Old Habits Die Hard

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Hmm, Lord Mayor’s show and all that. The last quarter-final of Euro 2008 put in a rather fierce challenge for the dubious accolade of being the tournament’s low point, and whilst the significance of the match probably kept its status as a spectacle slightly above that of France v Romania, that is the only hint of polish anyone could possibly offer this turd.

Spain and Italy played out an insomnia-curing 120 minutes that looked destined for penalties from a very early stage. As is the usual form when two sides of such magnitude play out a direfest, the commentators will try and convince us that the game is ‘tactical’, ‘technical’, or that the teams are ‘cancelling each other out’. Strangely, ‘shite’ never seems to be a term they’re keen to apply no matter how bad things get, and this was very, very bad. That, by the way, is all it was. The poor quality of the match was not down in any way to the two teams tactics, it was down to the fact that they were rubbish. They couldn’t pass it, they couldn’t cross it, they barely moved, and they couldn’t shoot.

The latter criticism applies in particular to the Spaniards, whose entire game plan appeared to consist of making their way at a snails pace to an area 25 yards from the Italian goal, before unleashing the most harmless of efforts on goal that generally failed by numerous yards to find the target. All this would have seemed speculative under normal circumstances, but considering the world’s finest goalkeeper was between the sticks, it just appeared lazy and careless. The Italians however, weren’t even this good, as any or all of the above would have been an improvement on the virtual zero they offered in threat to Iker Casillas at the other end.

The first half was probably honours even for both incompetence and negativity, both sides barely breaking into a jog, playing safety-first possession football which offered no threat whatsoever of penetrating either defence. Moves came to an end with either a tame and inaccurate shot , as described above, or with an equally hopeless cross or final pass.

After half-time, a divide did occur between the two sides; both were still awful, but Spain were at least poor in a good cause, at least making the effort to come forward, where as Italy just seemed to pack it in altogether. The game sank to unpalatable depths, one side not interested in playing, the other not good enough to punish them for it. I’m not sure whose reputation comes off worse in this situation, the Italians for making no attempt to look any good, or the Spaniards failing to do so despite trying quite hard.

For the Italians it was a return to the bad old days. In the last few years, and especially in the World Cup two years ago, their play had begun to make the common criticism of them being overly defensive sound like a tired old cliche. From the second half onwards however, it looked relevant again, as Luca Toni became totally isolated up front, and virtually had to come back to his own half of the field to have any chance of seeing the ball. Extra-time also came and went without any Italian advance that registered in the memory. Whether the side lacked the courage to try and dominate the midfield without the suspended Pirlo and Gattuso I’m not sure, but this is hardly an adequate excuse for such negativity.

Spain looked better after rejigging their midfield on the hour mark, taking off the ineffectual Barcelona pair Xavi and Iniesta, and bringing on Cesc Fabregas. A no-brainer to everyone else, it’s logic which still escapes the Spaniards’ nasty old fool of a manager, Luis Aragones. The performance of the two first choices must be especially worrying for Spain when considering that their opponents were much weakened in the same area. Fabregas improved the quality of Spain’s passing immediately, and added to it some much needed urgency, though it was still not good enough to break down the dour Italians and create any clearcut chances for David Villa and Fernando Torres.

Extra-time plodded on towards its inevitable conclusion with neither side prepared to show even a smidgen of the courage that Russia had in dominating their extra half-hour the night before. This is perhaps especially surprising when one considers the horrors that both sides have suffered in shoot-outs of the past. This extra period was a far cry from the one Italy played in the World Cup semi-final against the Germans two years ago, when they ended with four strikers on the pitch, so desperate were they to avoid the spot-kicks. On that occasion their positive attitude paid off and led to them winning the World Cup, but on sunday they appeared to have learned nothing from that experience.

The neutral observer was surely favouring Spain in the shoot-out, which convinced me that Italy would probably win it, as the team that deserves to win the match often seems to lose if it goes to penalties, as happened on friday with the Croatians. Spain’s nerves were allowed to settle early in the shoot-out however, as they took a successful first kick and the Italians followed it with a failure. Spain could even afford to miss their fourth penalty and come through, and fittingly it was Fabregas, the only player who really showed any quality on the night, that converted the decisive penalty.

Overall the quarter-finals produced quite a stark contrast, the big winners being the spectators in Basle, and ITV, whose two matches were both thrillers. The two matches in Vienna on the other hand, both covered on the BBC, were complete stinkers saved only by two minutes of drama at the end of Croatia and Turkey’s extra-time, and two penalty shoot-outs. By this standard, the first semi-final in Basle tonight between Germany and Turkey should be the one to see, whilst tomorrow’s match in Vienna between Spain and Russia will be the non-event, though the received wisdom would surely say that the opposite is the more likely outcome.

