The irony is, is that it's exactly what the English media is like right now and have been for the past few years.
And if not underrated, certainly not overrated. Kind of silly to bundle all CAF nations together when at least one of them overachieved in the last World Cup.
Africa is definitely overrated. Africa sucks! But too much WC berths are allocated to Africa. Japan and Australia are overrated. They suck dog shit. But media give quite a considerable tribute compared to real capability they have.
To add to what BocaFan has said, England has been abjectly poor at the Euros. They haven't qualified in 5 ( 64,72,76,84,2008) of the 12 tournaments that they set out to participate in. Of the remaining 7, in 80,88, 92,2008 they failed to proceed from the group stages. Only against Germany at EC96 (home) and against Portugal (qf) at EC 2004 did England lose on penalties. Look at these numbers however you want. This is a massive under-performance by the English side. And quite consistently, at that. From a nation of England's stature, financial clout and over all talent levels, I'd expect at least 1 EC title coupled with a couple of final and semi finals in the bag. That would be a par achievement.
Before 2006 Ghana was a disappointment they had talented players performed well in the African Cup actually won more than any other nation but never accomplished anything on the World stage. In WC 06 and! WC 10 Ghana played up to their abilities and truthfully in 10 surpassed them. If it wasn't for Suarez they would of made it to the Semifinals. The Black Stars have made it to the knock out stage the last 2 World Cups. Joining world powers Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, England. Spain, Holland. Germany.
Those African teams made just one time sensation. African teams overall weren't surprising at all. They are not that impressive.
Determined by one's media. Look at England their media always proclaims England as champs before the World Cup but they never make it past the quarters. Look at the media of the US they are always saying this is the te am or player who will bring respect for the country but the player and team always disappoint.
Actually no. Before 2006 Egypt had the same amount of trophies as Ghana, but Ghana had more finals. Since then Egypt excelled at the AFCON and Ghana excelled at the World Cup.
Egypt has won the last 3. No World Cups. Ghana right now is on the brink of becoming a dominant football nation not just in Africa but in the world
These are all fair points....There is also no doubt that Germany's success has, in some measure, been helped by their ability to win pk shootouts somewhere along the way in many tournaments both Euro and World Cup....and this is to their credit.
Didn't England win a pk against Spain in EC 96, otherwise they wouldn't even make it to the semis? And Germany lost the very first pk in the final of the EC 76.
1) they did...their only shootout win... 2) ....and haven't lost one since....and they've been in a few...
germany's won 5 straight since that initial loss to the czechs. speaking of the czechs, theyre probably the only nation historically on a similar level to germany when it comes to pens...won 3 lost 0. englands record stands at 1-5...doubt there's a national team out there with a worse record than that though the dutch might come close
Portugal also won the only two penalty shoot-out that they've played, in 2004 and 2006... ironically both against England
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_national_football_teams_by_penalty_shootout_record From the link: Saudi Arabia are 4-0 in shoot outs. The Dutch are 1-4 - not quite as bad as England. Costa Rica and UAE are the only teams to have lost more than one shoot out while never winning one. Mexico are the only team to have lost 6 shoot outs, but have won 4. England, Italy and Iran have all lost 5.
This post is simply BS. Define what "top-tier" teams is in your own mind. Established top-tier teams? Or top-tier teams in that single tournament? Russia crushed the Netherlands (who were probably he strongest team of the Euro at that point) in the QFs. Then Spain managed to score a 3-0 against them. We passed over a team that had crushed the Netherlands just the round before. Russia was definetely a top-tier team in that tournament. Also, to all of you nerds who love stats and think football can be measured by stats (thats probably cause you havent played football in your life), in the game Italy-Spain it was a fking miracle we didnt score, after all the chances we produced there. The penalty shoot-outs only made us justice, Italy did nothing on that game, nothing. It was luck + Buffon (remember him kissing the crossbar?). And the in the final game against Germany it was the same, we completely dominated that game and could have scored much more, the scoreboard didnt reflect what happened there. So, basicly, Spain dominated that tournament with fashion and style. Judging both by results and the way our game was played. Yeah in the WC we were a bit more conservative (Del Bosque took out a forward to put in a defensive mid-fielder) but that was mainly because of Torres terrible conditioning (he barely made the final team because of an injury). Still, we managed to dominate Portugal, Germany and even the Netherlands in the finals. I have to LOL at all these dutch-fans in this thread crying and shit..., your team sucked in the finals, for gods sake, you played rugby instead of football. There was only one team at the pitch that day, and it was Spain. Deal with it. You are not "alternative" or "special" just for saying Spain isnt a clear top-contender, when they clearly are.
