If You Can't Say Anything Nice...

In a recent online conversation with Guy Kay, he asked me what my take was on Euro 2008, next to the World Cup the largest soccer tourney in the world, and so after a minimal amount of thought, I sent him the following:

I think this is the year that Spain, and perhaps Portugal, figure out how to do it right. Spain especially, with a player like Fernando Torres making such a big mark with Liverpool. He hasn't scored as many as Ronaldo with ManU, but he's made his mark in a different way; he doesn't rather suddenly succumb to gravity every time he's tapped in the box. Instead he stays up and, you know, tries to score goals. It'll be a different experience for the Spaniards, and interesting to see if they can pick themselves up in response. I think they can.

My picks to get out of the group stages:

Portugal and Czech Republic
Germany and Poland (even though they won their qualifying group, Poland has never made it this far before, so they're a dark horse, I think)
Italy and Netherlands (Aidan will kill me for this, since France is his team, but I think they're in rebuilding mode)
Spain and Greece (tough group, but Sweden are perpetual underachievers and Russia is pretty unreliable)

My quarter final picks, based on the nonsense above:

Portugal beat Poland
Czech Republic beat Germany
Italy beat Greece
Spain beat Netherlands

Semis:

Portugal beat Czech Republic
Spain beat Italy

An Iberian final, with Spain coming out on top.

We'll see how far off I am.

Aidan's picks:

A - Portugal and Czech Republic
B - Germany and Croatia
C - Netherlands and France
D - Spain and Sweden

Quarter Finals: Portugal and Germany win their side, Netherlands and France win theirs.

Semis: Portugal and France win

Champion: Portugal (Dad here saying holy smokes, Aidan isn't picking France to win it all!)

Labels: soccer