Cher Philippe Mexes: Va Te Faire

These two have a lot in common.

Well, I suppose we could always lose 3-1 to a shitty team to start our WC 2010 qualifying push. We could give up a cheap goal (thanks, Philippe!) just 9 minutes into the match, and then give up another one right before half-time. When we pull back within a goal (thank you, Sidney. Really), we can then give up a PK just 10 minutes (thanks again, Philippe!). Want to see how it all happened? Check out this fantastic video.

In a stunning turn of events, Mexes actually acknowledged that he played like shite and was responsible for the loss. In a not-so-surprising turn of events, Domenech acted like nothing was wrong. It is generally believed that Raymond was given a minimum number of points to be achieved from the first 3 qualifying matches, and it is likely that the total was 5 points. So, I’m torn - engage in “fan-tanking” and root for another loss (or for 2 ties, or for a win and tie) in the next 2 matches and hope that leads to Domenech being fired, or hope we become a little more successful in qualifying matches and deal with Raymond for 2 more years.

I can’t bring myself to root against Les Bleus, so I have to hope that Domenech pulls his head out of his ass and starts to actually manage this team. A good start would be to FUCKING PLAY GAEL CLICHY!

I hate you Domenech, and Mexes, you’re now on the watch list.

Written by Darkvader on September 7th, 2008 with no comments.
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The Good, The Bad, The WTF: Euro 2008 Edition

Written by Darkvader on June 18th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on Austria and Croatia and Czech Republic and Euro 2008 and Germany and Greece and Netherlands and Poland and Romania and Russia and Spain and Sweden and Switzerland and The Good The Bad The WTF and Turkey and france and italy and portugal and ü75.

Euro 2008: Day 10

Germany 1-0 Austria
It wasn’t exactly an inspiring victory, but Germany have booked their place in the quarter-finals with this win. They’ve made hard work of what should have been an easy group, but now it’s time for them to really get their act together for the knock-out stages. They did at least look much more solid defensively here, although that’s kind of hard to judge against a team as goal-shy as Austria. Joachim Low juggled the back four a bit, bringing in Arne Friedrich at right-back and moving Philipp Lahm to the left in place of Marcell Jansen (supposedly injured, but I wouldn’t be so sure).

The German midfield still looks a bit out of sorts, though, and their strikers are also having problems. Particularly Mario Gomez, who wasted three good chances in the first 10 minutes — including an absolute sitter that he ballooned over the bar from about a yard out. Unbelievable. I’m not really sure how he keeps getting picked, because he’s been equally useless in all three games so far. I think they might want to move Lukas Podolski up front with Miroslav Klose for the next game, and bring in Bastian Schweinsteiger on the left of midfield. At least Podolski has proved that he knows how to find the net.

Oh, right, I’m supposed to be talking about this game. Not a whole lot to say about the first half, really. Austria tried hard, but they just don’t know what to do once they get into the penalty box. The closest they came was an extremely weak penalty shout, when Erwin Hoffer backed into Christoph Metzelder. But generally the Germans looked in control without creating much themselves either.

The main incident of the first half wasn’t even on the pitch but on the sidelines, when both managers were rather bizarrely banished to the stands just before halftime for a bit of nothing. I don’t know if they got into it with the fourth official, or each other, or what, but it seemed like an overly harsh reaction from the ref — Phil Scolari would be very disappointed; nobody even took a swing at anybody. Actually, if anyone was going to be sent off, it should have been Rene Aufhauser earlier in the half, for pushing Podolski in the face. But he was luckier than Schweinsteiger was against Croatia, because the referee didn’t see it and didn’t even book him.

The key moment of the game was right at the beginning of the second half, when Germany were awarded a free kick just outside the box for Andreas Ivanschitz’s foul on Lahm. Michael Ballack stepped up to take it and smashed the ball past the wall and into the net. Best free kick of the tournament. He’s been admitted that he’s been underperforming so far, but he redeemed himself with that goal. The rest of his team seemed to take confidence from the goal, although they weren’t able to extend their lead over Austria. They’ll have to do better than that against Portugal.

Croatia 1-0 Poland
I swear I watched this, but none of it really registered with me. It wasn’t an entirely meaningless game, since Poland still had a chance to go through depending on what happened in the other match, but Michael Ballack’s goal for Germany put an end to that.