Don't expect a response. I already responded to that post and the guy lambed out rather than defend his statements. If Spain win 1 game on penalties its "luck", if they only win by 1 goal its "luck". I guess the teams that Spain beat by "only" 1 goal should be rated higher somehow.
It was a tactic only.I believe the Dutch thought the could push the Spanish around and dominate them physically in the final. By the Dutch doing this was a testement to how good Spain was because the Dutch played Brazil straight up and used technical skill to defeat the Brazillians.
What happens many a time, is that, we tend to brush an entire tournament as failure only due to 'bad luck' if a team loses on penalties. For instance, we know that England lost to Portugal on penalties in the QFs at WC06. But just looking at this one statistic alone can be misleading. Did they play well during the group stages? Did they play well in the R16? Only after you see their performances in all the games, you are more or less convinced that the qf exit was more or less a fair indication of their performance in that tournament. They were quite poor, IMO. Especially against T&T. If I can generalize, the last few tournaments for England have been very typical. Struggle in the group stages against sides everyone expects them to beat with ease. Get past a mediocre R16 opponent. (not always) Play better against a strong side and go out on penalties.
The German ability not just to win in PK's but the way they push their will on their opponents is their main reason for sucess.
Russia a top tier team? Certainly not. Was Russia a top tier team at Euro 2008? No, of course not. In group stage, Russia lost to Spain, won 1-0 against Greece (who lost all their matches) and beat Sweden (who are not a top tier team). In the quarter finals played Holland and tied 1-1 after 90 minutes, and in extra time scored two goals to win by 3-1. Basically Russia had one extraordinay match against Holland. Holland as I’m sure everyone remembers, was in the group of death together with Italy, France and Romania. Nevertheless did a great job and won all three games sealing first place with 9 points. After the quarter-final match against Holland, eveyone was hailing Russia and saying they were such a talented side, while at the same time Arshavin was being called the next great thing. Well a day or two later, Russia got thrashed in the semi final. Funny because this same Russian team, you call top-tier in Euro 2008, failed to qualify for the following tournament (WC 2010), while Arshavin‘s adventure in the EPL was very dissapointing for all the hype he received after the Holland match. So, basically both this Russian team and Arshavin got exposed a short time afterwards and everyone stopped talking about them. So much for the myth “Russia was a top tier side in 2008”… Wisdom through hindsight is a great thing. Spain in the quarter-finals failed to score a single goal against Italy (a top tier side) in over 120 minutes but won the penalty shoot out. Uefa considers these matches as a tie, and rightly so, because there really isn’t much merit in penalty shoot outs, it is mostly luck. Truth is, in Euro 2008 Spain beat one top tier team and that was Germany in the final. This is a fact. I can’t remember the last time a Euro champ won the cup beating only one single football power. In fact I’m not quite sure this ever happend before.
Russia has one decent tournament in 20 years and has one amazing game in that tournament and all of a sudden they're a top-tier team? Give me a break. Besides, as I've mentioned before, their World Cup history (or lack thereof) post-Cold War isn't exactly flattering Only qualifying for two World Cups and failing to make it out of the Group Stage in either of them (Especially embarrassing in 2002, when they were grouped with Japan, Belgium and Tunisia) isn't exactly top tier