EUROPEAN 2016 Championship Finals France

[BobHelm]

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[Zidane]

In the first half England played very well and deserved to be a couple of goals to the good.
The two full backs,Walker and Rose,were impressive going forward and Alli and Sterling industrious up front.
But in the first 20 minutes of the second half,for some explicable reason,they let a very poor Russian side right back into the game.
Diers excellent free kick seemed to have won the game for England but Woy then made a couple of contentious substitutions bringing on Wilshere and James Milner !
I can maybe understand Wilshere for Rooney but Milner for Sterling ? In my view,a far better substitution would have been to bring on Vardy for the ineffective Harry Kane and use his pace to run at a Russian defence already stretched being 1-0 down.
When Milner came on for Sterling you just knew that that was the end of Englands attacking ambitions and they had shut up shop.It certainly came back to bite them in the backside in the second minute of injury time.
Some pundits seem to have Rooney as man of the match which surprises me a little.I thought he did OK but my MOM was the goalscorer Dier who had an excellent game protecting the England defence and setting up attacks from his own half.

[skinner]

Have to agree about Dier, he had a great game, I think Kane lacked pace , and Vardy might have been the answer there. Apart from the result , it was pretty positive, and I think the formation( 4 3 3 ) was good.

[socksy]

I thought the dark days of violence inside Stadia were in the past, notwithstanding what went on outwith yesterday in the City. My doubts about the 'Ruskie' hooligans came to the fore when they apparently attacked the England fans inside. Having watched some footage it appears that there was a lack of the French Riot Genderme inside and only Stewards to try and prevent the attack. Maybe the authorities can learn from the apparent lack of security and the tournament progresses with focus of what goes on in the field of play.

[GT93]

The French government and police are friggin' useless. I expect a lot more trouble.

I read that England always start this tournament badly.

This is always a sad tournament for me. In 2004 or thereabouts when I was teaching at a small Thai school in Udon one of the Thai teachers was betting heavily on the European Cup. He borrowed money from the wrong people to do this. He hung himself during the tournament rather than face the loan sharks.

His corpse was in a photo the next day in a local newspaper and young kids used to come into my teachers' room asking to see the paper and the photo. They were shown the photo.

Lets hope its only loony Russians and Poms causing the trouble and not loony Muslims.

[marjamlew]

Nathan Lyon and Mitchell Starc opening the bowling for England against Russia. If only the blokes on the park were so passionate.

[stattointhailand]

Sick to death of all this playing out from the back rubbish ..... you can only do that when you have a keeper who has the ability to choose the right player each time (which Hart has proven time and again he does not possess ).
Players running back towards their own goal and taking a free kick "backwards" Taking a free kick from inside the opponents half, playing back as far as Hart who then plays out to the other wing where we concede a throw in in our own half ... Obviously Woy has worked hard on that one in training Jeeeeeeeezzzzzz the idea is supposed to be to score goals so when you are given a "free" chance to threaten your opponents goal FFS TAKE IT .... kick the bl**dy ball forward into the penalty area not back to your own keeper
Agreed Dier had a good game except when he nearly beat Hart with a misdirected clearing header (something he was a bit prone to for Spuds last season ).
Typical England though, footballers wanting to defend when they have a suspect defense, in a game where you should be attacking, and bloomin' cricketers trying to blast the ball out of the ground in a Test match were their first priority should be to defend

I've looked at all the fixtures on BBC website, Sky and several others as well, I've located which group Albania are in and also Iceland, Slovakia, Wales, Eire, NI as well, but for the life of me I can't seem to see which group SCOTLAND are in ..perhaps I need to visit Top Chareon Opticians again to have me peepers checked

[waanjai]

Kick them out - both

[BobHelm]

[Zidane]

A shame Northern Ireland lost but if you dont have a decent shot on target you wont win matches,as Louis Van Gaal discovered too late at Manchester United !
But I see Bastian Schweinsteiger scored a nice goal for Germany just a couple of minutes after coming on as a substitute.
A couple of decent kick off times tonight...
Spain v Czech Republic 8pm Thai
Republic of Ireland v Sweden 11pm Thai

And late night connoiseurs of Trappist beer and Lasagne can watch Belgium v Italy at 2am Tuesday morning Thai time...