The game got off to a fairly even start, but Croatia became more dominant as the first half went on. That continued after half-tim, with Ivan Klasnic scoring the only goal in the 52nd minute, from Daniel Pranjic’s cutback. (Klasnic, incidentally, has made an amazing comeback after not one but two kidney transplants — he apparently wears a fibreglass shield to protect himself on the pitch.)

That goal basically killed off any remaining hope for Poland, and Croatia were happy to just pass the ball around and wait for the clock to tick down the remaining half an hour. Anyway, Slaven Bilic should be happy with his team, as he made a slew of changes to the lineup but still won pretty easily, making Croatia the first team into the quarter-finals with a perfect 3-0 record.

Next up: Germany play Portugal on Thursday, in a replay of their bronze medal match from the last World Cup, while group winners Croatia face Turkey on Friday

Bad hair of the day award: Vedran Runje, Croatia’s backup keeper, who made his first — and probably only — appearance at the tournament with a half-ponytail and lime-green scrunchie. (Sadly I cannot find a good picture of said scrunchie.)

Written by Jen on June 17th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on Austria and Croatia and Euro 2008 and Germany and Poland.

Euro 2008: Day 6

Croatia 2-1 Germany
So much for Germany’s status as tournament favourites. I don’t know if they just collapsed under the weight of expectations after their first game or what, but if so, Dear boys: You are not Spain. Stop being all neurotic. Love, me.

The first sign that maybe it wasn’t going to be Germany’s day came about 20 minutes in, after a relatively quiet start by both teams, as Mario Gomez put the ball into the net only for it to be (correctly) ruled out for offside. A few minutes later, it was Croatia who took the lead with a cross from the left wing that was poked into the net by Dario Srna, who’d got in behind Marcell Jansen. The Germans had several chances to equalize before halftime, but nothing came of it: a miss by Gomez, Michael Ballack’s free kick parried by the keeper, a header over the bar by Christoph Metzelder, another goal ruled out for a spurious foul by Gomez…

Croatia also had chances to extend their lead — Niko Kranjcar wasted a couple of shots — with the German defence looking decidedly shaky and Jens Lehmann being his usual nutty self. (I think I actually saw him biting the ball at one point. The hell?) Slaven Bilic had changed things after the game against Austria, putting an extra man in midfield, and he had his team fired up, passing well, pressing forward to support their lone striker, and closing Germany down quickly to deny them opportunities.

Joachim Low reshuffled his lineup at halftime, bringing David Odonkor on in place of the hapless Jansen, but they all just looked out of sorts — as if the entire team was cranky from missing their afternoon nap. And the changes didn’t have much impact, as Croatia scored again in the 62nd minute, a long shot from Ivan Rakitic on the right wing deflecting off Lukas Podolski and rebounding off the post for Ivica Olic to bury the rebound, with Jens Lehmann scrambling (and incidentally, I think he reacted late to the first goal too).

Bastien Schweinsteiger came on a bit later for Gomez (who’s been mediocre in both games so far and needs to be benched), and although he had a shot tipped just wide, his main impact on the game was getting sent off in stoppage time for a brainless shove on Jerko Leko. Podolski finally scored for Germany in the 78th minute, volleying home his shot after Ballack had knocked down Philipp Lahm’s cross from the left wing. Podolski and Lahm, by the way, are probably the only two German players who came out of this game with much credit. Ballack, who’s supposed to lead by example, mostly just stormed around and pouted — plus of course he got booked for a petulant tackle late on. Anyway, you would’ve expected Germany to really go for it after they made it 2-1, but Croatia still had way too much of the ball. They all just looked stunned when the final whistle blew, while the Croatians — especially Bilic — were going crazy celebrating an excellent win.

Austria 1-1 Poland
Austria, in constrast to their German cousins, played spirited attacking football, as if they were completely free of expectations of any kind. The only thing they were missing, sadly, was the ability to put the ball in the back of the net. Three times in the first 15 minutes they had clear chances on net, only to be stymied by a combination of terrible finishing and excellent goalkeeping by Artur Boruc. Possibly they were jinxed, or possibly Boruc had put high-powered magnets in both his socks and the ball. You never know.

Poland hadn’t played very well to start, but they got the opening goal against the run of play after half an hour: A cross from Ebi Smolarek, a shot by Marek Saganowski, and Roger Guerreiro scoring the rebound. But they couldn’t capitalize on that and extend their lead in the second half, with Jurgen Macho making a series of good saves. Instead, Austria were gifted a lifeline in stoppage time, with a penalty awarded after Mariusz Lewandowski dragged Sebastian Prodl down in the box while defending a free kick. Ivica Vastic stepped up to take it and took it well — he apparently won himself free beer for life in the process, by the way — to keep his team in the tournament for now.

