The Official Euro 2004 Thread

Or blurt even.

Neville played great. James played great, and I've never been able to say that before.

Croatia were pretty poor all along and we did seem to give them too much respect. For Christ sake, just run into the box and welly the ball in. Rooney does it, Gascoigne used to do it and Owen USED to do it.

Moment of the match for me was Rooney's beautiful passing header to Scholes for him to score. He could have easily had a go at scoring himself, but placed it so confidently to Scholes.

Portugal are a tough bunch to beat.

In Norn Ireland parlance it is a noun and almost onamatopoeic; "a farter from the mouth" is the best definition I can come up with, at least that's how my mother uses the word. Pretty good description for Joe.

John

I'm not sure how you spell it. In certain parts of both Manchester and London it means someone who talks too much, or talks bollocks or speaks out of turn.

It's used in Half Man Half Biscuit's The Referee's Alphabet, "J is for Jijitsu which I quite intend to display given a dark alley and some of the narky blirts I've encountered"

Matthew

It wasn't just Rooney, you know. Yer full backs were both superb today. Neville and Cole get a lot of stick; if you don't want them, we'll take them.

And the boy Lampard? What a star. He reminds me a little of Emlyn Hughes, which shows how bloody old I am.

Davie

He is 18 and he is (so far) the best player in the tournamanet. It's difficult to over-state the success he's had to date although no doubt the tabs will give it a fair old crack tomorrow.

You could almost hear Bill Kenwright shouting "£55, no £60 million" as the goals went in.

Matthew

PS Here's an early assessment of Rooney from one of our resident pundits:

"On the first few occacions I watched him, I couldn't help feeling that a lot of his success was based on the fact that he was a big, strong, aggressive lad for his age. The kind that fades away when trying to make the step up to the men's game. Only time will tell and it will be interesting to see how he progresses in the next two years. Obviously he will need to make a big impact at Euro 2004 (assuming we make it) if he is to stand any chance of eclipsing those who have gone before him. Whether he has a more complete game than any of the other English strikers is hard to judge just yet. Having scored only one goal in 9 appearances (admittedly some as sub), we don't even know yet whether he can shoot with both feet let alone head the ball."

From here

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Originally posted by Matthew Robinson:
He is 18 and he is (so far) the best player in the tournamanet.

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He's certainly been the most eye-catching, but the best player? Better than ZZ?

Rooney's made an explosive impact, and I love watching him play - but it seems to me that Zidane controls every game he plays in.

The astonishing thing here is that I'm talking about Wayne Rooney and Zinedine Zidane in the same sentence. I've got to stop that!

Regards,
Davie

38th minute England 0 Croatia 1

Motty: "Gerrard has moved to the left and Scholes to the middle"

Me to girlfriend: "About fecking time, no width on left etc..."

45th minute England 2 Croatia 1.
Eye theng ewe

Post match interview with Shrek:

Me: "Eeeeeerm ..."
Wayne, fraction of a second later: "Eeeeeerm ..."
Eye theng ewe .

Portugal eh. Bugger.

And Jo Royle, Peter Reid and Ian Wright, I am paying your fat wages FFS. Don't make me come over there...

Is it me, or was Joe Royle watching a different game last night. During the first half particularly, I got fed up of his whingeing; I thought England's performance was good throughout the team (until the last 15 minutes, when you could see they were tired).

Steve D

What with the assured continuation of the Czechs into the Quarter Finals and the amazingly speedily arranged financial package just announced for Prague's restoration, and mega tourist centre, GGGGGGGGermany can only but look forward to a luvvly jubbly Semi-Final bash with Eeeeengland, innit, as I'm sure you're all well aware ?

Fritz Von Theydon'tölikeitupem

Ps: Mathew, thanks for starting this excellent thread; you certainly know your stuff, I really have learn't a lot about football since it began.

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Originally posted by Bhoyo:
The astonishing thing here is that I'm talking about Wayne Rooney and Zinedine Zidane in the same sentence. I've got to stop that!

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Rooney is doing very well but for me the players of the tournament so far have been Nedved and Zidane. Zidane is almost single-handedly carrying a lacklustre French side and in the Holland v Czech game Nedved was fantastic.

Steve G

Agreed!

Steve D

Nedved's was wonderful against the Dutch and I'd certainly acknowledge his case over Rooney. Zidane, however, has been some way off his inspirational best. Very good and the leader of their team yes but his performances have not hit the heights he has been capable of.

