A sad day for football

Michael you are sounding a bit sore. Maybe the Greek players will be so elated to be holding the European Cup for the next four years, they might be able to cope with the likelyhood they wont even qualify next time. You cannot put defeating France, Czechs and Portugal twice (in Lisbon) down to luck or poor performances, unless you refuse to see the glaringly obvious.

 

Trouble is Michael they beat you twice. It if was just once I could understand the calls of lucky Greeks, but over two legs they had the better of you. The Greeks beat You, France and the Czech Republic, I expected those three and Englnd to be the best teams in it. They have every right to call themselves the best team in Europe

 

The Aftermath

Well, the Greeks are definitely the best team in Europe right now. Anyone who fails to see or accept that is simply suffering from delusions of grandeur. Saying that the Greeks were lucky is a just a cop-out for the lacklustre performance of the Portuguese.

Now, is anyone going to tell me what luck is and where it comes from because I really don't believe it exists be it in football or elsewhere in life? A football team is either good or they are not - luck has nothing to do with it.



Enjoy the music,

Lawrie.

 

good luck is a random element that works in your favour. for example a gust of wind that deflects the ball enough to score or miss a goal - depending on which side you are on. it could also be the referee allowing or disallowing a goal based on a foul or hand ball that may or may not have taken place
luck exists but isn't what most people think it is.
cheers


julian

 

I think people are missing the point here. Greece are the better TEAM. They work as a unit from front to back and reap the rewards because of this. Portugal may play subjectively better football on certain areas of the pitch, thanks to great individualism, but their TEAM work is poor. "Sum", "Parts", "Greater" anyone ?

The fact that Greece scored more goals (in both games against Portugal !) and conceded less means that they are the better TEAM and deserved to win.

What's there to argue about - they won .

 

I don't support Portugal :yikes:, so I'd like to think I was slightly more neutral in this. I agree that Greeks played their flavour of football very well. However, IMO this makes for a very boring game. Can you imagine how many people would be turned off if this became the norm? All those memories (or lack of because I just switched off) of certain Italian, German or Arsenal (under GG) games!

I preferred the way Portugal played, even though their finishing wasn't up to scratch. I'd rather see teams such as Holland (they were my favourites to win but they also got hard done by refs IMO) play their natural creative game and lose than see a defensive game. But that's just me.

 

If the Greek (ex German) style of playing becomes the only way to win championships then they should change the rules to prevent it. Some kind of rule requiring a certain number of players to always be in front of the centre line would do it. It would create more exciting football and allow the true talents to shine. It would hopefully mean that more goals were scored aswell, something that's been a problem in football in general over the last few years.

Overall, I think there's a problem with international football. When teams like Greece, South Korea (with a little help from the refs) and the USA, with average talent but a good manager mashalling them can do better in the big competitions than the footballing nations with the best players in the world there has to be something wrong. About the only great team in the world you can still rely on is Brazil, and even they didn't look too clever in the run up to WC 2002 but at least they managed to take the title.

And, another comment on the Greek's performance at Euro2004. The only team that beat them were Russia and Russia were soundly beaten by both Spain and Portugal. Russia's "advantage" was that they somehow managed to get a very early goal (2 minutes in) against the Greeks which meant they had to play less defensively, allowing in a second at only 17 mins. If Vryzas hadn't got one back then the Greeks wouldn't have even qualified for the quarters - hardly a convincing way through IMO.

Michael.

 

Sorry Michael but that's just quite ridiculous .

"True talents" ?

Like Deco, Beckham, Kluivert, Ballack, Henry, Pires, Gerrard, Owen etc. ?

All of whom had a poor tournament, not because of their teams tactics but because they are over-paid, over-confident players that don't appreciate that just because you have stardom and a large wage doesn't mean that you don't have to track back and defend with the rest of your team.

Football isn't just about goals. If it was, why not just remove the goalkeepers so that it would be more like basketball ?

Speaking of basketball, the great NBA sides have always been as good in defence as offence but the media only glorifies the offensive players.

What makes it wrong ?

No player or team has a given right to win anything just because they are pleasing on the eye. Michael Schumacher used to be a great driver that could come from behind, drive and win a race stuck in one gear but now he just wins Pole and stays there. Hardly great entertainment is it ?

Is he a poor driver because of that ?

You are only as good as your last performance and Portugal's was poor. Get over it man. The better team one (twice).

 

So Mike (B), is essence then what you are saying is Portugal is very mike like the dac 64 of the football world then?.( spot a theme here?)
Get lucky with a couple of 'lucky ref' deescisions, cheer like crazy, then when they can't do the biz, bleet like like sin, I'm sure Greece wern't the best team in the tournament, but hey they did what mattered on the day, and that I'm afraid is all that matters, they lifted the Trophy no one else.
Seems you'll need to be careful, going on this, and you'll turn into a BAT Bitter and twisted old fart.
Climb down off the horse and cheer for them another a day, because luck may well be on their side next time

 

A sad day for football. But a happy one for non-footie fans. Hurray! It's over. Who cares who won? Less football cluttering up the TV schedules, less chance of drunken English fans dragging our name thru the mud.

