The (Un) Official Football thread

[bloodfiend]

Took advantage of Coral's introductory offer of 5-1 for England to score at any time yesterday (max stake £5), getting me 25 quid of free bets, put £10 on the Sunday treble of Croatia, Poland and Germany all winning and 15 just on Germany winning....decent Chane of this coming off methinks.

[Matty_the_Emo_Slayer]

I would wish you luck in that, but you have bet against Northern Ireland there so to be honest I hope you lose your treble.

Poland probably will win though, which is a shame. I really wish we had Ukraine as our first game and not Poland. That's the group game we have the best chance of winning and need to win to get a decent 3rd place finish and keeping up the tremendous streak of not losing a game in so long would help with the confidence going into the much tougher Poland and Germany games. A loss to Poland today will hamper our chances against Ukraine instead.

[NeglectedField]

dat Modric goal

[houston4044]

Was a good game until Chorluka decided his head hurt whenever Turkey gained any momentum, even Hoddle showed his cynical side when Croatia used all 3 subs but left the two bleeding players on.

Bit of a slow starting tournament, hopefully picks up soon

[Matty_the_Emo_Slayer]

Lot of people complaining about Northern Ireland's "negative" setup but when you're being realistic about your chances of qualifying in third place I think playing so defensively was the right choice. Worked brilliantly for the first half, McGovern didn't even have to make a save for the first 30 minutes. Lewandowski was completely shut down the whole game and Poland had to completely change tact and start taking strikes down the middle instead of crossing it into the box which is how they got their goal and their best missed chance.

O'Neill was a bit too slow making his changes after the goal and I would've brought on Will Grigg instead of Conor Washington, but a bit more luck on the set pieces and we could've easily got a point out the game. A 0-1 loss is not that bad, still a good chance of beating the likes of Iceland and Czech Republic to make it through to the next round.

[Gandalf the Red]

Bit of a slow starting tournament, hopefully picks up soon

It was just waiting for the Germans.


International tournaments are nearly always slow starters in my experience. Nobody wants to lose the first game as then you are playing catch up. So the first few games are usually a bit cagey.

[NeglectedField]

Germany are a pleasure to watch, but Ukraine showing their worth. Best losers yet, albeit not in goal difference.

Northern Ireland it pains me to say are the weakest looking team to play, but I admire their spirit.

[bloodfiend]

Took advantage of Coral's introductory offer of 5-1 for England to score at any time yesterday (max stake £5), getting me 25 quid of free bets, put £10 on the Sunday treble of Croatia, Poland and Germany all winning and 15 just on Germany winning....decent Chane of this coming off methinks.

Well that came off nicely, £5 on Saturday is now £90. These trebles are too much stress though, one slight thing going wrong fucks the whole thing up, all 3 winning teams yesterday were much better than the losers, but only won by slim margins. Gonna bet some more rather than cash in now, but only on single matches from now on, Portugal will be the next team I bet on.

[Matty_the_Emo_Slayer]

Germany are a pleasure to watch, but Ukraine showing their worth. Best losers yet, albeit not in goal difference.

Northern Ireland it pains me to say are the weakest looking team to play, but I admire their spirit.

Ah come on we're much better than fucking Albania.

[Jobdone]

I dunno man, 10 man albania gave a great account of themselves.

Also got Ukraine in the works sweepstakes, fucks sake.

[Metalchemyst]

I wonder if the hardcore English fans will try to get revenge on the Russians at some point. At least now they know what they're up against - basically paramilitaries.

[Matty_the_Emo_Slayer]

I dunno man, 10 man albania gave a great account of themselves.

Also got Ukraine in the works sweepstakes, fucks sake.

I still maintain NI gave a really good show of themselves too though, even in losing. Poland had the top scorer from qualification/the Bundesliga and he couldn't even got a shot on goal the whole game, that says a lot about how well NI's gameplan went aside from Milik's goal.

Hopefully with the Ukraine game O'Neill will be opting for a 5-3-2 with Lafferty and Grigg up front and we can show what we can do in a more even match-up.

[NeglectedField]

When they play Germany it'll be very much a stop-they're-already-dead scenario though.

Also Sky now rate them 1000/1

[Gandalf the Red]

I wonder if the hardcore English fans will try to get revenge on the Russians at some point. At least now they know what they're up against - basically paramilitaries.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSEU5zHgcTc

[Matty_the_Emo_Slayer]

When they play Germany it'll be very much a stop-they're-already-dead scenario though.

Also Sky now rate them 1000/1

I don't know, Germany didn't have a great opening game. Shaky in defense and borderline terrible in their striker situation. If we managed to close down Lewandowski completely for 90 minutes no reason we can't hold Germany to a 0-2 game. That and a 2-1 win over Ukraine would leave us in third with 3 points and a goal difference of -2 which should be enough to get through to the next round. A skin of our teeth advance out of the group stage is all we ever really hoped for out of this tournament and we could still be on to do it.



My thoughts on the Republic's game today shouldn't be hard to surmise. Ciaran Clark is a fucking spastic. I have Irish friends who are Villa fans that have been cursing his name for years and today proved exactly why. Useless shitebag.

This also leaves me in a painful position because obviously I want Ireland to get a decent 3rd place position (i.e. either 4 points or 3 points and a decent GD), but I also want Belgium and Italy to finish as the top 2 as I have a really tasty accumulator going on group dual forecasts. And after today's draw there is no way of both those happening together.