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Ok let’s have them people. It’s pretty straightforward, so even the most casual football/soccer fan can have a go. Give your prediction in each category:
Euro Predictions
Winner:
Losing finalist:
Top scorer:
Surprise package/overachieving team:
Most disappointing team:
Impact of covid on euros:
Random prediction:
I’ll start with my own predictions.
Winner: France
Losing finalist: Germany
Top scorer: Harry Kane
Surprise package/overachieving team: Scotland
Most disappointing team: Spain
Impact of covid on euros: Minimal, some players will have to isolate and miss out, but all games will be played as scheduled
Random prediction:
1 Booing of BLM protests will become a major flashpoint with possibility of player walkoffs
2 England to hammer Croatia in their opener, Harry Kane to score a hattrick. Football will be coming home. Then it all goes stale and they’ll be knocked out in the last 16. Everybody laughs.
The difficullty lies in the Group stages, because they are so lopsided. Most obvious is Group C -Netherlands, Ukraine, Austria, and North Macedonia, where Group D has Germany, Portugal, France and Hungary. It means if England win GroupD they play the runner-up in Group F, whereas the second in D plays runner up in E, ie Spain, Poland, Sweden or Slovakia. To complicate further three of the best third placed teams will advance to the knockout stage-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UEFA_E...knockout_phase
Euro PredictionsQuote:
Originally Posted by Clodagh
Winner: Portugal
Losing finalist: France
Top scorer: Harry Kane
Surprise package/overachieving team: Denmark
Most disappointing team: Germany
Impact of covid on euros: ?
Random prediction: Top teams are Portugal and France, with other semi-fnalists Italy and Belgium.
I expect Croatia to beat England 1-0 in their game.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Clodagh
France
Portugal
Mbappe
Wales
Belgium
games postponed or forfeited
England will beat Germany in round of 16, but lose in QF.
Euro Predictions
Winner: North Macedonia ( film to follow)
Losing finalist: France
Top scorer: Romeu Lukaku of Belgium
Surprise package/overachieving team: Belgium
Most disappointing team:Scotland as usual
Impact of covid on euros: record TV viewing figures
Random prediction:Russia annexes the Ukrainian team dressing room
From just inside the Scottish half the Czechs score a goal as the ball sails over the Scottish goalkeeper who was camped near the centre circle to get a better view of the match presumably or was feeling socially isolated or something. One for the reels (pun intended)Quote:
Originally Posted by rodinuk
a) for the neutral, a superb goal.Quote:
Originally Posted by rodinuk
b) Czech Republic under-rated, just as i think Croatia are not the team they were in Russia, thus over-rated.
c) Scotland played quite well, but as with Spain, they have no finishing power.
So here are the outcomes so far, only your valid remaining predictions are shown
Quote:
Originally Posted by Clodagh
Quote:
Originally Posted by Stavros
Quote:
Originally Posted by holzz
Quote:
Originally Posted by rodinuk
it's coming home.
Its coming home!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
GUTTED.
Firstly, congratulations Italy. Deserved win.
England didnt' capitalise on the early goal.
Southgate didn't add subs earlier.
The pens.....Sterling and other senior players bottled it. I feel for Saka. Rashy is an experienced pen taker for man U but even then none of he, Saka and Sancho deserve racist abuse.
Slabhead's pen was BOSS.
Southgate IN. First final since 1966. Dons like Sir Bobby Robson God rest his soul never did that.
And on an unrelated note - Jorginho for Ballon D'or. Messi has finally got an international title,. but only won Copa Del Rey, and didn't score most goals in Europe (Levandovski won European Golden Boot). Jorginho is a European champion at both club and international levels.
And big up Sterling btw even though he bottled the chance to take a pen. Best English player.
Same with Shaw - did very well.
Good things to build on for the Qatar World Cup.
From previous predictions the only one I got right was Italy reaching the semi-final. Overall, they were the best team and it was up to England, as Holzz says above, to capitalize on the first goal because a one-goal lead is never enough with Italy, a team against whom we have a lamentable record.
Penalties- I can't be the only one who can predict a penalty by looking at the face of the player -Mbappe was a good example as his face beamed the message -'I want to be somewhere else'- and in addition, I suggest he is not yet a mature player - and France went home.
Much as I admire Southgate, I don't think he either selected the best team, or made the wisest substitutions. Jordan Henderson is one of the most improved players in the Premier League, and should therefore have been in every team. Had Rashford played more I don't think he would have made such a mess with his penalty. Yet while Southgate claims they practised penalties, surely he or Miller could have intervened to stop Rashford or anyone else taking silly walks in an attemt to deceive the goalkeper, and tell him to just thump the ball as hard as he can, as Shearer used to do. Of all players to look like a twerp, I am disappointed it was him. But look again at Sako's face, and you will see a terrfied 19-year old incapable of focusing on the moment. He should either not have beeen on the list or pushed back to 11. Greaiish says he wanted to take a penalty, though his record at Aston Villa is patchy, but in my view, as the most fouled player in the Premier League his job was to run at the Italian defence and secure a penalty in the course of normal play, and he didn't do that.
Did Sterling bottle it? I don't know, but against Italy he showed his past weakness of getting into dangerous positions but not passing the ball.
I feel sorry for Jordan Pickford, I txted a friend 'he usually saves at least one' -he saved two.
Lastly, I think Italy are a formidable team, and in Donnaruma, maintain a legacy of goalkeeping excellence, nota bene Buffon and in the 1980s Dino Zoff. But where are the lethal strikers Italy has had -Paulo Rossi, Gianluca Vialli, Alessandro del Piero, Roberto Baggio? Chiesa is good, but right now, not good enugh.
But just as England 'can only get better', so too can Italy. And is it not ironic that Roberto Mancini at his most successful club was in England?