Spain 4 Russia 1 1-0 David Villa (20) 2-0 David Villa (45) 3-0 David Villa (75) 3-1 Roman Pavluchenko (86) 4-1 Cesc Fábregas (90)
Pichi, can't we just use 1 thread? It's not like the other 2 are even coming close to 500. Good game by the team, against surprisingly weak opposition, their defending was amateurish at times. And what the Hell, Torres plays one of his few good games for the national team, and Aragones takes him out. I don't understand that man.
I think that Luis took him out to get Cesc in the match, and he left Villa in so he could get the hat trick. Spain had great counters much like the Netherlands, but they had various mental lapses in the match such as the goal and a few others and teams like Italy and France would have taken advantage of those lapses, much like WC06 against France. If Villa and el Ninho and other keep scoring most will forget about Raul staying at home!!
Speaking of defending, Spain aren't going to get very far if Puyol has to singlehandedly bail them out of trouble everytime opponents charge forward. Russia were incredibly sluggish looking today, I think if Spain really piled on the pressure instead of being content to pass back and forth in their own half, the scoreline could've become REALLY embarassing. Well done to Puyol, Senna, Villa, Torres, and Cazorla. These guys were the most impressive of the lot for me. Guus certainly had it coming after what happened in Korea.
Casi campeones oe, Casi campeones oe !! Just kidding. Enjoy it now cause it might not last. I didn't like Ramos or Marchena at times. I also thought Iniesta was a bit lazy in defense. Xavi + Villa were excellent. I liked Cazorla when he came on (great pass for the 3rd goal). Torres looked dangerous (but how will he play against antifootball?). I'm glad Russia came out attacking cause that allowed the 4-1 score.
Agreed. Ramos and Marchena need to improve, and the whole team needs to have better concentration when defending. IMHO the Russians were easier than what we're going to find against Sweden or Greece.
Yeah, don't single out Ramos and Marchena (though they were poor) when it was Capdevila who went to sleep for Russia's goal. Open header in the penalty box from a corner? Which other top class team allows that sort of thing?
*disclaimer* I'm only here because I'm a huge Cesc fan, so things I say during this tournament will be aimed towards him. Villa's third goal was a great piece of individual finishing, but that pass that Cesc set him up with was fantastic, no? I can't believe how it's been overlook. An absolute gem.
I'm more worried about the Greeks than the Swedes, we do better against a team that also tries to play attacking football.....but not too attacking, or else they'll score.
My feelings exactly. I'm also worried about our Midfield Midgets and ho will they stand up to a more physical approach by the rival.
this is why you don't convert mid-fielder's to center-backs.......... Thank you very much Shirokov! You were by far Spain's man-of-the-match... While everyone seems to be praising a 'fantastic' performance by the Spanish duo and Xavi being for Spain what Arshavin should of been Russia... what it all came down to was the Zenit central defender playing like it was a practice match rather than Euro 08. The first goal was completely his fault, gingerly jogging back to the box while watching Kolodin struggling in a one on one situation with Torres instead of tracking Villa. One would think that such a soft goal would wake a player up, however he continued to lazily drift around the pitch and be caught out of position. You could see what Hiddink was thinking; Spain are not a tall team by any stretch and despite Sergei Ignashevich and the twins being far more proven, the quick Shirokov & Kolodin are better suited to handle Torres & Villa. Even with all the errors Kolodin had today, he fared better than Berezutsky would have, particularly since some could be attributed to the rain. No, the blaim for Russia's dreadful defensive performance today in fact falls solely on the lazy and spoiled Zenit liability known as Roman Shirokov. Goal #2 came after a horrendous corner kick from Russia. As Spain kick-started their counter-attack, I counted seven Russian players rushing back to defend. Out of those seven, where was Shirokov? He was walking around in no-man's land on the other-side of the pitch! In fact it was the lone striker Pavlyuchenko playing center-back, along-side Anyukov, who thanks to the absence of any other defenders was caught out, having to cover a large area of the pitch and not being able to commit solely to marking Villa nor playing him off-side. And finally Goal #3 was probably Shirokov's biggest failure, underestimating a man with two goals already, as a complete amateur. Without a doubt a tremendous move by Villa to bring the ball back, however it was pure sloppiness from Shirokov to give Villa a look at the goal for two full seconds from 10 yards out while stranding his keeper Akinfeev to cover the entire length of the goal. How Guss Hiddink did not replace him with Ignashevich at half-time I will never understand. I don't care if it is harsh on a player, he had to send him a message, play like that and you won't be playing in this tournament. Spain's fourth and final goal, was a complete group failure, a result of the loss of will. Being off-side it shouldn't of counted, but the game was long over by then anyway. If Guss dares to play this man again, I can't wait to see how he does against the likes of Henrik Larson & Zlatan Ibrahimovic. *if I was Anyukov or Akinfeev, I would punch this lazy disgrace of a teammate
Re: this is why you don't convert mid-fielder's to center-backs.......... Shirokov also ate my last candy. The bastard!
