Veloso, Mirallas and Chiellini. Refs were too whistle happy and really ruined some games. UEFA have a lot to blame for of late and need to get their act together on this score aswell as the racism which marred the England-Serbia game.
Final Saturday and pray to the high heavens the Dutch come away with a victory for the sake of football.
Another Brian Marwood comment that p1ssed me off was when Nugent was booked for a lunging challenge from behind on a Dutch defender in what was a 50/50 situation.
He ranted "You can't book him for that, he had every right to go for that ball, every right".
True, but the Dutch guy got there first and would have had possession in clear space to develop play.
Nugent went for the ball honestly, missed it by a fair bit, took the man down and to his team's advantage. Why is that NOT a yellow card?
There are some things you can rely on in life a) It always rains in Ireland b) England always lose penalty shoot-outs. Not sure why that is reckon it's a mental issue. They don't have the same mental toughness as other nations.
That's what being really ''hard'' is in sports terms not cracking under pressure.
Anyway if Serbia do win the Under 21's, and from what I gather, they are on football terms at least deservedly in the final ,the best course of action on the Racism front would be to Ban them from next year's championship. Banning the champions would send a real message to the nutty racist element in their support