Europe’s new stars
While Eden Hazard, Shinji Kagawa and Xherdan Shaqiri are exciting prospects for Chelsea, Manchester United and Bayern Munich respectively, none of them are on display in the now.
Instead we have potential big money movers Alan Dzagoev, Robert Lewandowski and Yevhen Konoplyanka lighting up our TV screens in the youngest and most exciting Euro 2012 yet.
Here’s your Football Chronicle guide to this summer’s biggest event.
Russia, Germany and Ukraine have put in fearless displays in both their games and have perhaps been the most impressive teams in the tournament so far.
Russia opened their accounts by Czech-mating the Czech Republic and more or less ensured a safe passage into the next round after drawing against the hosts.
Germany made it two from two against bitter rivals Holland after easily seeing out the challenge of Portugal. The Netherlands were very poor against Germany and kept the ball like girls at a pyjama party keep secrets. Mario Gomez on the other hand impressed with both hairstyle and finishing.
The Ukrainians were inspired in their fairy tale win over Sweden in their first game of the tournament. Inspired by the one and only Andriy Shevchenko. But a man who impressed more than the talismanic Kiev striker was his teammate Yevhen Konoplyanka.
Almost all of Ukraine’s attacks came in from the right where he worked tirelessly at trying to breakdown the Swedes. Ukraine are yet to meet France while this article is being written, but I am hoping for an upset as both pre-tournament favourites Holland and France fail to make it out of their groups.
Spain’s tiki-taka was a breath of fresh air… in 2008. However pleasing on the eye they were against Italy, they were getting a bit boring because we have seen it all before and we have seen Barcelona do a spanking job of it with a proper striker as a target. And he is Lionel Messi, not Cesc Fabregas!
When England played France you couldn’t tell if the English were playing football or quidditch what with all the tackles flying around and with the ball mostly being played in the air.
However, Roy Hodgson must be given credit for being the first England manager in a couple of decades to understand English footballers. They aren’t any good. So he kept it simple and asked them to pull a Chelsea which they did.
Patrice Evra likened them to the Chelsea side that beat Barca. Fancy that because no one likened France to Europe’s most successful team over the last 5 years.
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