Not Bad Jose
Wednesday
6th July
Everything
is all about Wales and how marvellous they are.
It’s surely a formality that the Welsh will get to the final. After all it’s only Portugal who haven't won
a game in normal time. I know they’ve
been getting better every game but come on… this is Wales and they’re
great. Apparenly we should all support Wales but the
video they did celebrating England lose had kind of killed a lot of that. I saw the prospect of supporting Wales,
likened to being a Saints fan and supporting Bournemouth (with Scotland being
Pompey in that analogy). So anyway, fuck’em,
I want Portugal to win because they have Saints captain at centre back and
Cédric has kept his place despite his Poland howler.
The
first half is in the main, pretty boring.
Bale has a couple of long rangers straight at the keeper and that’s just
about it. Portugal are the side in the ascendancy
for most of it though with Wales seemingly struggling to get anything moving
without Ramsey. Straight after half
time, Portugal take the lead when they work a short corner and the eventual
delivery is bulleted into the net y the forehead of Ronaldo. I know he’s a twat but this is
brilliant. The spring he gets from a
standing jump is incredible. Anyhow, 5
minutes later it’s all over as the ball breaks to Ronaldo on the edge of the
box and he skews a shot across goal but Nani sticks a foot out and deflects is
past Hennessey who has no chance.
Now That's a Header
Wales
have to open up a bit now but the bench has no game changes on it. Vokes comes on, as does Church and Johnny
Williams but the latter two in particular are League 1 standard and so
predictably don’t do anything against the defence being expertly martialled by
José Fonte in pepe’s absence through injury.
Portugal should score more but Joao Mario misses a sitter and Hennessey
nearly throws one in his own net but just about recovers. Bale had a couple of pot shots but nothing that
was going to trouble Patricio.
2-0,
easy as you like. Wales will be happy
with their tournament and have done well to get this far but today the Dragon
did not so much roar as whimper. They just
turned up, did nothing and lost. The two
missing players seemed to take away 50% of their effectiveness but they’ll
still get an open top bus parade when they get home. Apparently England did it in 1990 after
losing in the World Cup Semi-Final. I
vaguely remember that and Gazza’s comedy breasts but it was naff then and it’s
nafff now. The bottom line is Wales ….
you lost to England… and we were fucking shit.
If they’d lost every game but beaten England it would have been “at
least we beat the English”.
Thursday
7th July
France
were playing their first good team of the tournament when Germany were in town,
albeit a Germany reduced by injuries to Gomez, Khedira, their main midfield
enforcer and a suspension to Hemmels, their best defender. None of this stopped the German’s dominating
the first half but France were dangerous on the break with Griezmann forcing a
good save from Neuer. Emre Can forced a
good save at the other end after a bobbled effort from the edge of the box and
then Giroud showed how shit he is by getting put through and failing both to
get a shot away or square it to the unmarked Griezmann. As half time approached, a corner came in and
for a reason only known to him, Schweinsteiger jumped for the header with his
arm up and punched it off the head of a Frenchman. After the protests subsided, up stepped
Griezmann to send Neuer the wrong way and make it 1-0
The
second half was better from France as they pushed Pogba further forward and it
worked well as they pressurised the German defence into mistakes. With 10 to go, Kimmich pissed about and saw
Pogba take the ball off him, beat him for skill and then chip over a cross
which Neuer could only flap to Griezmann.
2-0. German desperation took over
with Kimmich hitting a post and Lloris being forced into smart saves but France
were home and dried in their own tournament and heading for the Final, just as
Platini would have wanted.
Just as I Rigged It!
Joachim
Loew managed to stop scratching his balls and arse for long enough to have a
swipe at quality of tournament due to the format and the fact that there were
24 teams. He’s right but Germany added to the averageness by being bang average
themselves with no striker.
Sunday
10th July
France’s
date with destiny was here and in the way was Portugal, including Ronaldo who
was supporting the star men, Cédric and José Fonte. Despite Ronaldo being a twat, I 100% was
wanting Portugal to win this.
However,
it became apparent early on that they were going to have to do it without their
main man as payet went in very hard with a tackle and left the shiny one in
heap on the ground. For now he tried to
carry on and Pepe nealy made a balls of thing, presenting the ball to payet and
his superb cross picked out Griezmann who tried to lift a header over Patricio
who knocked it over the bar.
All
the cameras are on Ronaldo because he’s knackered and he can’t carry on. Much to my shame and disgust with myself, I
actually felt sorry for him as he was carried off to be replaced with
Quaresma. Most of the good stuff for the
rest of the half comes from France and from Moussa Sissoko who is running the
game in a way that he could never be bothered to do for Newcastle. He came closest to scoring as he turned in
the box before smashing a shot which was once again, well saved by Patricio.
15
minutes in to the second half and Payet, who has been kept very quiet by
Cedric, is replaced with Kingsley Coman who immediately gets in a great cross
which beats all the defenders and Griezmann has a free header from 8 years
which he puts over the bar. Giroud is
lumbering about as usual and his last action was to bring another good save out
of Patricio with a low diagonal driver,
before he lumbers off to be replaced like-for-like with the lumbering Gignac. Why? You have Martial on the bench.
Portugal
are offering sporadic threat and Nani nearly scores with an overhit cross but
the main chances are falling to France and Sissoko has another good effort from
25 yards well pushed aside by Patricio.
