EURO 2020 (2021 Edition)

Bad kit bad tournament, is how things usually roll.

Ironic that Mowbray referenced "the famous shirt" early on as I was looking at that kit wondering why

It's been alright this tho, Italy pretty but wasteful, Turkey gradually getting more confident in their counter

i’ve enjoyed the passing and tempo but turkey organised in defence and left italy looking a bit toothless. but for reasons not entirely clear i’ve been really looking forward to this tournament and will have bad opinions about all of it.

Donnarumma looks like he's got a fuck up in him

Chiellini enjoying that dive, lighten up Jenas ffs

At some point in this tournament, likely very soon, I'm going to need to get all the FUCK OFF VAR out of my system

italy looking p delish

How was that not a penalty for hand ball !?

cos you can't just kick it into a player's arm and call it handball

cos he was standing right in front of it?

Turkey to score first here, i'm calling it

There have been so many penalties for less than that...

Which shouldn't have been penalties either?

Handball was ruinously over-diagnosed even before VAR imo

That’s why defenders try to defend with their arms behind their back : otherwise why bother ?

Sometimes the limitations of human anatomy and the laws of physics will conspire to make that a tricky operation to pull off.

anyhoo i feel like Spinazzola got to the byline a yard clear so many times that half and they couldn't do anything with it

I'm a long time supporter of Jorginho but I'm developing a fanboy crush on Barella tonight, also Spinazolla looking great, Italy looking more self assured than the last time i watched them. Yeahyeah France but Italy look like winners to me, just sub on the Sassuolo kid for Immobile. I DGAF in the lead up, but have somehow started caring in the last hour

Nothing has really happened but I’m quite enjoying this game. Really feel like it is all about Italy trying too hard, so they will be a bit dumb and let Turkey get a chance to score first

Yeah MOTD lads being a bit generous to Italy

Bit of a snorer. Par for the course for an international tournament. It's been all Italy and they will win 1-0 or it will end 0-0 imo

Failing to get the ball anywhere near the penalty area after fucking around on a short corner is more professionally disgraceful than a foul throw imo

Thanks for reminding me of our season

Feeling a 1-0 to someone from a pen in this one.

Money is on Portugal for me, I like the defence and I think it’ll be a low scoring tournament. Nice to be watching football that feels like it means something for the first time in ages.

Ah well

Told you Turkey would score first

Lol

Turkey have gone

Spinazzola's had a great game

Aye, goal has shaken them. Oh, number 2 came as I was about to post "a second is inevitable"

Cyrus immobile the scorer, quelled surprise

Italy have been really fuckin good, thought turkey handled them well enough in first half but jesus they work you

Turkey's defence looked terrible on this.

Turkey have been fine, the keeper looks good, they're just outclassed here. they're better than Wales

Italy playing at a decidedly unitalian tempo is cool to see

Anyone heard the bang?

If Berardi had managed anything useful with his time and possession all night this wouldve been long wrapped up

I mean yes the first goal but still

Tournament of Bearded Men

That's 3

berardi substituted for a man whose surname contains all of his own within it, in the right order

Every chance a red yet

Italy have been pressing, lovely passing, no false moves, none of the totally off vibes in opening games of old. Kinda miss it but maybe it's me that needs to grow up.

Spinazzola MOTM for me

Actually, forget I said that if these BBC cunts are gunna agree with me

Italy were good throughout. Turkish keeper had the worst distribution of any goalie I have ever seen, almost as if he grew up in the handling backpasses era. shockingly poor.

Great shot stopping I thought

france, germany, and belgium are looking good.

out of those, i'd go for the belgians. nothing against the other two, though.

hoping netherlands, switzerland, and/or spain can have a good run out of pure luck/desire

Beyond rooting for France, I’d love to see a country to do a Greece 2004, pure out of nowhere surprise.

There has been a lot of bad coverage of ENG but this one article I find accurate:

https://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2021/jul/12/englands-deep-lying-issue-resurfaced-as-control-turned-to-survival

Sweet Caroline has been a cricket staple of the last few years. Best goal of the tournament def Schick but Chiesa vs Austria, Shaw, couple of others up there too

it's Chiesa for me - although Schick's was one of the classier halfway line jobs you'll see

Thank you England. You cheered your heart out. Now eat your heart out. Get a free taco today. #iSeeaTaco @tacobelluk pic.twitter.com/9rJQAZGweA

— Harry Maguire (@HarryMaguire93) July 13, 2021

didn't American soccer have a system where it would be one player versus the keeper but they'd start from centre circle and dribble it in?

