Wales beat Northern Ireland in the round of 16 to advance to the Euro 2016 quarter finals while Portugal finally overcame Croatia after extra-time.
Switzerland 1 Poland 1 (Poland win on pens)
Following a 48-hour break, the Euro 2016 returned with the knock-out stages and three such awful games that it made you wish they’d taken a third day off instead.
Poland continue to underwhelm and yet make progress, albeit that they finally conceded a goal in the tournament. It was a wonderful scissor kick from the edge of the box by Shakiri which gave the Swiss a late, but well-deserved, equaliser. This took the game into extra-time and then penalties. They’d also managed to hit the woodwork and forced a couple of fine saves from Fabianski
Poland hold their nerve in shoot-out.
The Poles had opened the scoring with a smart counterattack started by a brilliant throw out by Fabianski in the 38th minute. Blaszczykowski gave them the lead in a game which, to that point, they had just about shaded. But thereafter, it was the Swiss who took control of the fixture. They suffered from the inability to hit the back of the net from a string of decent chances. This was a condition that had afflicted virtually every nation in the tournament.
With Poland hanging on, they took it all the way to penalties. Finally Lewandowski had a chance to score. The striker had thus far sacrificed his individual aspirations to the good of the team. Xhaka smacked his effort wide, leaving Krychowiak to drill in the decisive spot kick, taking the Poles into the last eight.
Wales 1 N Ireland 0
Wales squeezed through to a quarter final showdown with Belgium thanks to a 1-0 win over Northern Ireland. In terms of quality, it was the kind of game we’d feared. A Tuesday night League Cup tie between Championship opponents. The two sides largely cancelled one another out with the kind of typically British fare that will have UEFA looking to follow the EU by chucking the Brits out in future.
But if the quality wasn’t there, the determination and the character that you associate with both sides was there in spades. Northern Ireland continued to be supremely organised at the back. For long stretches of the game they were able to completely nullify the threat of Bale, Ramsey and Allen. This lead Wales to concentrate on their own defensive work in order to eliminate any costly mistakes. They did so brilliantly, Chester was imposing, Williams the very image of bravery, battling through the last ten minutes with his left arm hanging off after a thunderous collision.
Gareth Bale To The Rescue
Coleman is a shrewd enough manager to understand that in Bale Wales have a footballer who just needs one glimpse of goal to make something remarkable happen. He did it again when Hughes was too slow to get out to the Northern Irish right as the ball reached Bale.
With time to look up and play his cross without any pressure, he was able to spear it into the six-yard box. Too far out for the goalkeeper, he forced McAuley to try and make some kind of interception, knowing that Robson-Kanu was hovering behind him. In doing so, all that the hero of the win over Ukraine could do was put the ball into his own net and put Wales through.
Portugal 1 Croatia 0 (aet)
Croatia versus Portugal was the kind of mind-numbing spectacle that you’d think only the Kardashians could serve up. Without a shot on target in the 90 minutes, extra time was marginally worse. Modric was clearly some way short of fitness. Ronaldo was starved of service and this time chose not to go looking for the ball, clearly instructed to just stay up front.
The game finally woke up in the last five minutes of extra time. After Perisic had stabbed a header against the post, a lightning Portuguese break ended with Nani miscuing horribly. The shot dropped perfectly for Ronaldo. His effort was well saved. The ball bounced up nicely for Quaresma to head in from a yard out and send them through to play the Poles.
France 2 Rep of Ireland 1
For a while, it looked as though Euro 2016 was going to be a party without a host. For 45 minutes, France were in all kinds of trouble against the Irish. Starting slowly, they conceded a second-minute penalty through a clumsy Pogba challenge on Long. Brady stepped up to convert the kick, in off the post.
From there, the French played with insufficient intensity through to half-time. Ireland kept them at arm’s length with some ease, right up until the final moments. France ended the half with a flurry of activity that proved portentous. It suggested that the home side were finally getting going. Also, Ireland, who had three fewer days of preparation, were beginning to run out of steam.
In the end, Ireland were defeated by their lack of ambition in the early minutes after the break. They defended in numbers and forgot to play on the front foot whenever possible, as they had in the first half. By conceding territory to the French, they were merely inviting disaster. It ultimately arrived when Griezmann pounced twice in three minutes either side of the hour mark to turn the game on its head.
Discipline issues for Ireland
The 58th-minute equaliser unhinged the Irish badly. The discipline which had hitherto been their strength went AWOL. The second goal came for France on the counterattack, a disaster shortly thereafter compounded by Duffy’s desperate lunge at Griezmann. The foul resulted in a red card and, in effect, the end of the game.
For Ireland, overall, it had been a positive competition where new players had emerged from the shadow of the likes of Given, Keane and O’Shea. They provided strong signs that they could go on into the World Cup qualifiers with real confidence. Particularly if they played with the drive they showed in the first 45 minutes.
France lacking goalscoring threat
France moved forward and took similar confidence from this game. They had come from behind to win. They played with more intensity and bravery in the second period. That style needed to become emblematic of the team if they are to progress further, They would be pleased to see the way Griezmann had stepped up to look a real goalscoring threat now.
That’s because, as we had seen, finding a finisher in this competition had been an issue for everyone. Gignac, who came on in the second half, looks as if he couldn’t score in a massage parlour. Even if equipped with a handful of gift vouchers and an instruction booklet.
Belgium 4 Hungary 0
All through Euro 2016 to this point, we had been waiting for someone to emerge as its star. A few had their moments, but there had been no individual display yet to rival that of Eden Hazard in Belgium’s demolition of Hungary.