Re: this is why you don't convert mid-fielder's to center-backs.......... If he had gone up for the set piece, it's the full-backs that should be closing the counter. Blame them (or the full-backs and Pavlyuchenko, if he was there) for not fouling in midfield, but it's absurd to blame the player that went in for a header when Iniesta and Capdevila had a 30-meter head start on this poor fellow. Also, rant in the Russia forum.
Almost every goal is the result of a defensive mistake. Good forwards make them make those mistakes. Good defenders make few of them. If defenders played everything perfectly, there would almost never be goals.
^ Even so, accusing a guy that had just attempted to head a corner of not defending the ensuing break is preposterous.
Yeah. Why is a Russian fan making excuses for his team's loss in a Spain forum? Russia were beaten in all departments. If you can blame it all on your defense, then your team must be crap. All Russia's chances were due to bad defending by the Spanish defenders. Russia let in 4 goals and could've been a lot more so please don't give excuses when your team gets thrashed. Anyway, about Spain's performance. I am pleased with the scoreline. Villa was sharp and I think he and Torres can develop a better understanding as they play more together. I liked the way we attacked but not so in defending. I thought we were sloppy and nervous in defence. There were times we were caught napping and there wasn't enough effort to clear the ball out of the danger zone. Even Ramos looked a bit shaky. He could do better. I was also a bit disappointed with Senna especially in the first half. He didn't make any attempts to win the ball which is supposed to be his job as a defensive mid. However, he did improve in the second half. Overall, it was a good performance for the first match. However, we really need to improve our defense. We need to get organized at the back. I think Aragones test out Albiol against Sweden. Marchena still looks shaky as ever. Viva Espana!!!
If Russia would have scored early, I reckon it would have been different but can we really take Spain seriously. Year after year after year, I support them to go on and they usually do, until they get to the real competition stage where they seem to implode horribly. But it does help to have 2 strickers who between them have scored 56 goals this season. Thats just Sick.
A lot more positives to take from this than negatives, but the concern about defense hopefully will be improved by the next game, Sergio Ramos was getting owned over and over. I was telling my bro who doesn't watch that much soccer before the game started that Ramos was one of the best players on the team, only to see him have a dismal game. Villa showed such quality throughout, he was unpredicteable and ruthless in attack.
I am quite surprised at the lack of activity at this forum. Is it because there aren't that many spaniards at bigsoccer or is it that just that spaniards simply doesn't care about the national team. I know there's heavy regional conflicts within spain, would that have something to do with the lack of activity in this forum.
Very Good Game For Spain. David Villa Was brilliant. any1 who missed the hatrick can watch it aT: http://worldfootball.us/news/euro_2008/156.html
Spaniards usually don't speak/write good enough English. There are a few exceptions (there's a few of us in the Real Madrid forum), but this is undoubtedly the main reason there aren't many Spaniards in BigSoccer.