Hoping for Germany-Portugal final!

Oh yea! I forgot all about Sturridge. He is certainly a better option (overall) then Defoe. I was disappointed that he didn't make the squad.

I'm not that surprised. I knew he was a really good passer and that it was a large part of his game. Unfortunately, for as a good of a touch on the ball that he has, his finishing tends to lack.

Yea, England certainly needs to change their play into the modern era a little more. They have more flexibility then they like to think, it is all about making a system around the players. Not building players around a system. Spain is a good example as you said, but I think Italy can best relate to England right now. Look at them a few years ago and where they are now. Italy has created a defined system of play that makes use of all starting 11's talents. Both combining old and new tactics in tandem. I mean, who would think that a creative mid could sit in front of the defense, with a double pivot midfield duo in front of him, and could completely dictate the field of play? Also dual attacking full backs is a modern strategy, but then you also see them work 2 forwards. Anything is possible, Hodgson just needs to look for it.

Me too. Their first match was sloppy but exciting. Now that both teams are in better form it could make for a classic.

and Spain has won another game ...
I did not watch it ... I could not motivate myself.

How in the hell did Ronaldo not get to take a penalty!? Makes no sense to have two defenders go before Ronaldo. Maybe if Portugal were going 1st it would make sense, but not with them going 2nd.

Anyway, Spain looked amazing in extra time and deserved to advance. But they're gonna need to play much better to win the title, because for 90 minutes they were totally uninspired.

Spain have the most creative midfield and box game of all the teams in the tournament, but they got progressively worse after each game. It's just a real shame that David Villa can't play; him and Torres are a most formidable forward duo.

Portugal were overall the better team tonight, I think. Their defense was very solid, they gangraped Iniesta on a couple of occasions and they put a lot of pressure on the Spanish players.


Probably afraid of Casillas knowing him inside out, lol.

Perhaps. But then why did Pepe take one?

^ Pepe is a good penalty shooter.
Ronaldo, obviously, was in charge of the fifth penalty kick (so he can score the last glorious shot), but the portuguise failed to reach to the last kick of the first sequence.

If that was the case, the coach should have stepped in and made sure Ronaldo went 3rd or 4th.

What a fuck-up on behalf of Portugal. Alves can't count, Ronaldo and Bento agreeing on the 5th penalty...gah. They were very close to winning before extra time though.

Well a thoroughly depressing game. Germany's defense was suspect throughout the tournament and was exposed today. That's really the area they need to improve if they're to succeed in the World Cup. Possibly a little overkill with all the changes up front as well.

Great performance by Italy. Balotelli and Buffon were stellar.

Finals prediction: Spain 1 Italy 0.

HAHAHA WE LOST!
Couldn't bear this dumb hype one day longer.
Heard our team played like shit.

^ could not have said it better.

What was Low doing. He should have played Reus instead of Kroos. Kroos kept coming into the middle. When he should have stayed out wide. Muller should have been on instead of Podolski and Klose should have started instead of Gomez. Hummels was terrible last night!

Badstuber as well.

It is always so easy to be an armchair coach. Kroos was supposed to come into the middle. He was trying to be used to stop Pirlo, but he wasn't aggressive enough (though he did better then Rooney in that he stayed goal side, hardly a consolation I admit). Also, in case you didn't notice, Kroos and Ozil switched positions around the 8 minute mark.

Low didn't make any particularly illogical decisions, but the team wasn't definitely caught in two minds of how they wanted to play. What is noticeable from both sides was the lack of width used (offensively and defensively). Defensively had a huge impact on Germany. Boateng's lack of protection from the midfield (Ozil had zero defensive responsibilities) meant that he would have to step up. Which in turn allows Cassano space and brings Mats Hummels out. The defending could have been a bit better sure, but to be fair Italy were doing a lot right to take advantage of the german defensive system.

Spain will win it tonight. Unless they play without a forward again. (4-6-0). I fail to see the benefit of such a system.

Looks like they'll be playing 4-3-3

And the referees are Portuguese, fancy that.

I presume that Italy will win (And I hope).

I think this tournament has managed to turn me away from football for quite some time. It's not been bad, in fact it's been better than usual, but it's made me realize that football is just not that interesting a sport most of the time. 10 minutes of exciting parts are not worth the 80 minutes spent yawning and watching the ball get passed from one defender to the other with an occasional intersected pass and a failed counter attack.

And I hope Italy wins, Spain is a dreadfully boring team.

I think Italy's got it today

I really want to see balotelli score 3 times in a row, while not smiling at all.

