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Of course, this assumes that stopping penalties is a skill. I have no idea if that's true. I think in hockey, for example, the best shootout goalies don't necessarily correlate to the best 'open-play' goalies (DA, ursus, zack, other NHL followers, please correct me if I'm wrong).
I agree with you. And the odd number for the fifth PK may be because some believe that you should put your two best takers first and last. But looking at the situation without data I would say taking the 5th PK has more pressure than taking the first. Maybe the difference is not really so large but I think there is one.
This seems misleading. The players age directly has nothing to do with it, it's experience that is the factor--against the player. We know that some players shoot the same place or at least the same direction a vast majority of the time, just as we know that some keepers dive to the same location or side a vast majority of the time. A 22 year old has only taken so many penalties, there is only so much data on his tendencies. We have a much better idea of where say, Frank Lampard or Zlatan Ibrahimovic will shoot than say, Eden Hazard or Danny Welbeck.
This is correct and is also true of shooters. It is not uncommon to see a fourth liner or a defenseman go in the shootout while a top offensive player does not. And there have been a few times where a coach has changed the goalie for the shootout because the backup that day is better at it.
You have to make up your mind before you can read anything much into the players posture. Generally, without the advantage of film: Go right (your right) against righties, and left against lefties, unless the angle from their run up is very acute. To go the other way, you have to either kinda inside-out the shot, which isn't very natural, or kick off the outside of your boot, which is much harder to control. Like in baseball, most players prefer to pull the ball.
I think that the skill involved in hockey is different. The most important factors is that you don't bite on dekes and are quick enough to be able to cover both bottom corners. Those skills just aren't relevant in a soccer shootout.
Italy: 1-Gianluigi Buffon; 6-Federico Balzaretti, 15-Andrea Barzagli, 19-Leonardo Bonucci, 3-Giorgio Chiellini; 21-Andrea Pirlo; 8-Claudio Marchisio, 18-Riccardo Montolivo, 16-Daniele De Rossi; 9-Mario Balotelli, 10-Antonio Cassano
Soccerball time! Not too late for Neuer to do something stupid and save my twatball team.
Fearless prediction time!: This game will not go to penalties!
Angela Merkel will do the Funky Chicken!
There's not much to choose between them really. Reus plays a wider game with more pace. My guess is Löw is scared of the Italians dominating the centre of the pitch too much, so he chose Kroos, who is a better bet to unstable them there.
Edit: Assuming, as FP says, the same "defending" in the box.
From The Guardian.
I'd argue without Balotelli, Italy would have a tough go of beating Spain. With Balotelli... I think they could do it.
OTOH, if he's given a cheap second yellow the outrage will be such that FIFA will surely have to go to the instant replay--oh.
I missed the call, was it something that would have been called in the first half or a late game special?
Let me tell you, it's delicious...
I basically guessed every time there was a penalty kick against me. I was in a playoff shootout once, and I made a save, and I thought that it had won the game, only to see our shooter miss the net. We lost on extra shooters...
Take it to the political thread.
I have been in two in the last two years, and faced about 9 or 10 penalties during games over my goalkeeping "career".
My technique is always to dive in one particular direction - my "best side" so to speak. This is because (i) I'm very tall and you'll have to put it right in the corner to beat me on that side and (ii) nobody Panekas or hits it down the middle in amateur football. Everybody places it for some reason.
I save about 1 in 3 kicks this way. I didn't save one in either shootout but didn't need to - people kept hitting the woodwork whereas my team didn't miss any...
Incidentally, I agree with whoever said there was no pressure on a keeper in a shootout. The kicker is expected to score. Nobody expects anything of a keeper.
I agree with the first sentence but not the second. I don't think Italy had more chances than Germany. It was an evenly matched game IMO, Balotelli was the difference. Edit: Or probably put a different way, Germany's defense just wasn't good enough to win the tournament. The defense on both goals was really pretty awful.
Nah, I don't even read the political threads here, and I'm certainly not trying to ruin this thread that way. It was just quite the day.
I agree with this. Germany creates lots of chances, however they didn't take them particularly well and when they did the goalkeeper made good saves.
