Jump to content

The final! France - Portugal


Recommended Posts

Ah, i quite enjoyed his enthusiasm on the touchline towards the end of the game. Course he hogged the trophy a bit. Nani had to prise it out of his hand. While Eder seemed to be stuck somewhere at the back. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

32 minutes ago, StefCurry said:

First time in EURO's history, the winner team hadn't won any game in group stage.

It was almost (though not quite) mathematically impossible before. There were only a few very unlikely ways that a team could leave a group without winning at least one game:

1) All games end in ties and two non-winning teams progress based on tiebreaks.

2) The non-winning team gets three ties, one team wins all of its remaining games and the other two teams tie each other.

3) One team wins all of its games and every other game in the group ends in a tie with one of the three teams with 2 points progressing on tiebreaks.

On the other hand, with the new format, it is quite simple for a non-winning team to progress from the group stage: 3 points and 0 goal difference should almost always net third place and usually progress to the playoffs.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

45 minutes ago, john said:

Ah, i quite enjoyed his enthusiasm on the touchline towards the end of the game. Course he hogged the trophy a bit. Nani had to prise it out of his hand. While Eder seemed to be stuck somewhere at the back. 

The accidental punch was funny. And the ladies I was around appreciated his topless tour.

 

BTW, what's with all the coach nose-picking going on? Is it psych warfare, code...or what?

Edit: My 2 favourite moments were that beautiful almost goal on the pele kick and that Portugal player...can't remember which....who felt the ball maybe graze his head, thought it was the other player, and went down like he'd been shot.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Boring game, as finals tend to be.  And not the most exciting tournament overall either.  The large proportion of late goals and the Cinderella Welsh and Icelandic (possibly Italians too) were the only excitement.  The expanded format is partly to blame, but most international tournaments are a bit dull after all the anticipation -- they encourage defensive football and grinding out wins against more attractive teams.  

Is Brazil 1970 the only champion who also played beautifully?  Brazil 1994 with Romario and Bebeto?  I don't remember France 1984.  Maradona was glorious in 1986 but that team played a lot of pragmatic football.  The Dutch lost in '74 and '78.  Spain 2010 and 2012 got a lot of narrow wins with lots of dull possession.  Holland 1988 didn't sparkle much outside of Van Basten's finishing.  Germany 2014 was already a duller version of the 2010 team, despite walloping the hosts.

If Portugal had to win, then winning without Ronaldo made it a bit better.  But then he managed to make it all about him anyway.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 hours ago, Consigliere said:

What? Did they actually play substantially better tonight than they did in the previous games?

They may not have played substantially better last night than they did in the previous games but they sure didn't play any worse.

As someone mentioned already, when Ronaldo is on the pitch almost everything goes through him. Which would be great if he'd been scoring but he's wasted (not missed, but wasted) more shots than the rest of the team combined. His free kicks track record is horrible and still no one else comes even close to taking them instead. He behaves as if his teammates are a bunch of Sunday league fatties who can't do anything.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, Iskaral Pust said:

Is Brazil 1970 the only champion who also played beautifully?  Brazil 1994 with Romario and Bebeto?  I don't remember France 1984.  Maradona was glorious in 1986 but that team played a lot of pragmatic football.  The Dutch lost in '74 and '78.  Spain 2010 and 2012 got a lot of narrow wins with lots of dull possession.  Holland 1988 didn't sparkle much outside of Van Basten's finishing.  Germany 2014 was already a duller version of the 2010 team, despite walloping the hosts.

While I only dimly remember France 1984 (I was about 12 and it was only the second international tournament I followed after 1982) that team (Platini etc.) played beautiful football. They had the bad luck being stopped by efficient, lucky and sometimes brutal Germans in 1982 and 86 when they might have won the cup otherwise whereas the Germans had shown their best efforts in the match against France in 82 and were quite chanceless in the finale. The 1986 finale was more open and Germany came back after 0:2, so it was probably their best match in that tournament

France in '98 I also remember as nice to watch and successful.

I think one problem is that the "sparkle" often shows against certain teams but does not work against others. E.g. Germany rolling over England and Argentina 2010, becoming a favorite for the tournament and then being efficiently stopped by Spain in the semifinals. I vaguely remember how in 1986 England and Spain were hailed as favorites after high winning scores in the first final round but both lost in the quarterfinals.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 hours ago, Corvinus said:

Still doesn't beat failing to qualify but getting in anyway and winning it.

With this extended field the Danes would have qualified though...

But the Danes were a.) showing up the Euros 92 and played a good overall tournament. b.) they beat the reigning Championship (the Netherlands in the Semi-Final) and the reigining World Cup Winners (Germany) in the Final. c.) They had a very likeable team gathered, and they played the entire tournament without their biggest Star (M. Laudrup had a falling out with Richard Møller Nielsen). While Portugal had Pepe and C. Ronaldo on their team. 

Ok, I might be a bit biased, because the Danes had Brian Laudrup on their roster, who was my favorite footballer back then.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 11/7/2016 at 6:21 AM, Iskaral Pust said:

Is Brazil 1970 the only champion who also played beautifully?  Brazil 1994 with Romario and Bebeto?  I don't remember France 1984.  Maradona was glorious in 1986 but that team played a lot of pragmatic football.  The Dutch lost in '74 and '78.  Spain 2010 and 2012 got a lot of narrow wins with lots of dull possession.  Holland 1988 didn't sparkle much outside of Van Basten's finishing.  Germany 2014 was already a duller version of the 2010 team, despite walloping the hosts.

Hungary in 1954 didn't win only becouse Germany cheated, they were the best by far. Same for Netherlands in the 70s. Italy in 1982 after the group stage played amazing football against Argentina, Brazil, Poland and Germany. If you want to witness artful football 1982 Brazil was maybe the best ever.

Anyway this tournament proved once again how politics and football don't match. Allowing 24 teams now, maybe 40 in the next world cup to get votes from minor federations brings only hideous games. But if corrupted people like blatter and platini can decide the future of football that's the outcome...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, Lucailduca said:

Anyway this tournament proved once again how politics and football don't match. Allowing 24 teams now, maybe 40 in the next world cup to get votes from minor federations brings only hideous games.

Totally disagree. The format gave us more qualifying teams (including Hungary, who topped their group), more matches, a last round of group matches with something at stake, and a better tournament.

40 teams in a WC might be too many to work but 24 in a Euros worked fine.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, mormont said:

The format gave us more qualifying teams (including Hungary, who topped their group), more matches, a last round of group matches with something at stake

Yes that's the point of this formula. More teams included, more votes, more money!

At stake? It all depends on the calendar (which means luck). Let's for example look at group E: Italy, already qualified, changed 9 players against Ireland, and lost the game playing the worst game possible. Ireland qualified when clearly they didn't deserve it.

 

5 hours ago, mormont said:

better tournament.

That's a matter of semantics: more doesn't mean better. Quantity is not quality.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...