[BobHelm]

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[Zidane]

Cant see Spain winning it,tbh.In Iniesta and Silva they have two of the best midfielders in the competition but they don't have any decent strikers ! There winner came 7 minutes from time with a close range header from central defender,Gerard Pique.
Not a bad result for the Republic of Ireland but you feel they will have to beat one of Belgium or Italy to progress.
A poor result for Belgium last night but Italy played well and to their strengths....

[blondieaka]

Showing on Thursay at 8pm (which is a great time for once.)

Can anyone recommend a good place to watch the match which has a good atmsphere???

Cheers!

[GT93]

Russia?

[blondieaka]

Ha Ha =D>

[mathusalah80]

Sick to death of all this playing out from the back rubbish ..... etc . Dier had a good game.....
I can't seem to see which group SCOTLAND are in ..perhaps I need to visit Top Charoen Opticians again to have me peepers checked

Welcome back, and about time
That England started brightly, promising great things, excited me not at all; don't they always. England were overwhelmingly superior in the opening half, and to end up scoreless, at half time, was a remarkable achievement. The major contributing factor, for this situation has been most 'picturesquely' described by Statts, although he didn't mention Sterling's wasting of some first class service, by his insistence upon impersonating a one man football team . Kane was virtually starved of any quality service, probably because he would insist on positioning himself where, to reach him, a forward pass would have been required. :-" Again Statto has already referred to Hart's ball distribution. Countless times, his kicks or throw outs either landed at the feet of opponents or into touch; a weakness which may yet cost England dearly. I thought Lallana, not a favourite of mine, absolutely outstanding in the first half, although he faded noticeably in the second,; that Alli was disappointing, whilst Cahill & Smalling were adequate in defence, but appearing to pose no threat at all when England were awarded corners. Outstanding throughout the game were England's only two world class players, Walker & Rose, plus the ever maturing Dier. I have no comment to make upon Rooney's contribution , or continuing selection into the team, and as captain, or upon Hodgson's substitutions; although I did have the passing thought it might well have been to England's benefit, had they had the option of substituting their Manager at the interval! ! Also I leave Socksby to deal with Statts, as regards his insensitive remarks about Scotland. :-"

In General; Have seen most of the matches to date and, I don't consider any of the pre tournament favourites, (France, Germany, Spain and Belgian) has put in a particularly convincing performance although, of those four, I favour Spain, (Iniesta sends me into raptures every time I watch him), or boring but ultra efficient Germany. One certainty is England will not lift the trophy, and one likelihood is, further embarrassment at the hands of Gareth Bale & his band of merry men. Want to bet Zid? I think it is possible that, with a super human effort from my perennial favourite striker Keane, ROI might just surprise Italy. [-o<

[stattointhailand]

Wouldn't have mentioned Scotland (can't blame anyone for that can you :-" ) if it had not been for socksy saying there was a lack of banter these days, so not wishing to lose him from Udonmap, I thought i'd throw it in

[mathusalah80]

[quote="blondieaka"]Showing on Thursay at 8pm (which is a great time for once.)

Wouldn't it make more sense to have all posts relating to this current Euro Championship, kept under the already existing thread?
The possibility of members opening a separate thread for each individual match, is mind boggling!

[blondieaka]

Can anyone suggest where we can watch this match on Thurs 8pm kick off.

Bar wich has good atmosphere any ideas please.

[BobHelm]

Euro 2016: Russia given suspended disqualification

http://www.bbc.com/sport/football/36528403

& this is the country that were awarded the next World Cup..

Disgusting & FIFA should, immediately, suspend the next 2 World Cup decisions until some sort of sanity breaks out...