Portugal need something up front so bring on Eder, who was fucking awful
for Swansea last season, for the impressive Renato Sanches. You can see why he was brought on through as
Koscielny and Umtiti at the back clearly do not fancy playing against the big
guy.
In
the 91st minute, Evra squeezes over a low cross and Gignac, in a
move with defied his lack of ability, turned Pepe and scuffed a shot past the
diving Fonte and Patricio and sees it bounce away off the post.
Ronaldo
appears to rally the Portuguese troops again and he appears to have taken over from
the manager as he attracts the attention of every camera in the stadium. The first half of extra time goes by with nothing
happening aside from Eder giving Koscielny nightmares. Portugal are getting stronger as the game
goes on and nearly take the lead from a free kick as everyone is waiting for
Quaresma to take it, only for Guirrero to ping one over the wall and off the
bar.
No
matter though as two minutes later, Eder gets the ball, easily holds off
Koscielny, makes his way infield before hitting one from 25 yards which flies
like an arrow past Lloris and into the bottom corner. Brilliant strike. Deschamps responds by throwing Martial on
finally but France have nothing left and Portugal hold on easily with the back
four and goalkeeper absolutely magnificent.
Tough shit France.
Having
been the manager for half an hour, Ronaldo is desperate for more camera time
and takes his short off for no reason whatsoever during the celebrations. Presentation, crying Frenchmen and then the
trophy is lifted by the Shiny Camera Whore.
And that is how Southampton won the Euros.
It
was a ‘tear in the eye’ moment to see José Fonte carrying the trophy around and giving it the big
one. He stepped down a division to join
us in league 1, won the JPT, promotion from league 1 to Championship, promotion
from Championship to Premier league, 14th, 8th, Captain, 7th,
Europa league Qualifiers, 6th, Europa League Group Stages. He was nowhere near the national team when he
joined us and now look at him – holding up the second most prestigious trophy
in World Football. And the best bit is
that he’s still a Saints player and he’s achieved more as a Saints player than
any of those bastards who’ve left in that time.
Now that’s a legend.
Then
there’s Cédric Soares – what a great tournament he’s had once he got into the
team and it really makes you wonder how on earth he wasn’t in the Saints side at
the end of the season. There’s no
telling what this could do for his confidence so whilst it’s not the ‘made in
Southampton’ fairy tale that José’s story is, it’s great for Saints fans
nonetheless for what it may bring to us in the future.
Finally,
would Portugal have won it with the defence they started the tournament
with? Once the Saints boys came into the
side they kept a clean sheet against Croatia, let in one goal against Poland
(from a Cédric mistake admittedly), clean sheet against Wales, clean sheet
against France. Yep, Southampton won the
Euros.
The End
The
tournament as a whole was pretty dull. There
weren’t many good games and the format meant that there were many teams just
boring the shit out of it. I’m sure you
could easily list 8 teams who would not have been missed from a football point
of view, had they not been there… Ukraine, Sweden, Albania, Republic of
Ireland, Austria, Romania, Russia, Slovakia and one other…. Oh yes, England.
The
TV Coverage was ok though there were some nauseating moments. Clive Tyldesley as commentator with Glenn
Hoddle summarising had me screaming at the TV with the fuckwittedness of it
all. Of the studio pundits, I enjoyed and
agreed with Shearer’s England rants, Rio was ok and Bilic and Matthaus were
excellent with Ian Wright entertaining in a dangerous kind of way.
Ryan
Giggs is such a fucking dullard isn’t he.
Jesus Christ. No wonder no one
will give him a manager’s job – doomed to failure. Can you imagine him saying anything inspiring
at all. Not at all.
So
anyway – The L1-10 awards
Best
team – 1st Portugal (has to be, they won it). 2nd Italy
(wins against Belgium and Spain)
Best
player – 1st Griezmann (France), 2nd Pepe (Portugal), 3rd
McGovern (Northern Ireland)
Worst
Team – 1st Russia, 2nd Ukraine, 3rd Austria
Most
Overhyped Team – 1st Belgium, 2nd Austria, 3rd
Spain
Most
Overhyped Player – 1st Paul Pogba (France), 2nd Thomas
Muller (Germany), Equal 3rd Harry Kane (England), Joe Hart (England),
Dele Alli (England)
Most
Predictable – 1st England, 2nd Republic of Ireland
Over
Achievers – 1st Iceland, 2nd Wales
Best
Manager – 1st Fernando Santos (Portugal), 2nd Chris
Coleman (Wales – genuinely good guy)
Worst
Manager – Equal 1st – Roy Hodgson (England), Leonid Slutsky (Russia)
Player
Who Should Never Have Been There – 1st Henderson, 2nd Wilshere
(both England)
Time
to Retire – 1st Rooney (England), 2nd Schweinsteiger
(Germany), 3rd Evra (France)
Lost
3 Times But Still Did Well In Their Own Mind Award – Northern Ireland
Best
Pundit – Lothar Matthaus
Worst
Pundit – Ryan Giggs
Best
Saints Player – 1st Jose Fonte (Portugal), 2nd Graziano
Pellè (Italy), Equal 3rd Steven Davis (Northern Ireland), Cédric
Soares (Portugal)
English Club with most Euro Winners - 1st Southampton, 2nd No Fucker Else
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