What this all means is that Croatia are into the quarter-finals as group winners, while all three of the other teams are still alive depending on various permutations. If Austria beat Germany in their final game — which is not so out of the realm of probability as it once seemed — then the hosts will go through. You have to expect that Germany will get the win they need, but then they’ll have to face Portugal in the quarters; they likely would’ve had to meet them at some point anyway, but it’s still not a pleasant prospect for the Germans.

Next up in Group B: Austria v. Germany and Croatia v. Poland, both at 2:30 pm (ET) on Monday

Bad hair of the day award: Bastian Schweinsteiger and his platinum blonde monstrosity. Annie Lennox wants her hair back, Schweini. (I am also dubious about Lukas Podolski’s patchy hair colour, but I’ll give him a pass because at least he was useful, whereas Schweinsteiger gets points deducted for being sent off.)

Written by Jen on June 13th, 2008 with no comments.
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Highlights of Poland Vs Austria 1-1 in Euro 2008 with video

Euro 2008, Group B match
Poland Vs Croatia - 12th matchWith co-hosts Switzerland out of the tournament, hosts Austria managed to get some hosts remain for themselves after a Injury time penalty goal from Ivica Vastic. The Croatian born Austrian player also qualified his birthplace with his goal and too became the oldest scorer n the history of European football championship.
Video highlights of

Written by Sudip Kafle and Sujan Kafle on June 13th, 2008 with no comments.
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Highlights of Croatia Vs Austria 1-0 in Euro 2008

Euro 2008- 3rd match
June 8, Group B- Croatia Vs Austria

Croatia defeated the co-hosts Austria in Group B match after Luka Modric scored in the 4th minute penalty. Austria playing their first European championship actually were on command as they were charging against the Croatian defence. It seems Austria at least deserved a point as they showed totally an attacking game.
Here is the Video

Written by Sudip Kafle and Sujan Kafle on June 8th, 2008 with no comments.
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Euro Trash Day 2: “Electric Boogaloo”

The 90-something ranked Austrians probably deserved better, save for the critical fact that they neglected to score but, silver lining, they disposed of the notion that they would embarrass themselves as they flat outplayed Croatia in the second half.

Croatia, who often will just punch a team in the face until they relent found that the Austrians were happy to punch right back. In fact it was while Pogatetz was carrying the yellow and still pulled at [I think] Olic's shoulder not once but twice before clubbing him across the face with his forearm—should have been a second yellow and an ejection—at about the 30th minute that Croatia realized they might have to win on skill alone. And somewhat surprisingly, they didn't seem like they had enough of it (I know Eduardo led the qualifying group in scoring but is he really that important?).

Austria peppered keeper Pletikosa with chances, but failed to get a couple of headers down that might have netted the equalizer. My $.02, this was the most exciting match of the tourney so far. It was far from pretty, buy fuck if these two teams didn't run at each other for 90 straight.

Germany 2 - Poland 0

The really sad part about this is that with each successive encounter, Poland seems more convinced that they are going to beat Germany. Today's 2-0 quasi-methodical defeat brings Germany's running record to 12-0-4. Lukas Podolski had a brace off a fortuitous bounce and a couple of good looks at a hatty (Oh wait, the really, really sad part about this is that Podolski was born in Poland).

I didn't see the second goal live because my ESPN2 went out (along with ESPN, but Classic was still raging, strange). Was that national?

Anyway, Poland created some chances, but keeping with the letimotif of all teams having been shut-out, couldn't finish. I think that might be a tautology.

Too bad Johnnie Cochran is dead or he could have made a killer pre-game pep talk. "If Lehmann is in goal, you must score if you're a Pole." Yeah, shit that rhymes is always true.

Despite Jens showing in the first minute (ah, shades of the EPL opener against Fulham) that he was apt to blunder, Poland couldn't take advantage. They actually outshot Germany 11-9 (with a good number of the German shots coming late) but didn't make Jens have to handle enough of them.

Germany looks like a lock to advance, but given the other three teams' performances, Group B's bridesmaid derby is wideopen.

Linkage:

Looks like Spain won't be having any Cesc on the field. Not for starters anyway. I don't have the coaching credentials of Aragones (I'm also not quite as racist either) but this seems like a very bad idea.

Shocker. People drinking at the Euro.

Didier Drogba can't stand not being the center of attention.