Life is far better all round.

When I am King, I will make football, football fans and footballers illegal.

 

When you are king, you wont last long

The Greeks didn't look too sad going on the scenes in Athens last night!

 

I'm not bitter, just like the Murphy's

- Portugal did better than they've ever done before
- The tournament was (according to the UEFA prez and other "high ups") the best organized ever
- there was virtually no violence (67 arrests for violent behaviour compared to over 1000 at Euro 2000)
- great stadiums. All 10 stadiums (7 new and 3 refurbished) were built for significantly less than the projected cost of the new Wembley
- great atmosphere and friendliness amongst the fans
- great hospitality

All in all, Portugal has a lot to be pleased about.

Seriously though, I do think there needs to be a debate about where the major footballing nations have gone wrong recently. Do the big European stars care about these major competitions anymore? Perhaps if they didn't have their contracts for the upcoming season already signed they'd care more. Perhaps if they weren't knackered out after a long national and CL season they'd play better. Perhaps national sides need more competetive games where they can get used to playing as a team. I don't know what the answers are but I do think something's wrong and something has to be done about it.

Michael.

 

Quite right Tone, Michael really has taken sour grapes to a new level. It is impossible for all teams to play like greece, one team has to attack and one defend, even if only in spurts.

What Michael conveniently forgets is that Greece were better in BOTH departments in BOTH games.

Portugal might qualify for the World Cup, but I very much doubt once there they will worry too many teams, including England

 

Michael,

Surely, you wrote the above in jest. A good team should have been able to run rings around the Greek players and penetrate their defence. If the Greeks did not have any one in front of the centre line, they would not have beaten all the teams in the way that they did. I would say that based on what I saw, it is the Portuguese team that ought to polish their finishing techniques and tighten up their defence otherwise we will always be hearing excuses such as your's for their poor performance against teams like Greece. I have to say though that those were very disappointing comments from you Michael, very disappointing.

Here I agree with you but I think the real issue lies with how badly the players want to win for their respective countries. I think that a lot of these so called top players who play well for their individual clubs don't have the passion to win for their respective countries anymore - perhaps due to the lower financial incentives? If the passion is there as with the Greeks, the top names like England, Holland etc would win, time after time. Take Clarence Seedorf for Holland. His mind appeared to be elsewhere and that showed in his disappointing performance. Yet game after game, the manager selected him. Madness!! Therefore, I don't think the rules (as you suggested above) should be changed. It's the players and managers of those 'highly rated teams' that did not make it that ought to sharpen-up. The problems lie in their individual attitudes to the international game and their playing styles not the defensive strategies of teams like Greece.



Enjoy the music,

Lawrie.

 

Oh do me a favour merlin - Greece better in attack? They barely knew the meaning of the word They scored a single goal from a set piece, which was their only serious chance of the game. Better in defence, yes, but that's about all they were good at. I'll remind you of your WC remarks in a couple of years time - I hope you have a hat that tastes good :MILD: .

Lawrie, no, my comments were deadly serious, I'm sorry they disappointed you. It's rather like Formula 1, it's become too boring (not because the same guy is always winning, but because there's no overtaking). If football were to become just about having a strong defence and 1-0 victories from set pieces then it would rapidly deterioate into oblivion and rule changes would be required (as the are in F1).

You also say that a good team would have run rings around the Greek defence but I doubt it. I don't think even Brazil at their best would have had it easy. As I mentioned before, Russia were the only team who appeared to be able to penetrate their defence and they hardly set the tournament alight did they? The Czechs were arguably the best team in the tournament and they suffered the same fate as Portugal.

Michael.

 

The underdogs always play a defensive game. The job of the attacking team is to penetrate that defense and score. If they can't do that they haven't played well enough to win. It isn't Greece's fault that neither Portugal nor the Czech Republic nor France were creative enough to get past their defence. Teams with creative attacking players don't earn the right to win just by playing attractive football, they have to score too.

I shall now remove my football commentator's hat and won't put it on again until the next time I watch a match, which will probably be when the World Cup starts. My money's on the Germans.

-- Ian

 

All too often in football the team that can defend best wins. I know I'm a fan but look at Manchester City last season, 3rd highest goalscorers but finished 5th from bottom. We were unlucky but we also conceded too many goals often from corners.... Anyone see any similarities yet. If you had defended properly you would probably have won Michael, but you didn't and Greece did. You can have all the talented players in the world, but if they don't play well together they'll not win anything. That's whats wrong with England, Sven is obviously terrified of Taggart and Arsole Wenger, and will do anything they say, hence the few times they play together for a whole match. I'd rather watch club football myself.

 

Ian, you'd make a passable job as a pro commentator (mind you, one could interpret that as an insult).

 

Cheers Greg. If I find myself turning into Jimmy Hill I'll shoot myself immediately.

-- Ian

 

On webcam for the world to watch!!!

No suprise in hearing Germany are trying to get the Greece coach to take up their now vacant top job! Don't think he'll be going though. Contracted till 2008 (I think), and been given greek citizenship! Watching the celebrations in Athens, he'll be drinking out on that for the rest of his life!