I am saying nothing, trying to predict what will happen in this tournament is clearly for fools, though you if you are prepared to dabble in groundless guesswork, you should have no problem in securing employment with one of our fine broadcasting networks. A Turkish side ravaged by injuries and suspensions against a now mighty-looking German team that go in as hot favourites. Only one result right? The only thing I’m certain of is that if the Germans are one goal ahead with a minute left, I don’t think too many in the crowd will be nipping off to miss the traffic.

You Asked For It (Part 1)

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Writing about matches after subsequent matches have taken place sometimes offers a different perspective, for instance it opens up the opportunity to see teams make the same stupid errors, and you just want to ask them “Weren’t you watching yesterday?, Didn’t they do exactly the same thing?, And didn’t they look stupid?, And don’t you now look even more stupid?”.

More of that in the next post however, first to take care of Saturday. Group D is not exactly getting into the spirit of things at Euro 2008, it’s a bit too well organised and not especially adventurous. It’s not dull or completely bereft of interest by any means, but it needs a bit of chaos to get it going.

Spain and Sweden played out a largely uneventful encounter, which looked all on for an appropriate draw until a little late genius from David Villa settled it in Spain’s favour. The match did reveal the vulnerability of the Spaniards, who looked pretty clueless when it came to making chances, and appear to be relying on their two superstars up front to both make and take their own opportunities. They got away with it in this match by the skin of their teeth, but you wonder how many more times they will.

Sweden however, were the side guilty of brainlessness in this match, and got their just desserts for settling for a point with a level of negativity that was quite unnecessary. After the two sides had traded scrappy goals in the first half, the Swedes largely dominated, and looked more than capable of causing an upset. As the second half dozed along however, the Swedes drifted back, and back, and back… and then came the substitution of the forwards, which left them with no outlet and therefore made ball retention much more difficult for themselves. Consequently the Spaniards ended up with more possession at the end of the match, and despite not exactly using it to apply unbearable pressure, the fact is that if you’ve got the ball then you’ve got a chance, and if a chance falls to either of Spain’s strikers, there’s only one place it’s finishing up.

Just why do teams do this? I’ve seen this kind of petrified mass retreat so often before, and it just never works. If Sweden wanted to protect a point, the logical thing to do is surely attempt to keep the ball as far away from your goal and the opposition players as possible. You certainly don’t achieve it by altering the shape of your team into something unrecognisable to the players, forcing them to play entirely in one half (the wrong half) of the pitch, and sending the opposition a postcard to let them know you no longer have any intention, or possibility, of scoring another goal in this game.

Spain can consider themselves lucky, because against a more courageous side they would have been beaten. We should not be surprised of course, except perhaps for the fact that Spain’s inevtiable collapse has started a little earlier than usual. Generally they complete a full group programme impressively before imploding. Alright, they haven’t exactly fallen apart yet but the cracks have definitely started to appear in the form of a fragile looking rearguard, and a void of creativity in midfield. Why the Spanish coach Luis Aragones, a racist old fool, chooses to start with the ineffective Xavi and not Cesc Fabregas is beyond me and presumably anyone who’s watched a Premier League match in the last two years.

It’s just irresistable for a commentator to resist a cliche. I might have said it was like a moth to a flame, but that would just make me look silly, so I won’t. I am overall very happy with the return of Jon Champion to the ITV microphone, he has far more acute sense of perspective than his idiot colleagues Tyldesley and Drury, far less likely to use inappropriate hyperbole, or, as in the case of Tyldesley, grovel at the feet of any ‘big 4’ Premier League player. Alas he still appears to be third choice behind them for some reason, but at least they are making use of him. Even Champion can’t resist the cliche though, and it was a slight disappointment that he couldn’t get through Greece v Russia without reducing himself to the cringeworthy “It’s a Greek Tragedy”, and “No need for Russia to beware Greeks bearing gifts”.

I must admit at this point that I did myself make some allusion to the whole Greek tragedy thing after their first game, but I like to think that I at least made some attempt to steer it clear of the obvious and repetitive. I must admt also that my chosen avatars to represent the various nations on this blog may have a hint of cliche about them. The difference is that I am under no obligation to maintain any standards, I shall be as crass and predictable as I like if I think it’s funny. Champion really needs to try harder.

As you might have already guessed from those choice cuts of questionable commentator’s language, Greece continued on their merry quest to make the worst defence of a trophy ever seen. Greece appear to be the poorest side in Euro 2008 by such a distance you have to wonder if they shouldn’t have been made to play in every group in the interest of fairness; it seems wrong that only three teams in the competition get the opportunity for a gift three points.

