At 6/11/12 11:22 AM, LostFaceInTrain wrote: Also Ukraine to shock Sweden with Shev getting the goals

Finally, I got a prediction right

At 6/11/12 02:44 PM, Victory wrote:

No, you just need to learn to fucking read.

Great response.

England what?

Its all about Shevchenko! :)

Also, on a side note what do people think of the expansion to 24 teams from 2016?

At 6/11/12 04:42 PM, bhsqad15 wrote:

At 6/11/12 04:37 PM, LampFace wrote: Also, on a side note what do people think of the expansion to 24 teams from 2016?

Its going to be Group A to F

The winner runner up and 4 out of 6 best 3rd placed teams will advance Just like in 1986-1994 world cup

I know, I was wondering what your opinion was do you prefer it now or do you like the idea of the 24 teams?

At 6/11/12 04:43 PM, LampFace wrote:

At 6/11/12 04:42 PM, bhsqad15 wrote:

At 6/11/12 04:37 PM, LampFace wrote: Also, on a side note what do people think of the expansion to 24 teams from 2016?

Its going to be Group A to F

The winner runner up and 4 out of 6 best 3rd placed teams will advance Just like in 1986-1994 world cup

I know, I was wondering what your opinion was do you prefer it now or do you like the idea of the 24 teams?

The more the merry!

(Plus it means England have better chances of beating someone - in theory)

At 6/11/12 02:55 PM, Auz wrote: For tonight I got Sweden winning 3-1 to Ukraine. Sweden is a bit of a dark horse on my predictions sheet. I got this feeling they'll knock out England.

Or maybe not. First time I got everything wrong.

I have to say I'm a little disappointed in Sweden. I thought they were in pretty good shape lately, beating the Netherlands earlier this season and being the best #2 in the qualification phase. It's not that their play was absolutely terrible, but I expected they would be able to beat Ukraine at least.

At 6/11/12 04:46 PM, Gagsy wrote:

The more the merry!

(Plus it means England have better chances of beating someone - in theory)

Haha, or more of a chance of disappointing fans :P

I think the level of quality could potentially go down, but not by much at the minute I'd say there about 20/21 teams that could've been at these Euros who would've played to a good standard.

At 6/11/12 04:50 PM, Daikenkini wrote:

Best #3.

Nope Auz was right best second.

At 6/11/12 04:46 PM, Gagsy wrote:

At 6/11/12 04:43 PM, LampFace wrote:

At 6/11/12 04:42 PM, bhsqad15 wrote:

At 6/11/12 04:37 PM, LampFace wrote: Also, on a side note what do people think of the expansion to 24 teams from 2016?

Its going to be Group A to F

The winner runner up and 4 out of 6 best 3rd placed teams will advance Just like in 1986-1994 world cup

I know, I was wondering what your opinion was do you prefer it now or do you like the idea of the 24 teams?

The more the merry!

(Plus it means England have better chances of beating someone - in theory)

Only if they are in a group with teams like Liechtenstein and Malta. :P
Anyway, I think all this "expansion" bullcrap has to stop. Blatter also had plans to ditch the Euro League in favor of a even bigger Champion's League. This is just crap and they should stop doing this.

Tonight's match: I said (either in this thread or in the NG football crew) that I didn't expect too much from this game, but that I didn't expect too much from Croatia vs Ireland as well. Turns out, this was one of the most entertaining matches so far.

Now that the first match day is completed, we all know a bit more of what to expect from the teams in the upcoming matches. So far, the most convincing team was Russia. But on the other hand, they played against the Czech Republic. Not the strongest team in the EC.

The other favorites:

Holland, complaining about the grass being "too long" and the pitch being "too wet". How about complaining about your own players not taking their chances?

Germany, a bit disappointing, but at least they won their match. Hummels had a great first match in a tournament. Let's hope he plays as well against Holland.

Spain, complaining about the pitch being "too dry". How about starting with a striker next time?

Italy, playing defensively as shit, but still the spanish players had too much space. Didn't look too convincing at times.

England, disappointing as always. :P Seriously, though. France is the strongest opponent in the group, so a draw might not be a bad result after all.

France, dominating the match in the second half without creating too many real chances. They still are my #1 pick for the group win.

Also:
Ukraine, very good game. Even came back from a goal down. But do they stand a chance against France and England? We'll have to wait and see.

At 6/11/12 04:43 PM, LampFace wrote:

At 6/11/12 04:42 PM, bhsqad15 wrote:

At 6/11/12 04:37 PM, LampFace wrote: Also, on a side note what do people think of the expansion to 24 teams from 2016?

Its going to be Group A to F

The winner runner up and 4 out of 6 best 3rd placed teams will advance Just like in 1986-1994 world cup

I know, I was wondering what your opinion was do you prefer it now or do you like the idea of the 24 teams?

Bad, I don't want to see Scotland vs. Estonia or N.Ireland vs. Wales, the numbers are fine as they are

Lmao, I bet those Croatians were shitting bricks during the last 5 minutes of the game. Still managed to hold the Swedes off well, though. Really entertaining game!

When you say Blatter and Euro League, do you mean Platini and Europa League?

At 6/11/12 05:16 PM, Syztm wrote: Lmao, I bet those Croatians were shitting bricks during the last 5 minutes of the game. Still managed to hold the Swedes off well, though. Really entertaining game!

And by Croatians I mean Ukrainians. I'm tired, sorry.

At 6/11/12 05:16 PM, Syztm wrote: Lmao, I bet those Croatians

...

At 6/11/12 05:19 PM, LostFaceInTrain wrote:

At 6/11/12 05:16 PM, Syztm wrote: Lmao, I bet those Croatians

...