If I weren't such a HTML 'tard I would have given the two photos cutlines of "My name is Luka" and "My name is Lukas" respectively. Go ahead, laugh. That shit is funny.

Written by Darkvader on June 8th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on Austria and Croatia and Euro 2008 and Euro Trash and Germany and Poland and Precious Roy.

Euro 2008 Open Thread: Croatia v. Austria

Written by Darkvader on June 8th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on Austria and Croatia and Open Thread and The Fan's Attic.

Euro 2008 Preview: Group B

Austria, Croatia, Germany, Poland

Germany couldn’t have asked for a better group, really. They should go through easily –possibly all the way to the final, what with having the easier side of the draw and (practically) home field advantage. I expect Croatia to be the team to join them in the quarter-finals. Poland did very well in qualifying, but I don’t think they can keep it up in the tournament. Australia will just be hoping that they can manage to pick up a point or two.

AUSTRIA
FIFA rank: 101
Odds of winning: 100-1
Coach: Josef Hickersberger
How they got here: Qualified automatically as co-hosts
Past record: This is their first ever appearance in at a European championship, and their last World Cup was 1998, when they were eliminated at the group stage
Questions to ask:

• Will their own fans get behind them, seeing as they were circulating a petition before the tournament trying to get the team to drop out?
• Captain Andreas Ivanschitz is supposedly known as the Austrian David Beckham: is that a good thing or not?
• How bad is it when the only name on the roster I recognize is Middlesbrough’s Emanuel Pogatetz?

Why to cheer for them: You feel like the home team ought to win at least one game.

CROATIA
FIFA rank: 13
Odds of winning: 12-1
Coach: Slaven Bilic
How they got here: Qualified top of their group, ahead of Russia and England
Past record: Finished third in their group at Euro 2004; also eliminated at the group stage in the 2006 World Cup
Questions to ask:

• How will they cope without Eduardo up front?
• Will playmaker Luka Modric prove that he was worth all the money Tottenham just paid for him?
• Just how cool is Slaven Bilic?

Why to cheer for them: They’re the official dark horse candidates of the tournament.

GERMANY
FIFA rank: 5
Odds of winning: 4-1
Coach: Joachim Low
How they got here: Qualified easily, but – perhaps intentionally – slipped to second in their group behind the Czech Republic
Past record: Finished third in their group at Euro 2004 (they haven’t won a game at the Euros since 1996!); third place in the 2006 World Cup
Questions to ask:

• How will Jens Lehmann perform, after spending most of the year on the Arsenal bench? And will he start a fight with anyone?
• Michael Ballack, now in form for Chelsea, will be running the midfield, but which of their plethora of strikers will be providing the goals up front?
• Will Jogi Low (and his natty scarf) prove that he was really the brains behind their 2006 World Cup campaign?

Why to cheer for them: They actually know how to win on penalties.

POLAND
FIFA rank: 27
Odds of winning: 50-1
Coach: Leo Beenhakker
How they got here: Somewhat surprisingly, finished first in their group ahead of Portugal and Serbia
Past record: They’ve never qualified for a European championship before; went out at the group stage at the 2006 World Cup
Questions to ask:

• How *did* they manage to do so well in qualifying?
• Why does Poland seem to produce lots of good goalkeepers and not much else?
• They’re defensively disciplined, but do they have anybody who can grab a goal for them when they counter-attack?

Why to cheer for them: You like watching Artur Boruc taunt opposing fans.

Written by Jen on June 3rd, 2008 with no comments.
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Euro 2008 preview

In less than a week Euro 2008 is about to begin. From 7-31 June, Austria and Switzerland will be the home of the best 16 national football teams of the old continent.
On 7 June is the grand opening with the match between Switzerland and Czech Republic which will take place in 18:00 and the final is scheduled for 31st of June 20:45
The group phase will face four groups each four teams and the two top-positioned teams will continue further for the quarter-finals.

Group A
Switzerland
Czech Republic
Portugal
Turkey

Group B
Austria
Croatia
Germany
Poland

Group C
Netherlands
Italy
Romania
France

Group D
Greece
Sweden
Spain
Russia

While Poland and Austria are least favorite, teams like Germany, Italy and Spain lead the polls among the newspapers.

Odds 7 days before the kick-off:
Germany 4.5
Spain 5.5
Italy 6.5
Portugal 7.5

Euro 2008 home
Matches
News

Written by done_mkd on May 31st, 2008 with no comments.
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