Pedro to wear the #7 shirt. #5 goes to Juanfran. 1. Iker Casillas 2. Raúl Albiol 3. Gerard Piqué 4. Javi Martínez 5. Juanfran Torres 6. Andrés Iniesta. 7. Pedro Rodríguez 8. Xavi Hernández 9. Fernando Torres 10. Cesc Fábregas 11. Álvaro Negredo 12. Victor Valdés 13. Juan Mata 14. Xabi Alonso 15. Sergio Ramos 16. Sergio Busquets 17. Álvaro Arbeloa 18. Jordi Alba 19. Fernando Llorente 20. Santi Cazorla 21. David Silva 22. Jesús Navas 23. Pepe Reina
I don't mind the squad too much under the circumstances. I will be interested to see: 1) Will VDB experiment with a 3 man back line given the loss of puyol and the strength of our midfield. It would be nice to have Navas on the pitch on the outside at the same time as Llorrente and to still have our other great midfielders inside. 2) How will Silva be used? I really think he is the x factor for us this tourny. 3) will Llorente be the first option striker or Torres?
I'm going with 75% chance that Torres will be the first striker in the EC. p.s. we're going to have our Euro games topics in this forum again from the start this year right? Or will we have to endure the 'experts' in the main tournament fora for the first couple of games again just after the amount of stupidity loses it's funny?
OMG I used to love that song so much, I had it on that Caribe 2002 compilation when I was like 11, I used to buy those compilations every summer that I went to Spain. Each time Spain progressed in the 2010 World Cup, I blasted this from my room at full volume:
I think Del Bosque chose chemistry over quality and if Villa & Puyol were alright it would be practically a repeat team of 2010, without Capdevila basically. Torres has played in big games, done well in those important moments and he's been on the team since 2006 with many of the same players. I say VDB wanted to keep a familiar face on the striker position for the midfielders. Llorente is somewhat getting there, but he gives us an aerial threat and height advantage that our team needs big time (pun intended). I have no problem with any of the call ups except Negredo. I'm assuming he's not going to see many if any minutes. I say Pedro is the new Villa. He's not a true striker-forward either but he fits in with the system perfectly. He's also on fire too. I think Torres will see a lot of pitch time too since most teams will focus on Pedro and the midfield he may get a lot of open spaces for long passes or air attacks too. Negredo to me is just a bench warmer. Soldado wouldn't accept that role and he's a hothead that would stir shit up in the locker room. VBD doesn't want that.
In the end, VBD intentionally didn't go with an all out all star team in that he didn't pick the best possible players in every position. Negredo and Reina being the most obvious cases. But Reina's presence will lighten the team up. A sort of team mascot and Negredo will be just happy to be there and will be quiet and not expect much time on the field unlike Soldado. Raul is well past his peak and even if he did find his form I think he's a bit of a black cat for Spanish National Team football in general. He never delivered and the team lost many games they had no business of losing. I think people see Raul as the figurehead of Spain's past underachievements during his peak years. VBD knows better than us and I trust his decision. The team are World Champs and he was the man on the bench for it. Even if Aragones formed the core of the squad.
I think Aragones has never been as close to having a heart attack as he did when he participated in this music video. I was almost expecting him to go "Esto es...España!!"
As long as we don't play double-pivot I'll be happy. And it wouldn't surprise me to see Torres playing on the righthand side of Llorente (kind of how Villa played on the left of Torres).
I think 4-2-3-1 is ok. Casillas; defs; Xabi-Busquets; Iniesta-Xavi-Silva/Mata/Cesc; Torres is not easy to beat for any team.
4-2-3-1 is all we've seen since Del Bosque took over. I'd like to see the team go back to Aragones' 4-1-4-1 or better yet try 4-1-3-2. This would be my preferred lineup... ......................... Casillas ......................... S.Ramos ... Piqué ... J.Martinez ... Alba ................,....... Busquets ........................ ........... Xavi ..... Iniesta ..... Silva ........... ............... Torres ....... Llorente .............. Yeah, I'd throw Torres in there. But with the uncertainty of the defence 4-2-3-1 is probably the way to go. Don't know why but as the tournament gets closer and closer I'm steadily feeling more and more confident in this group assembled.
- easy to feel confident: I don't think any team has a better squad than Spain. - 4231/4141/4132 all good, especially since Spanish players are not known to just stand in one place but rather move around quite a bit. - unclesox's line-up looks good to me. - Yeah Torres in the starting line-up is fine. He has a record of doing well in the last matches of Euro, WC and with Chelsea in CL: all gold. Call me crazy but I think there's a better era for him just around the corner.
I like unclesox's lineup as well but we all know that Del Bosque will use two holding mids. So that means both Busquets and Xabi Alonso will be there. So take Llorente or Torres out, replace with Xabi Alonso and that is what I think you'll see. Well, also I'm pretty sure Sergio Ramos will be playing in the center and most likely Arbeloa will be on the right.