Yeah, it was from a line 35m out, and you had a five-second shot clock. I always thought this looked quite good when NASL popped up on World of Sport...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJEnwi7otu0

dear me, those were some terrible efforts

Serie a floated this also iirc

A couple of my DC pals may well have been at that game - I think they went to see the "Dips" in that last season before they disbanded. They had Cruyff!

I can't accept the Schick goal as goal of the tournament because I'm still furious that I went to get a drink for the 20 seconds it took to happen, and my brain's been cynically briefing me that those halfway line open goal ones don't count as properly brilliant goals ever since

(it was a bit like the ol Petrov vs Derby one though wasn't it, tremendous technique on the hit even allowing for the lax goalkeeping)

The Christensen one v Russia was still the one I went most nuts over tbh; there were also lots of those (comparatively) low-key elegant goals in this tournament that were up there, like the Chiesa Austria one and Spain finally unlocking Italy

Got a lot of time for Switzerland just repeatedly boshing in unsaveable headers against the world champions too

(If anyone wants to fall down a rabbit-hole of NASL videos, there's plenty btw. If only to be reminded of Chinaglia's Welsh-Italian accent.)

Well done England

I’m told that plans to have the England team to Downing Street for a reception this week have been shelved, with attention turning instead to the PM’s levelling up speech in a few days.

— Aubrey Allegretti (@breeallegretti) July 13, 2021

Re the dribble penalties, what happens if the taker goes past the keeper and gets brought down, do they get an actual penalty then? Any scholars of the art form, please let me know.

that NASL vid, why not just chip the keeper? Especially the yellow one, he just kept steaming out. J/K I'm sure it's harder than it looks.

does look a bit more interesting than pens though.

xp yeah i was wondering that too

thanks mike. 1980!

5 seconds didn't seem like enough time though

> I’m told that plans to have the England team to Downing Street for a reception this week have been shelved

was it the racism, the child poverty or wearing a football shirt over a shirt AND tie that made them cancel?

Apparently, MLS revived the practice for the first few seasons in the late '90s? And, yes, fouls by the keeper in the box = regular penalty. I don't know what happened with fouls outside the box, or if the keeper ran the risk of being sent off for repeated offences.

time to unleash the jedermann sein eigner fußball protocol, two goals, 22 players, 22 balls, at least 22 officials, let the mayhem begin

i admire your constraint at sticking with only 2 goals.

England would still only score once

my favourite goal was locatelli's volleyed pass wide right, sprint into the box and slotted finish from cut back. also schick and insigne's vs belgium. oh and pogba.

pogba’s passing was god-tier

Locatelli and Insigne's goals, even though they unfolded in each about 5-10 seconds, both possessed a building sense of tension that a wonderful goal was going to be scored, and the satisfaction felt when the ball hit the net is amplified when that sensation bears fruit.

With Insigne's goal, I literally shouted every manoeuvre he did just before he did it. And who doesn't love a lung-busting run from deep to collect a pass into the box? I think that if Spinazzola had scored in that early second half blitz against Belgium it may have topped them all.

Other than the most "holy shit!" goal moments had to be Schick against Scotland and the Gavranović equaliser against France.

re: Allegretti's tweet -

https://skwawkbox.org/2021/07/13/breaking-england-teams-downing-st-reception-was-cancelled-because-players-refused-to-meet-johnson/

just in case there was any doubt which way the traffic was going

"The so-called ‘msm’ reported earlier today that..."

opening sentence vmic! I was thinking yesterday that perhaps Boris might have cancelled it before they got a chance to snub him.

which players are the shy Tory voters that nodded along with this for the sake of group unity? Maguire looks like a dodgy fucker!

Idk where to put this but Jorginho had a pretty hilarious PK miss for Italy moments ago.

🚨🚨| Jorginho MISSES the penalty.

pic.twitter.com/SlFwOLYlWz

— CentreGoals. (@centregoals) November 17, 2023

That's one of the worst penalties I've ever seen a pro footballer take.

the English language broadcaster (not on this feed) was incredulous. then one of his teammates scored on a daisycutter minutes later so nobody cared but lord I don't think he'll ever be given a PK again after his history with them