Euro 2012 Group B: News & Analysis

The Group of Death looks all too predictable: Holland and Germany; unless Portugal and/or Denmark get lucky.

The fact that the Dutch play with two defensive mids should give you your answer.

Then I guess it shouldn't be called the group of death...

Yet, contrary to 1800's assertion, this group is anything but predictable. I doubt there ever has been as strong a group in a tournament.

ROFL. This group has 3 top-5 teams and 4 top-10 teams. This is the -least- predictable group I can imagine. Pretty much anything could happen. Germany of course are favorites but there is no easy game in the bunch. It will blood and tears for every game for every team. Germany x Holland and Portugal x Holland in particular are likely to be brutal, tense games if past experience is any judge. I can't wait!!

Yeah, and to add to the number of FIFA top ten teams this group has all the cannons of Europe on the pitch, Van Persie, Huntelaar, Gomez, Ronaldo. Only Messi is missing.

Personally, I don't think we are giving Denmark any credit. They might just make it out of the group.

This could become a very fun group because of the not so good defensive operation of both Germany and the Orange squad. Lots of goals!!!

Denmark is the weakest team, period! I've read they've lost the last 8 matches against Holland? Now how can they possibly win?

By playing like Chelsea? How did Switzerland beat Spain in the last WM?

Not sure if serious.

I guess Holland has no chance of beating Portugal then....

Sneijder injured and Robben played not well in recently time. If the both did not barely recovered. Chance for Dutch will very difficult.

Denmark is too defensive. Saw them against Brazil (well ok, friendly doesn't count 100% ) and their counter attacks were unbelievably weak.
I'm not sure but I guess Holland and Germany should really really win there...if not then god help us all.
And Portugal vs. Holland....well it might be like Germany vs. Italy, Germany just can't win against Italy. So yeah maybe Holland doesn't stand a chance against Portugal ^^
But I'm damn ready to be proven wrong. It's gonna be brutal and wild!

They topped their group in qualification and forced Portugal into the play-offs.

While they're the underdogs, I can well see them making it out of the group. Underestimate them at your peril.

Well I feel confident enough to say they WON'T make it out of the group ^^.
Cause that would especially mean the better teams Germany and Holland don't make it. Would be a big surprise...

Well maybe you should get used to the idea that there are good chances at least one of them won't make it. I mean, even ignoring Denmark, this only has 33% chances of happening if you assume Germany, Holland and Portugal are about equally good. And Denmark is in the FIFA top 10 i think, and while that doesn't mean much at least it shows they are pretty hard to beat. And everyone will probably be focused on the "big" matches and completely underestimate Denmark.

I personally think Germany will beat Portugal with everything they've got. Then it's defeat against Holland and then Denmark is the last enemy before the quarter finals. Should be possible.

Damn I am ready for the Euro. Great, wild matches!

for the first set of matches my guesstimations would be something like

Germany-Portugal 50%/15%/35%

Denmark-Holland 35%/10%/55%

I think the match vs Turkey sentenced the team´s morale.

We´re in need of an anchor, M. Veloso is not the answer so I would rather to go with Custódio at this stage. H. Almeida also proved to be a useless mammoth and his physique matters little against the germans if he´s unable to score or provide basic assistance. In this case I would go with Postiga at least.

All in all, I just didn´t see confidence in their eyes. I hope this blow was only that, an insignificant blow. But I highly doubt it.

If Denmark loses its first game it's immediately all over for them I'm afraid. And I don't think anyone's underestimating anyone in this group. We all know each other too well.

25 000 tickets sold for the first training session in Krakow of the Orange team..talking about popularity.
What are the numbers for the other squads?

Well for Germany it's 11000. But there were only 11000 tickets available and all were gone after 13 minutes (as it seeems).
11000 for Germany and 25000 for Holland...well ok ^^

Impressive numbers for just watching exercises