I think this sells Italy way short. They were in control of the game for wide stretches. Balotelli was great, but so were Cassano, De Rossi, Montolivo, Chielini, and of course Pirlo. And Germany had a bunch of guys who were completely MIA. Gomes sucked. Kroos was busy chasing Pirlo's shadow. Schweinsteiger was... did he play yesterday?
The only time Germany really looked dangerous was when Lahm and Boateng pushed forward, since they were the only players willing to exploit the width, while Italy packed the centre of the pitch. But that left them hopelessly shorthanded at he back, especially since neither Kroos or Özil or Schweinsteiger were tracking back at all.
Hummels is getting a lot of crap for his defending on both goals, but the bottom line is, he shouldn't have been put in that position on the first goal at all. He should have been in the middle waiting for the cross with Badstuber, but he can't leave Boateng out there alone, because Cassano was drinking Boateng's milkshake all game long (he drank Hummels' on that play as well). One of the mids HAS to be helping out in that situation...
It's still Vidic. Then Pique and Pepe.
Feel free to point out that I've been wrong about nine other things in there, but hey, I got one.
Boateng did get open a lot on the right side, even more so than Lahm on the left. Maybe Italy was willing to concede that area because they just didn't believe Boateng could hurt them, even though he actually put in some decent crosses. BTW has anyone mentioned that Germany had FOURTEEN corners (Italy had none!) and didn't do anything with them? One Hummels chance and basically it.
As to Pitlo, he had a lot fewer touches and passes, because Italy were content to let Germany have the ball for most of the game, and counter them after the 2:0. He was still excellent in possession, and orchestrating the Italian offense, when they did have the ball. His long diagonal ball to Chiellini into acres of space was the set-up for the first goal.
Euro '08 - Russia 1, Sweden 1, Greece 1
Confederations Cup '09 - AMERICA!!1 2, South Africa 2
World Cup '10 - Switzerland 1, Chile 1
Seems like there should be something here, no?
Euro '12 - Italy 1
That's 10 total goals against in 23 games. And famously, only 4 of them were allowed in any of the 11 knockout games.
Aaaaand the confederations cup is somewhat minor compared to the other 3, so they've allowed 6 goals in 18 of the biggest international games, and still zero in the knockout stages.
And if I'm correct, they've allowed 0 penalties in that span (not including the shootout, obviously). Have they even given up a penalty attempt?
Ridiculous. Please score, Italy.
It helps immensely that Luca Toni is far, far away.
LET SPURS IN CHAMPIONS LEAGUE LET SPURS IN CHAMPIONS LEAGUE LET SPURS IN CHAMPIONS LEAGUE LET SPURS IN CHAMPIONS LEAGUE LET SPURS IN CHAMPIONS LEAGUE LET SPURS IN CHAMPIONS LEAGUE LET SPURS IN CHAMPIONS LEAGUE LET SPURS IN CHAMPIONS LEAGUE LET SPURS IN CHAMPIONS LEAGUE
Rumors are Deschamps is going to take over. Also, reports out of Italy that Chelsea want to sign Maicon which mean I'll get to break out my Taxi For Maicon t-shirt next year! Malaga supposedly after Giovani Dos Santos. Liverpool media continue to paint Gylfi Sigurdsson as a heartless, greedy mercenary with no appreciation for what's important in football. He's supposed to sign officially for Spurs on Monday. AVB is supposed to be unveiled tomorrow or Monday and the Jan Vertonghen transfer saga is coming to an end now that Ajax and Vertonghen have agreed on how much of the transfer fee Vertonghen is entitled to. Lucio has been released by Inter. William Gallas may be on his way to the Hammers. The owners of Udinese have completed their purchase of Watford. DiNatale to Watford! The 2 names you'd expect are rumored to take over Holland and Glasgow Rangers players are already scattering across Europe. The German media has decided Loew isn't a genius after all. How long before Klinsmann is the tactical genius and Loew was just a good man manager?
And now to enjoy this sweltering New York City day. Oh how I love to sweat! Looking forward to tomorrow's game already. Any chance Prandelli goes back to a 3 in the back formation?
are we going to have a new thread for the Euro final or afterwards?
It usually takes a couple of days for the new month's thread to kick in so we'll just use this one for the Final.
