Conditioning also takes place at national team level for such tournament. And if you are a German player, like the Russians, you have access to more opportunities and technology (with less risk for an Onana episode ). Although it is less relevant here, big federations like the DFB keep tabs and data of all their players and have liaisons everywhere. Same for Brazil for instance (already when Ronaldo was at PSV they kept an eye - this was a superstar but is now extended to many more players). I don't make that up. They help them with the fitness aspect.
Germany are Portugal's bogey team. They have only beaten them once in the last 20 years https://www.flashscore.com/match/juIFPLhB/#h2h/overall
Van der Vaart says Gosens looked bad against France and that he isn't better as what we have as full-backs
Maybe the truth is somewhere in the middle. Semedo did make it easy for him. 152— Goalimpact (@Goalimpact) June 19, 2021
I in one of the threads some months ago predicted we could see unlikely teams to become heros because of the ridiculous number of matches the top players of the top teams had to play in a short time, UEFA CL/EL/WC qualifiers/friendlies to prepare, and at the end of that without any rest time the Euro2020 in 2021, which benefits the countries with less burdened players.
Müller said to Gosens after the game: "No wonder you only run for 60 minutes, you play in Italy."😂— Raphael Honigstein💙 (@honigstein) June 19, 2021
April: Ronaldo left Gosens hanging when he asked for his shirt.June: Gosens gets the better of Ronaldo at EURO 2020. pic.twitter.com/lmrDj9jQt1— ESPN FC (@ESPNFC) June 19, 2021
After two rounds completed, Group A seems indeed to have the weakest third-place team (Switzerland with only 1 point and -3 GD). Switzerland vs bottom-placed Turkey tomorrow. So if there’s one time Oranje fans have the itch to cheer for Turkey - this is it!! A draw would be ideal. Or a slim Turkey win. Remember, in the absence of 3A, Oranje will avoid 3F (could be Portugal or France).
Portugal have big issues. Their central mid-fielders can't play football. Carvalho & the other guy just recover balls & can make a sideway pass. Slow, limited vision & vertical play. In this situation, Bruno who has been brilliant for MU, should drop down @ help in build-up play. Bruno was terrible vs Germany. Their full-backs are also attacking but are mediocre to poor defenders Guerrero is okay defending & Semedo is a disaster. He allowed Gosens to move around how he wished, allowed him to shoot, pass & cross however he liked. Semedo has no idea about defending @ all & didn't even try to block the shot or cross of the LWB. Germany had Kroos-Gundogan. Hummels is a great ball playing CB. Their RWB Kimmich is a DM/CM with decent passing & attacking skills. They dominated the mid-field. This is where FDJ & Wijnaldum came in handy. Portugal has good attackers but clear weakness. Like England with their soft defense & poor Central Midfield of Rice & the others. France have quality everywhere but can't get it right attacking wise so far. Pavard & Hernandez are CBs playing as Full-back. The team lacks width ! One great thing about Germany was how attacking their full-backs were in Gosens & Kimmich. This is what you need to make up for wingers. They had Havertz in a #10 type situation. And they had no outright enforcers - 2 CMs in Kroos & Gundogan. Orange can go with FDJ & Wijnaldum with 1 of the CBs going up in build-up !
Portugal 4-2-3-1 were very slow out of the gates as Germany attacked them and pressed straight away, playing their 3-4-3 despite having no speed in their backline. Portugal struggled to identify who was playing up front for Germany, with no true center forward as Havertz, Mueller, and Gnabry all taking turns playing as False 9 while the other went to the right it appeared. Portugal defending was woeful because of the lack of pressure especially on Germany’s left side we’re Gosens just had no block in front of him. Semedo got no help from Bernardo who was anonymous or from Bruno who was out of sorts too. The 2 midfielders William and Danilo are very limited with the ball and always seem to be in the side for their defensive play, but they were lost as well picking up runners. Portugal completely out of gas I thought at 4-2 with 15 minutes to play was sad as Germany have holes on their team and backline, but Portugal had little fight.
I think the truth is perhaps somewhere in the middle (but he should have been playing for us - but then he wouldn't have the whole 'The Athletic' clickbait machine behind him). Defensively Gosens does have his shortcomings. In GoalImpact he is one of the weakest players of his team. WhoScored lists 'concentration' and 'discipline' as weaknesses. Technically - one of his strengths is accuracy with shooting - there are also blind spots: incapable of a through-ball, infrequent dribbler and loses 50% of them, average in poor touches and possession loss, average accuracy in passes, more often dribbled past than dribbles an opponent, crossing accuracy below 30% etc. https://www.sofascore.com/nl/speler/robin-gosens/377118 His main strengths are his timing, drive, heading and shooting. Has a SofaScore rating of 7.14 and WhoScored of 7.19 despite being such an offensive player. No doubt he has his strengths but it is not an obvious one to scout. Certainly not a few years ago when it was important to be defensively solid while on the backfoot. How would he perform in the 2017 and 2018 matches against France, when you are for a quarter or half of the game on the backfoot? Gazzetta dello Sport has also a higher average grade given to De Roon than Gosens You can't only blame De Boer here. His rating in the algorithms is only marginally worse, despite being a clear defensive player. His GoalImpact is much higher, for what's worth. Imho the most crucial player of Atalanta is whoever plays behind the striker in the Litmanen role.
It's pretty apparent from all the matches I've watched to date that games are won and lost in the MF. Fortunately, the Dutch have one of the best set of MF players of any team in the competition. Even de Roon with his known issues is better than what a lot of other teams have. High pressure also works well but there are not a lot of teams using this approach. It takes time to install and work properly which is why it is so lethal at the club level but perhaps more problematic to use well for the NT. Dutch have not yet gone full bore on pressure and I wonder if they will turn it up in the knock out round to take advantage of opponents poor MFs.
These stats are interesting no doubt but I’ll let my eyes be the guide regarding talent and effectiveness.
My eyes tell me he is defensively limited, technically deficient, but is great with shooting, timing and drive forward.