Well the double pivot won us the world cup...when you have both fullbacks attacking and providing the width that we lack you need busquets and xabi to help out in defense and cover their backs. The question is whether Arbeloa will be able to provide that width like Ramos has done in the past. You win these tournaments by being stable at the back and not letting any goals in. Look how we have performed in the knockout stages of the euros and the world cup. No goals conceaded! That's what won us the world cup. Having said if we are a goal down then no doubt del bosque will take off alonso or busquets for cesc or cazorla etc. Our main issue is who is going to provide the width in this team? ------------------------casillas------------------------- -------------ramos--------------pique---------------- arbeloa----------------------------------------alba--- -------------------xabi----busquets------------------- -----------------------xavi---------------------------- -------silva-------------------------iniesta------------ ----------------------torres---------------------------- Hopefully Del Bosque will not shy away from making important changes. I think our plan B will be navas and pedro on the wings with llorente. Plenty of width and big man up front. ------------------busquets------xavi----------------- ------------------------iniesta----------------------- ---navas-------------------------------------pedr0 ----------------------llorente--------------------------- navas - silva pedro - xabi llorente - torres
Torres Cesc Silva - Xavi - Busquets - Iniesta J.Alba - Piqué - Ramos - Arbeloa Casillas PLAN B SUBS: Llorente IN, Torres OUT Navas IN, Cesc OUT Pedro IN, Silva OUT
I agree. For the deficiencies we might have in certain positions I challenge anyone to name a better "team" (I emphasize team as in team chemistry) and better set of skilled individuals at their positions as Spain has right now. Even Germany, France and Holland have holes in their respective squads and they didn't win anything meaningful with their current players. Torres looks good, seemingly back in form and most importantly euphoric over being on the team. Which means he will look to prove doubters wrong and he won't have Villa to take away a serious chunk of possession or vital passes from him either. In some ways I feel Villa (as great as he was) sort of stole Fernando's thunder because he was just the easier person to pass to since he was playing in La Liga therefore the midfielders were more in tune with his tendencies and strengths. Now they don't have that option and they need to focus more on Torres for the attack. Pedro may take over the Villa role, but he seems like more set on being a true midfielder with more free reign like an Iniesta. We have options galore. We still have Llorente and Negredo to fill in if necessary. Many haters who post on Spanish clips on You Tube all say Germany or Holland will win it. Spain look far superior on paper and these core group of players have proven themselves in the big stage twice already. The pressure is off now. They nabbed the Euro and WC. They've got the monkey off their backs. They can sort of free wheel it and play loose again. I've always been a Torres fan. I felt that on his day he was the total package. He had height, speed and good ball handling skills, as opposed to Llorente who I feel he's more of an "air attack-corner header" type of player. I think for those haters I believe they're sort of biased against a latin or romantic speaking team as opposed to an anglo or germanic team which I believe Americans have a certain fondness for. I've noticed it in bars and in general. I think Spain can repeat.
People talk about Germany being that team that will take it to Spain, but I really think it will be a repeat of 2010 if we face them. Yes they are better but so are we. In 2010 they were also hyped to be the Spain slayers and guess what happened. They were too scared to come forward because they knew Spain would take advantage of the space they'd leave so they basically just sat back, and would send out the odd counter attack which we dealt with pretty easily. I worry more about Italy or Holland then Germany. But I think overall we will be our own worst enemies.
I don't really see Italy as a threat, but they've been known to have shitty squads in the past and somehow find their way into tournament form. But with the scandal and a serious lack of quality players I don't know if they'll even get out of Spain's group. Croatia and Ireland are worthy adversaries to Italy, given their play of late. Spain "should" easily destroy that group. Germany still aren't THE team to beat just yet. France may surprise, since Laurent Blanc seemingly put the whip to the soft, lazy Frenchies since Domenech got hauled on his ass. Holland may not be that good since Robben is a big game choker (i.e. Spain final, vs Chelsea, vs Dortmund, vs Barcelona with Madrid, etc.) and Sneijder and company are getting a bit old too. They're on their way down and I don't see quality youth taking their place. Portugal are in a crazy tough group and they play tough and fast. They have serious quality players and they play with passion an hunger too. For me, the power rankings going into the Euro are so forth; 1. Spain 2. Germany 3. France 4. Portugal 5. Holland So basically in the group of death I'm picking Germany and Portugal to come out and Holland to bust. I may be wrong, but I'm going with my gut on this. I hope I'm right.
I don't see the Portuguese going over Holland personally, that they play in the group of death might even be a benefit as the Dutch tend to play better against bigger opposition. It's all pretty equal though, maybe even Denmark will go through as opposed to those 2 teams.
Off topic. Italy having their asses handed to them.. its 3-0 against Russia (the Russians are not even celebrating the goals at this point). I know its a friendly but good lord!