It was a curious victory in many ways. Belgium were comfortably on top through the first half but could only boast the one goal; Alderweireld’s 10th-minute header was all that was separating the sides despite Belgium being on a different level.
Their inability to put the game away encouraged the Hungarians. They were much more feisty in the second period as they threatened an equaliser. But ultimately, Hazard, who had been unplayable all night long, stepped it up into an even higher gear. He created a tap-in for Batshuayi in the 78th minute to all but seal the game. He then helped himself to a sensational solo goal a minute later.
Hazard warning
Carrasco then made it four on the break in injury time. The scoreline indicated the real gulf between the sides. The Belgian win elevated them to the pick of the sides in the top half of the draw as they headed off to play Wales. There were still question marks about them, not least in their cohesiveness as a side.
There were great attacking individuals in the team, but there was a lack of humility among some. The selfishness showed in attacking situations by a few, not least De Bruyne. This cost them a chance or two when the game was still in the balance. That is a foible that could cost them dear at the sharper end of the tournament. But the way Hazard was playing, he might just be enough on his own.
Germany 3 Slovakia 0
Germany were looking clinical, albeit that they were playing Slovakia, who were abject. This was the consummate German display aside from Ozil’s missed penalty in the first half. They were in front after eight minutes when Boateng pounced, Modric-like, on a ball cleared out of the box. He flashed a 20-yard effort into the bottom corner.
A typically clumsy Skrtel challenge then gave Ozil the chance to make it 2-0 from the spot shortly after. His miss merely kept the game interesting for a bit longer. Gomez slotted in just before the break after good work by Draxler.
Draxler shot across the bow
Slovakia picked up a little at the start of the second half, but Germany, with typically good timing, found a third. Draxler steered in a Gerd Müller-type volley to end the contest and set the rest of the competition off worrying about the Germans once again.
So they should. For Germany looked the most composed and consistent side to date. In traditional German fashion, they looked to be finding their best form at the business end of the tournament.
But unlike previous German sides, this one liked to open the game up a little more They didn’t give the opposition an opportunity to play. They don’t crush the life out of games the way they used to. That gave every other nation a little glimmer of hope.
That said, they hadn’t conceded a goal in four games either.
Iceland 2 England 1
England. Dear God, they were beyond awful. Men who lord it around the Premier League week after week and who were given a goal start in the opening minutes through a Rooney penalty, then spent the next 86 minutes punting the ball around cluelessly.
After they failed to defend a routine long throw of the kind Allardyce and Pulis sides have tossed in routinely for ten years, they then allowed Iceland to pass through them as if they weren’t there before Hart and his swing door wrists allowed a weak shot to dribble past him.
England out with a wimper
From there, England simply could not put a thing together and went out of the competition with a whimper. Full credit to an Iceland side that defended superbly and totally deserved their win. From an English perspective, this truly was the moment that the noisy kid pointed out that the Premier League is wearing no clothes.
Roy Hodgson has already paid with his job, but once, just once, maybe the inquest – and the buck – shouldn’t stop solely with the manager. Perhaps it’s time the players took their fair share of the blame too.
Italy 2 Spain 0
If there were any doubts remaining, they were conclusively answered in this game. The Spanish era was over, at least in terms of international football. After a poor World Cup two years ago, their eight-year reign as the champions of Europe was ended when they were comprehensively outclassed by an Italian side that had all the answers throughout 90 minutes of almost total control.
Had it not been for a string of superb saves from De Gea, Spain would have been heading for oblivion long before Pelle’s injury-time goal finished the game off at 2-0. But it wasn’t merely the defeat, not the scoreline that mattered in the end. It was the way in which Italy dismantled the last ramparts of the tiki-taka castle. They showed it to be a system that has been overtaken by time and by the age and weariness of those required to put it into practice.
Italy were quicker, pressed higher, more determinedly, gave them no room in which to play and to pass. Consequently, they denied them the opportunity to play the mesmerising game that came so naturally and easily when the likes of Iniesta, Fabregas, and the much-missed Xavi were young men.
Spain Doomed
But Spain stuck to their system and simply refused to vary it in any way. Ultimately, it led them to their doom. The world – its better teams anyway – had worked them out and knew how to defeat them. Following this tournament, and facing a World Cup group that included the Italians, Spain needed a long, dark night of the soul to decide where they go from here. With what system? And with what personnel?
Meanwhile, the bandwagon for “the worst Italian team in 50 years” just rolled on. Conte’s tactics, in contrast to Del Bosque’s, are shrewd but fluid, intelligent, and evolving. And above all, he had crafted a group that clearly loved being together, believed in one another and in what they were doing, and fancied its chances.
This was the most cohesive team in the tournament – though they were weak beyond the first XI. So suspensions could yet play a big part. In defence they had a belief in the impregnable nature of that Juventus back line. They gave the team real confidence in each game.
They could have been over the hills and far away by the break, but had just one goal to show for it thanks to De Gea. Even that goal underlined the Italian drive. Spain barely reacted to their goalkeeper’s parry from a free-kick, four Italians converged on the ball, Chiellini getting the decisive touch.
Bonucci Shines
Spain were better after the break, a little more urgent, but Italy were rarely flustered. You could make a good case for Bonucci as player of the tournament thus far. He was magnificent again. Then behind him, the grand old man, Buffon, was security itself. He produced one extraordinary reflex save in the dying seconds to keep it at 1-0, Italy went up the other end moments later for Pelle to volley in from close range to complete the victory.
Read all about the quarter finals here.