Not that I’m not pleased that Greece are taking part, that’s why I advocate them having more matches as opposed to none at all. They are after all the best comedy value in the tournament, and they continued in saturday’s match where they had left off against Sweden. Their attitude to the match wasn’t quite as comically negative as it had been against the Swedes, this time it was just ordinary dullness, which was disappointing. Their goalkeeper Nikopolidis more than made up for it however, with a second hilarious howler of the tournament, taking an inexplicable stroll towards the left hand edge of his box in the direction of an overhit cross, blissfully ignorant to the fact that a Russian was several yards better off in the race. The hapless custodian looked on as the ball was lobbed gently back over his head into the centre, where Zyryanov was waiting to tap in to the vacated net.

Greece ensured that a sense of balance was applied to the occasion by proving themselves equally capable of slapstick at the other end as well, as Charisteas put forward a leading contender for miss of the tournament, failing to convert a header when unmarked from 3 yards. The striker showed his prowess with the boots was on a par with his heading too, when turning down the opportunity to fire an easy chance past the Russian keeper, instead choosing to give the watching defenders a textbook demonstration of the safe back-pass.

The fact that Russia actually seemed a little tentative about making an attempt to increase their lead probably tells you the extent of their ambition in this tournament. They now face a winner-takes-all clash against the Swedes, but having scored only one goal against the Greeks and been leaky against Spain, have handed the draw to Sweden.

Greece of course are out, and their presence will be greatly missed in Euro 2008, if not for reasons they would appreciate. They will now play a dead-rubber against Spain; their swansong as European Champions. If what we’ve seen from them so far is just the first act then I, for one, cannot wait for the finale.

Encore! Encore!

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Whilst it’s a well known fact that the Ancient Greeks were the first masters of tragedy and comedy, it’s a debate in literary circles whether they can truly be credited with getting to grips with the idea of the hybrid genre of tragicomedy. The argument may step up a gear tonight, after Greece’s modern footballers suggested that the tradition was flowing through the blood.

The defending champs delivered an opening performance that was so dreadful that it went beyond bad, came all the way around again to good, then soared to hilarious. The Greek display had the appearance of being choreographed, so perfect was its execution of comic timing during passages of despairingly poor play.

Sweden looked on dumbfounded, as the Greeks gained possession in their own half, and preceded to pass it amongst themselves aimlessly in the fashion of West Germany and Austria in the 1982 World Cup, when the two sides fixed the result in order to both qualify for the next phase. The Swedish crowd whistled with fury as time after time, the Greeks just walked around with the ball showing no interest whatsoever in participating in a football match.

Maybe Greece have grown so fond of their tag of champion spoilers that, aware they have no chance of producing a repeat, they’ve come here to parody the concept. Perhaps their three games at Euro 2008 will soon be arriving on a stage, entitled Greece Are Dull: The Musical. In its way it was enormously entertaining, and the way in which Greece seemed to deliberately play as awfully as possible definitely contained a certain artistry, comparable, say, with Les Dawson’s piano playing, or Tommy Cooper’s magician’s act.

Greece’s apparent preference for the performing arts didn’t end there either, their number also included a classic hero-villain in centre back Sotiris Kyrgiakos, who first tried to combine with a team mate to make a human vice in which to crush Freddie Ljungberg, then spent the rest of the match attempting to render redundant as many of Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s body parts that he could gain access to.

Before the curtain came down, it was time for the final act; a stunningly executed piece of slapstick involving a high ball, a floundering custodian facing his own goal, and four pairs of legs succeeding more in kicking each other than the ball. Eventually the ball appeared to find its own way into the corner of the net, and the show was over to a thoroughly merited standing ovation. Alright, maybe the standing ovation was from the magnificent Swedish fans for their players, but in my head they were all cheering our Greek entertainers.

ITV’s Steve Rider proved to have his finger as far from a football fan’s pulse as possible by declaring “At least the first goal made it worth watching”. The first Swedish goal, a decent strike from Ibrahimovic, scored whilst the defenders were presumably busy with a costume change, represented the intermission drink or ice cream, a pleasant enough diversion, but soon forgotten again in a long evening of cultural indulgence.

 

Before the Greeks took the stage, Spain had earlier made yet another good start to a tournament, setting up perfectly their usual scenario of false dawns and miserable failure. If the inevitable crash to earth is as spectacular as the lift-off though, it should be worth watching, as Spain gave pretty much a complete performance, ruthlessly exposing Russian defensive hesitancy with forwards oozing pace and class, then giving a masterclass in how to complete a victory by snuffing out any thoughts of Russian resistance in the second half with perfect possession retention.

It will all end in tears though, as we know, and it was pleasantly surprising to see the BBC pundits not falling into the trap of bestowing upon Spain the status of genuine contenders. A studio full of once bitten pundits stonewalled the issue beautifully, heaping praise on Spain’s display, but remaining transparently non-committal on the issue of their further progress. Sensible boys.

Spain’s day for sorrow is to come later though, tonight the tears belong to Greece. Whether they are tears induced by sadness or laughter depends on your position, but one thing is certain: The show must go on.