Transfer window is open!
Marca confirms the Maicon to Chelsea rumors. Every speedy winger in England is tingling with excitement. Clarence Seedorf off to Botafogo. Roma have confirmed they're negotiating with Chievo for Michael Bradley though they claim Inter and Juventus are also interested. Every player whoever played for AVB at Porto being linked to Spurs. All of those guys at Porto have complicated contracts and with as slow as Spurs move on negotiations I can't see those two clubs being good trade partners. There is some smoke about Spurs making a push for Internacional's Oscar, though. That might have legs.
I meant to watch the San Jose v LA game last night but forgot about it and ended up falling asleep watching a doc about Charles and Ray Eames. I should stand in the corner for an hour today or something.
I think if they tried this once they would like it. The travel wouldn't be too onerous--if your team made it to the semi-finals you'd have to travel to 3 cities at the most. It wouldn't be any worse than traveling from Wroclaw to Kiev. And, as far as traveling goes, having to go from Oslo to Paris to Rome (hypothetically) would be kind of fun, no? Also, you'd be able to include great cities in smaller countries like Prague and Dublin and Helsinki and Budapest, etc. Plus you'd avoid the massive corruption that is involved in building huge public works like you had in Ukraine.
*When I say 'quality', I mean the overall entertainment of the games, not the quality of the teams. Obviously, by definition the average quality of the teams will go down when we add the 17th-24th best sides in Europe.
No, I think everyone thinks this is the case.
Luuk de Jong looks to be heading to Monchengladbach. Diego Forlan may be heading to Inter--the Brazilian Inter, this time. And Gianfranco Zola is going to be the new Watford Manager. Things seem to be looking up for Watford.
This is a pretty big advantage, to my eyes. I wonder if this is in part motivated by the noticeable empty seats in this Euro, given that this is being talked about for when the tournament will be in Turkey.
You are so, so, so very, very, very wrong. And I am not talking about Slovakia...
Shooty, it's not just about the travel itself, which would likely kill a lot the travelling support, especally for nations that don't travel well. It's organizing and planning, which is the real problem. If you are in Athens, and don't know if your next game is in Dublin, or in Porto, that's a problem. You have to book flights and hotels last minute... Now imagine 50000 people trying to do that. And now repeat that for a dozen fixtures. It's COMPLETELY insane.
And the "massive corruption involved in building huge public works" is a feature for UEFA/FIFA, not a bug. I am 117% sure they have no intention on following through with this proposal. They are just trying to intimidate the governments of future host countries into pouring more public funding into free stadia for its members.
It could be organized in brackets so support would know the city ahead of time if their team advances. Is it really so much different than the NCAA tournament? Each group is in one city. The quarterfinals take place in one of two cities. Depending on what group you're team is in, you'll already know which city if your team advances. The semi's and the final are in the last city. Is that really any more insane than what they did this year?
Agreed. 24 teams is a bad idea.
This.
Well, ok, but swap Scotland for Montenegro and my point could last.
Couldn't you do 6-team groups with the top 2 advancing?
There is a tiny bit more difficulty for the Euros in that at the end of group play, you could be sent to one of three different cities and that would make travel difficult. In the NCAA, once the bracket is announced you know where the next destination will be if your team advances.
At the same time ... the NCAA announces seedings/matchups late on Sunday and games start on Thursday. You don't even know if you are qualified for the tourney and you could be playing 96 hours later. That seems to be just as difficult, if not more so, than the switch from group play to elimination play in the Euros.
Granted, I follow a team that is typically seeded in a way that the 1st round matchup is rather predictable and I can make arrangements accordingly. But since I won't know the 2nd weekends location until the brackets are announced, it still makes for some fun travel. But it does work out just fine.
No striker, no Navas for Spain.
Buffon, Abate, Barzagli, Bonucci, Chiellini, Pirlo, Marchisio, De Rossi, Montolivo, Cassano, Balotelli.
Prandelli sticks with the 4-4-2- midfield diamond.
I don't think so.
This would force an extra two round of games (five groups games) vs only one extra round if you allow a round of 16.
I'm looking forward to a Ramos/Balotelli duel - kicking, jostling, pushing and elbows galore!
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