Tactical Genius wrote:


I suppose there's often at least one player who you look back and think "how did he ever make it into the team?" I forgot that Upson was playing in that game, and that was my reaction.

Klose has scored in 42 games for Germany: 39 wins, 3 draws

I've not seen any evidence that England would know how to counter that front three today. I'm not saying they'd ship four but I'd expect Germany to get one in the first half and force England to come out, whereupon it would be game over.

.

The movement of the front three when they were counter attacking with ease in the second half when England were desperately trying to get back in the game and pushing up.

Getting from your goal to the other goal quickly and with at least as many attackers as they have defenders is what counter attacking is.

Anyway. Thomas Muller has said pretty much the same thing to the German media (about the original point). He said that Germany were not in the kindergarten this time as they were two years ago and all the teams this time are very organised.

That sounded like a big dig at Maradona and at Australia (whom he mentioned elsewhere in the interview).

Asked about the more defensive tactics at Euro 2012, he said:

"It's a sign that before their games, everybody is now thinking how to beat their opponents and not simply start to play as if they are in a kindergarten. Maybe that's the difference: in Europe there are many well-trained coaches; we just don't have the 'let's just play" philosophy."

Nothing about England. And I don't think Müller's evaluation is intended to dimiish his team's accomplishment. To put four past England and Argentina, in successive matches, is an impressive achievement which not many sides would have accomplished; to call it "overrated" seems a bit curmudgeonly.

I have upgraded from nonsensical to curmudgeonly, I suppose that is a victory.

Spain came in for a lot of criticism then and since because they struggled to score many goals when winning the World Cup. There was a good reason for this though, everyone defended desperately and with considerable depth against them for the entire tournament, even when they were behind.

I don't doubt that Spain would have destroyed Argentina and England on the counter attack in the same way as Germany, in the same conditions, had they been fortunate enough to be drawn against them.

But they were not. Argentina and England might be historically good scalps to capture in a tournament, but they were absolute shells of themselves last time round. Germany went out and played a decent game against both and must have been surprised at how easy their opponents made it for them -Argentina all game and England in the second half.

Again, this is no attempt to denigrate Germany, but those results looked spectacular on paper and dazzled people into thinking that Germany were / are perhaps that bit better than they actually are.

But your original comment was "over-rated wins", which I think was problematic. I don't think you can over-rate the actual performances, which were as good as Germany could have done against those particular sides. They played the perfect tactical game both times, as it were, and executed the plan brilliantly.

I'd agree it was a logical gaffe in 2010 to think "they've scored 8 v England and Argentina so they'll definitely get one against Spain", or to think that Spain, Brazil, Holland and Uruguay (plus maybe Ghana and a few others) wouldn't have beaten England and Argentina those days.

So you're right to the extent that beating two shit tactical formations 4-1 and 4-0 doesn't make the victors great in isolation.

This match was the first time in European Championship history that two countries who share a first letter played each other in a city that also shares that first letter.

However, it's happened three times in World Cups. Any guesses?

I have no idea Lodz! Give us a clue?

dalliance wrote:


The way they played against Paraguay in the same round? I don't think so. And Argentina got on by OK up to the QF.

The three matches in question all involve the same letter.

Sweden v Scotland at Sampdoria ground Italia `90? Or am I stretching the rules here?

PM for Lodz although dont know where are those after the upgrade.

We have the first one from Magiczny:

1966 Spain-Switzerland in Sheffield.

I should warn those searching for the other two that one involves the Soviet Union (rather than the USSR).

btw where can i read my PMs on this board? and don't say in a library....

Spain v Sweden in Sao Paolo in 1950

Sweden v Soviet Union in Stockholm in 1958