:(

At 6/11/12 05:06 PM, Haggard wrote: France, dominating the match in the second half without creating too many real chances. They still are my #1 pick for the group win.

I wouldnt go as far as 'dominating', unless you mean passing back and forth and ot advancing at all, which is basically all that happened during the second half. England easily did a lot better on the first half, being really aggressive in both offence and defence while france was just trying to keep possession and not much else.

At 6/11/12 04:43 PM, LampFace wrote:

At 6/11/12 04:42 PM, bhsqad15 wrote:

At 6/11/12 04:37 PM, LampFace wrote: Also, on a side note what do people think of the expansion to 24 teams from 2016?

Its going to be Group A to F

The winner runner up and 4 out of 6 best 3rd placed teams will advance Just like in 1986-1994 world cup

I know, I was wondering what your opinion was do you prefer it now or do you like the idea of the 24 teams?

I'm not sure what the point is behind stretching the tournament with an extra round.

I do kinda like that we get more teams joining, because on EC's it always feels like there are a few countries missing. I would've liked to see Belgium joining again for instance.

The "four best 3rd placed proceed" sounds like a bit of a lame rule to me though. I suppose advancing will come down to winning that one match against the weakest team and once you do a lot of pressure is taken away. Also, I prefer to see the big teams struggle and get eliminated when they fuck up rather than still having an easy way out until the end.
But I guess it also has the potential to make matches a bit more exciting as teams might have to try and score more goals to be more safe in the 3rd place rankings.

So I don't really know if this is good or bad. For now I'm a little negative towards this decision, but I'll judge in 2016 when the system will be reimplemented.

At 6/11/12 05:26 PM, Auz wrote:

I do kinda like that we get more teams joining, because on EC's it always feels like there are a few countries missing. I would've liked to see Belgium joining again for instance.

I agree, when they played England I thought they were a good team and better than some of the teams in the competition at the minute.

The "four best 3rd placed proceed" sounds like a bit of a lame rule to me though.

Hmm, I can see your point but when a group has three teams on 6 points it seems harsh on the third placed team going out on goal difference.

At 6/11/12 05:22 PM, BumFodder wrote:

At 6/11/12 05:06 PM, Haggard wrote: France, dominating the match in the second half without creating too many real chances. They still are my #1 pick for the group win.

I wouldnt go as far as 'dominating', unless you mean passing back and forth and ot advancing at all, which is basically all that happened during the second half. England easily did a lot better on the first half, being really aggressive in both offence and defence while france was just trying to keep possession and not much else.

Yes, "dominating" isn't exactly the right word. "Controlling" would be more appropriate. Since they where in control of the ball most of the time in the second half.

At 6/11/12 06:01 PM, Haggard wrote: Yes, "dominating" isn't exactly the right word. "Controlling" would be more appropriate. Since they where in control of the ball most of the time in the second half.

Yeah but that implies they were doing something with the ball.

At 6/11/12 06:22 PM, Daikenkini wrote:

Do commentators do even any type of research?

Because in my country it doesn't seem so ... instead, they were nearly proud to present a list from best to worst.

I guess not, I think they have a 'team' of researchers if any research is done at all.

At 6/11/12 06:30 PM, BumFodder wrote:

At 6/11/12 06:01 PM, Haggard wrote: Yes, "dominating" isn't exactly the right word. "Controlling" would be more appropriate. Since they where in control of the ball most of the time in the second half.

Yeah but that implies they were doing something with the ball.

They did. They passed it around. ;)

At 6/12/12 05:07 AM, Haggard wrote: They did. They passed it around. ;)

Exactly lol

I can't believe Sweden lost against Ukraine. Jeeezzz...

At 6/12/12 09:59 AM, BlubbOnly wrote: I can't believe Sweden lost against Ukraine. Jeeezzz...

They're a good team, and this is actually a tough group.

Oh man, what a game. 2 goals, one substitution and a yellow card. And not even 30 minutes played yet!

Lol at Petr Cech with the first big blunder of the tournament.

I placed my bet on Greece winning 1-0. From what I've seen of this match they seem like the better side, but apparently they screwed up badly in the first couple of minutes.

For tonight I have Russia winning 3-0 to Poland.

At 6/11/12 05:38 PM, LampFace wrote:

At 6/11/12 05:26 PM, Auz wrote: I do kinda like that we get more teams joining, because on EC's it always feels like there are a few countries missing. I would've liked to see Belgium joining again for instance.

I agree, when they played England I thought they were a good team and better than some of the teams in the competition at the minute.

Indeed. They usually have a bunch of good players in their team. I don't get why they haven't managed to qualify for any tournament since 2000 or so (when they hosted it along with the Netherlands).

The "four best 3rd placed proceed" sounds like a bit of a lame rule to me though.

Hmm, I can see your point but when a group has three teams on 6 points it seems harsh on the third placed team going out on goal difference.

True, but that's a situation which happens very rarely so I don't think they got to change the rules for that particular case.

At 6/11/12 06:22 PM, Daikenkini wrote:

At 6/11/12 04:52 PM, LampFace wrote:

At 6/11/12 04:50 PM, Daikenkini wrote: Best #3.

Nope Auz was right best second.

Do commentators do even any type of research?

Because in my country it doesn't seem so ... instead, they were nearly proud to present a list from best to worst.

Lol. This takes like 10 seconds to look up really.

At 6/12/12 01:52 PM, bhsqad15 wrote: Greece 1-2 Czech Republic

Czech republic wins

Ah,that was unfair.It should have been at least 2-2

Nice game. Fastest 2-0 lead in a EC match EVER. Later on, Czech Republic sub out Kola for Rajtoral. But Kola was subbed in during half time for Rosicky. Solution: They didn't meant to take off Kola again, but they told the 4th offical the wrong number. Oh. My. God.