Besides in direct comparison when England played France Rooney was the best player on the pitch for 90 minutes and Zidane did basically nothing. He had a whole half to unlock an England team that was firmly in "men behind the ball" mode and couldn't manage it until Heskey, James and Gerrard handed it to him on a plate. Zidane of old would have found something -- rather like the buck toothed Brazillian did 2 years ago. Rooney, by contrast, singlehandledly won the penalty that 9 times out of 10 would have won his team the game.

Anyway this is not the point. Rooney is 18, is the leading scorer and through the groups stages is amongst the very top 2 or 3 players in the tournament.

Matthew

PS La Liga watchers will know that Zidane going from awesome levels to merely excellent has been the case for nearly 2 years but as the media is so utterly dazzled by his reputation and is incapable of making a sane judgement.

See also Figo for the last 4 years and the non-Arsenal version of Thierry Henry who the idiotic Richard Williams praised for his MIA performance against England for, in part, a 540 degree off the ball pirouette in front of a bemsued Ashley Cole who was probably wondering why TH was spinning around like a small child

PPS The best player in the world isn't Zidane or Henry. It's Ronaldhino and watching the second half of this years La Liga would make this very obvious.

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Originally posted by Matthew Robinson:
PPS The best player in the world isn't Zidane or Henry. It's Ronaldhino and watching the second half of this years La Liga would make this very obvious.

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While I don't agree with much of the nonsense you spout (England fans best in the world etc.) I'd certainly agree that Ronaldhino is the best player in the world at the moment.

England fans are the only fans who support their national team in the same way people support a club. Other countries have fans who are often of the middle class armchair variety. By and large, they don't have songs, they don't support their team when they are losing, they don't have the humour, they don't find a way to get tickets so that they are almost always a big majority at international games, etc, etc. Overall there is a palpable cultural difference between England fans and fans of other teams.

I also note that 75% of the total general sale tickets for all matches at Euro 2004 were bought by England fans. If more than 3 Frenchmen bought tickets for Sweden Vs Bulgaria I would be astonished.

Matthew

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Originally posted by Matthew Robinson:
England fans are the only fans who support their national team in the same way people support a club.

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Have you forgotten about the South Americans?

No. South American football in general is culturally different from European football -- the Argentinians are the closest thing to England's support although really they are more like the Turks than anyone.

The Brazilians are a one off and do the samba thing and generally have the nicest breasts (Although many England fans can generally boast the largest). It doesn't really compare.

Matthew

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Originally posted by Matthew Robinson:
generally have the nicest breasts (Although many England fans can generally boast the largest).

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Well your responses on this thread have certainly demonstrated that England have the biggest tits supporting them...

Having now lost a stone and weighing a svelte 14st 3lb I'll have you know that I am now man-breast free.

Matthew

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Originally posted by Matthew Robinson:
PPS The best player in the world isn't Zidane or Henry. It's Ronaldhino and watching the second half of this years La Liga would make this very obvious.

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Do you mean this fellow?

Has everyone here forgotten that from now on all England's matches will be settled by penalty shoot-outs? And that Beckham is a suspect penalty taker (at the top level anyway), but doesn't know that himself?
Simon

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England fans are the only fans who support their national team in the same way people support a club.

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Isn't that historically part of the problem?

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Other countries have fans who are often of the middle class armchair variety.

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I could have sworn that's where those flags came from!

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they don't support their team when they are losing

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So what was all that booing at Wembley about?

For what it's worth I'm with Joe Royle (and he wasn't alone - the radio commentary was scathing as were the comments on Eurosports). England weren't desperately bad but they weren't desperately good either.

Basically, the difference was Rooney. Getting the lead also forced the Croats forward which played to Englands' strength of counter attack. When England concede the first goal against a good time then it's hard to see how they would turn things around. Still, it's currently wide open...

That should have said 'team' not 'time'!!!

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Originally posted by Mike Hughes:

So what was all that booing at Wembley about?

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Those lovable cockernees like to boo anyone who doesn't play for London teams. England have been much better supported since playing in the 'regions'.

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Originally posted by Matthew Robinson:
Argentinians are the closest thing to England's support...

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Living and working alongside so many Latin Americans, I know something about the way they view Argentines. Three words that always come up are "joyless" "arrogant" and "psychotic."

Now come on - does that sound like England fans to you?

Davie