Italy can eat a dick. However, game's far from over, so I won't say much else yet But comebacks like this....ehhhh....

EDIT: It's over.

Fuck, that was painful to see ):

You've probably never played competitive organized soccer before in your entire life.

That was some awesome football. Completely destroyed Italy at the end for a damn fine historic win, and somehow the Spanish team are boring? If people are expecting jumping 360 volleys and flying Liu Kang scissor kicks all the time, they might as well go play video games instead.

Now let's see the Spanish win the 2014 World Cup. They're already one of the greatest, but surely that would seal their place as the absolute greatest team of all time.

We, Portugal, sure are Kings without a crown -.-
Congratulations Spain aka "nuestros hermanos"

This spanish team is surely unmatchable. Hats down and I'm not even a fan (and never will be).

Yeah man, that was some performance.

Juan Mata: 6 minutes, 1 goal. He's probably one of the more interesting players in the world. Can't say how it was boring at all.

What an idiotic answer. You've never played in a noise music project, so you're not allowed to dislike noise music! Fuck off.

This game happened to quite exciting for the first half, but there was no tension left after Motta pulled his hamstring and Italy couldn't make any more substitutions. Spain were definitely the deserved winners though on the night. But in a few of the games prior to this one they were one of the least interesting teams to watch in the tournament (though always having a few moments of quality that the lesser teams didn't). They played a different and more exciting style of football in the final though and if they play like that, I have nothing against them winning.

That said, I still dozed off ten minutes before the end and missed the last two goals.

Boo hoo. Don't like it, don't watch. And be a little nicer to others next time.

Still, I think Germany would have been more deserving the final. It would have been a better performance anyway. Didn't the Italian coach say before the Euro that the Italian team isn't even prepared for it?

I was plenty nice, he was just being a moron. And I believe I already said I wasn't going to continue watching it like I used to. At one point I was a huge fan, but for some reason the excitement has died down.

Germany probably would've been able to give the Spaniards a tougher battle, but it's their own fault for not making it past Italy.

The reason Spain were more exciting today is because Italy attacked them, consequently creating holes in the defense that had not been present vs. previous opponents. And now we see why so many teams don't attack Spain, because if you do, then you get torn apart.

Well deserved victory for Spain. Clearly, they are still the best team in Europe and the world. I wish Germany could have made the final, I think it would have been a much more competitive match, though I still think Spain would have won. Maybe some of the young players on Germany such as Gotze and Reus will develop by 2014. That team is still super young.

This match wasn't boring at all, best footbal I have seen in this tournament. Spain pretty much did the same thing as in every other match, but this time they did it with 150% speed/grace, that's why it didn't turn out to be a total bore.

Gratz to Spain!, best team in the world for sure.

Did we witness the same game?

Fantastic game by Spain. It reminded me on the last match between ManU and Barca. The British attacked them fiercely and Barca had been impressed ... but after a quarter of an hour the started to play their game and the tide turned in their advantage. It is a pity that Italy had so few days for regeneration, because otherwise it would have been a more intense (and probably more equal) match.

It's almost tradition for Germany to lose against Italy and Spain

In 2006 and 2012 they lost to Iatly.
In 2008 and 2010 they lost to Spain.

And it's always been the semi-finals or the finals.
It seems they can't win against these teams.
Thay always blew it when it comes to the interesting phase of the tournament.
I think they already shit their pants when they hear the words "Italy" or "Spain".
In Germany fans slowly start to believe that they aren't able to ever win a title again

That's absolutely not what you said the first time (you clearly said something about the game having only 10 minutes of proper gameplay). Stop changing your stories.

Also, you need to relax. You're getting riled up and swearing at some random stranger an unknown amount of miles away from you. Big deal.

Congratulations to Spain! I like both the Italian and the Spanish teams, so I didn't feel disappointed when Spain won even though I was hoping that Italy would make it.

That was clearly before that particular game when I said that and was meant as a comment about football overall not any concrete match. Sure, there's going to be a game or few where there's more stuff happening than in the average ones. This was one of those. An average game still has about 10 minutes of play where there's any interesting action and the rest of it is dull passing in the attacking teams own half or near the halfway line or long passes with no results. Boring shit, in other words. And don't presume that I thought the whole of the first half in this game was worth watching, there was just more attacking than regularly. Maybe 15 minutes of entertaining play when added up. The fact that it was a final upped the excitement a bit too, of course. So, it's absolutely what I said the first time and I'm also sticking to my conclusion that you're an idiot. Fuck off! (just for the sake of continuity )