EURO 2024 ⚽

[DuncinToffee]

EURO 2024 kicks off in Munich on Friday 14 June and ends with the final in Berlin on Sunday 14 July

It was

Very surprised that it didn't go to VAR

Oh, Robbo's interview - the players are really hurting. Felt so bad for him and the rest of them when he said sorry to the people at home for letting them down. 😔

The Scottish players really care about losing ,whereas you sometimes get the impression the English players aren’t that bothered in the end. England will have to win their group or we will be facing Germany.

Varga is stable and conscious they’ve said

Which is great news, and as gutted as I am that’s really the most important news of the evening

Very well said.

I've just read he suffered a fractured cheek bone and has to have an operation. It's good to hear he is ok.

Exactly how I feel too. I'm gutted but just so glad to hear about Varga being stable. DH has just told me he has a fractured cheekbone and will be having surgery.

He looked like he was in the fencing position and that scared me seeing that, especially when the blankets came out. Kudos to Szoboszlai for helping them rush the stretcher over when they seemed to be taking their sweet time.

At least we won for the best fans of the tournament. My friend's husband and dad were over and got invited to a wedding in the hotel they were in and got the place doing the Gay Gordons. 🤣

Sorry if this has already been touched on previously on this thread, but I feel a bit deflated about all the coverage of England’s performance at the Euros so far.

There’s always so much unrealistic expectation around England in major football tournaments, which I’m sure is not easy for the players to bear, but they seem to have good ways of managing that.

This year though, it feels like there’s that massive level of expectation (partly because we’ve got a fantastic group of players) but also a side of really unpleasant criticism from the media, which I don’t think I’ve seen in previous years. Normally, the media come across as supportive and protective of the team, but this year, they’ve been very quick to be critical and pretty disrespectful. England’s performances haven’t been brilliant so far, but I don’t think they deserve this much criticism.

What do others think?

I think there’s been a heavier than usual criticism all round.

Some of the comments about Steve Clarke after Scotland went out last night are horrific.

I think overall more people, now including commentators, are falling into that trap of thinking they’re just “saying it as it is” but are actually falling over into abject rudeness

The criticism over Harry Kane is something else.

If Southgate left him out and they weren’t repeatedly scoring 5/6 he’d get slated, but playing Kane in the way Kane plays is getting him slated as well.

I think the quality of football this time is poor overall - I wonder if with the last one being late and the last work cup being later in the year the players are just tired

The higher the expectations, the more criticism there is. And that applies to all countries.

England got a lot of flak after drawing with Scotland at the last Euros but that soon turned as they went onto the final. The press are very fickle.

I do not know how the Argentine press responded to the defeat to Saudi Arabia in the first game of their World Cup winning campaign two years ago, but I imagine it was not sanguine.
The question is about whether they can switch up the gears, whether they will and how lucky they are.

Tournament winners usually start slowly. When Portugal won the Euros they didn't win any of their group games and scraped through in 3rd.

The Denmark team of 1986 were perhaps the greatest the country ever had, they were in the group of death and won all three games very easily. Then went out 5-1 to Spain in the next round.
Six years later, their best player had retired, they failed to quality and were only in Euro 1992 by default and were terrible in the group. Then won it all.

The Netherlands in 1988, lost against the Soviet Union in the first match and beat them in the final.

We got knocked out on penalties by Denmark in 1992, van Basten missed.

Croatia v Italy is very dull viewing so far.

When Southgate finally has enough of the English media and all the weight of expectation, who on earth would want to take over from him? Why would any top level manager want that job? I still remember how the press absolutely savaged Sir Bobby Robson and Graham Taylor, both decent men and well respected club managers who were unmercifully pilloried during their respective times as England manager. Don't forget we were reduced to the likes of Steve McLaren and Sam Allardyce (FFS!) before Southgate, because (quite understandably) nobody wanted the gig. So for all the calls for Southgate to give up...who would succeed him?

Pen for Croatia.

Ahh shite. It was saved.

Oooh, something interesting in the Croatia v Italy game at last - Donnarumma saved Modric's penalty and then, barely a few seconds later, a cross came in and this time Modric scored!

Dont think the Italians anticipated that.

If Albania beat spain, and Croatia beat Italy, Italy would be out.

Both games quite dull

Bollocks.

Oh no! Crikey, yet another last gasp goal.

Harsh..gone from going through to probably going out!