So beating the HOST NATIONAL TEAM in a stadium they've NEVER LOST isn't good enough to say one team was better than the other? lol C'mon now, bias or not, you can't deny Italy's quality from 2006. How many goals did Italy allow from their opponents in the tournament? How many different Italian players scored a goal? And the US was not a 2nd rate team at the time, they just didn't have any luck. Let's not forget 2002 and how the "mighty" Germany had to beat the US...
LOL Repped!!! I couldn't believe it, either! Germany getting dominated by the Americans, a country that thinks the sport is boring...sad...
It was more than that. All this talk of Italy cheating Australia, when Frings was playing GK in that game against the US. The past is past...let's move on.
Would you please stop this boring & childish "I'm better than you" discussion in this thread? Thanx! The topic is the EC 2008 draw and not the history duels between countries that aren't even in the same group...
Kick this thread up so it would be on the front page and that way you would hear more opinions about this topic
Apples and oranges. Doesn't really count since that was a second-stage group. The toughest group in recent memory for me is still Euro 2000 Group "D": Holland, France, Czech Rep. and Denmark.
eh?? The question was whether or not Germany ended-up in the toughest group. Come on! England and Germany were rubbish back then. Romania was nothing special. I'm not even sure if Portugal was any better than the third -best team in Group "D" considering Czech Republic won all 10 of their qualifying matches. When a team with 100% qualifying record is grouped with the World Cup champs and a very tough host, wouldn't you say that is the group of death? Even Denmark was pretty good back then (probably would've qualified out of Germany's group )
Perhaps you are correct. Certainly a tough group by any standards though. Portugal was beginning their goolden age as where England...and Romania, well they are always a surprise team (made the second round while Germany and England went home. I suppose the group with Holland, France, Denmark and Czech Republic could have been the "Group of Death" of that tourney.
I submit to you that virtually any two out any four groups at any Euro can be considered "groups of death". Of course this year's one is really special. but I think that it is much easier to have a bonafide "group of death" in the world cup, just because they are that much harder to come by, if that makes any sense.
Point of order!.... Once a "Group of death" meant that only European and South American teams was in it...No Asian or African teams that everyone expected to roll over easily. Suddenly it´s just a tough group regardless and we know how media loves to hype stuff like this. But can we agree on the definition of a "Group of death" as a group that will see team/s eliminated that we expected to see in the play-offs..?
I would call the "group of death" a group in which at least three of the four are candidates (not dark horses) to at least make it to the final.
The dumbest thing about the draw which nobody has mentioned yet is that teams from the same group are lined-up to play each other again in the semis (instead of the finals).
I think it was mentioned already, perhaps not this thread but another Euro 06 thread, and yeah; that sucks!!
I read a funny comment in the Guardian the other day from their German correspondent who (jokingly) accused Klinsmann of not doing his patriotic duty; he didn't make theirs a perfectly piss-poor group by drawing Croatia rather than Sweden into the group.
By popular request this thread is being re-opened. I have removed all the OT posts, please ensure all future posts stay on-topic
If the Poles think drawing Croatia is better than drawing Sweden, then they need to get acquainted with a little thing called reality. Croatia is much, much better than Sweden. Even their 2006 WC team beat Sweden twice in qualifying, and this Croatian team is light years better. Poland is not beating Croatia. They will battle Austria for 3rd place. And some other poster said that this group is the easiest? Whoever thinks that the Greece, Sweden, Spain, Russia group is more difficult than the Austria, Croatia, Germany, Poland group needs to get their heads examined. Obviously Austria brings down the level a lot and is are weak but Germany and Croatia are both better than anyone in Greece's group.
And some posters need to acquire more knowledge before posting about things they don't know much about. There are three key reasons why Poland prefers to play Croatia instead of Sweden: first, Sweden has had Poland's number recently, having defeated them in both World Cup and EC qualifiers in the last decade. Second, Poland has defeated Croatia in the final friendly for both teams before the 2006 WC. Third, and more importantly, Sweden is a much better team than Croatia. Croatia has done jack with the current coach and squad (winning their qualifying group means nothing, but if it did, Poland had won their group by beating a higher ranked team than England). I feel that Croatia has a lot to prove, and that they are goven way to much respect, since they didn't acomplish anything yet.
I don't really agree that winning the group is nothing, it certainly means something, but you are completely correct about Croatia being given too much praise, they really, really don't deserve it.
I agree about most things you said. Lagerbäck is a coward. His coaching against T&T had to have been the worst coaching in ALL of WC 06. Just send a lot of crosses into the box against a technically inferior team. Nevermind that their whole team has been parked inside the box. I'd disagree with you on the Swedish team. This team is weaker than the last Euro but there's more than Zlatan. Elmander who was the top scorer in the French league and was nominated for player of the year in ligue 1. Källström is excellent should have gone to Valencia for 23$ million. Freddie isn't trash as well.
Rubbish. The match played in Sweden was PURELY decided on 1 referee mistake. Zlatan scored a goal that was 100% by the book. The ref signaled it was a goal, the linesman signaled goal. Suddenly the ref changed his original decision and ruled it out ??. We'll never know why. Croatia won at home after Mellberg decided to start playing basketball, a correct penalty was given and Croatia won 1-0. Croatia won the group. Had the ref not made the mistake in stockholm, Sweden would've won the group. Sweden is a better team than Croatia and if we could switch places in the Euro, I would be jumping with joy. Germany are tough but i'd rather face Austria and Poland instead of Greece and Russia. Greece has already been underestimated in 1 Euro.
As for the groups, not a very good draw. I expect Sweden to make it past the group but unfortunately A&B and C&D are hugely different because of the group of death. A team from group D who wanna hold the trophy probably have to defeat the 2 WC finalists to get to a final. Sweden goes to a quarter but thats the end of the line.
As far as I remember it was decided by Srna's free kick. It probably should have stayed but Zlatan did not touch the ball. Our keeper put in his own net, so it's not like the goal was a product of some great piece of football. Obviously he either hates Sweden for some reason or we paid him off with our oil money. It was an honest mistake by the referee, because the box was crowded, and you don't know how the match would have ended had the goal been disallowed. Great teams can't afford a defender who prefers basketball to football, you should know that. We found out that ourselves in Stuttgart '06. Anyway, you had two real chances in two matches, both in Göteborg. In Zagreb you played like, hm, England did. Enough said. Had we drawn in Göteborg, we would have won in Malta. So, no. No, again.