Euro 2012 Qualifiers

[Gustaf]

Anyone who cares more about their national team than their club is not a real football fan. End of discussion.

This seems to assume that one has a club. Where I grew up everyone cheered for the Stockholm posh people team. A minority cheered for another team and got beaten up occasionally. I got beaten up by both for not really caring.

I guess I never really got into it. I don't really feel a connection to either the players or the fans of the local teams here.

Then you should have picked some suitably proletarian team from somewhere else (ideally somewhere with some sort of connection with you) and cheered for them instead. Obviously.

There are people who do that, of course. However, that strikes me as even MORE silly.

I didn't grow up being taken to games by my parents so I don't have a strong connection to any club, really. I have idiosyncratic likes and dislikes for certain teams based on perception, but since they're all commercial machines purchasing seventh-rate Brazilian players...it doesn't go very deep.

[Gustaf]

Then I don't think you're taking things anywhere near seriously enough. Mind you, it is always an objectively good thing (proven by Science, I believe) to not support the posh club, if there is one.

Oh, I see that point. Thing is, Stockholm has 3 clubs. The posh one I mentioned. The traditional workers' club which is now mostly supported by the faux proletariat (culture workers, PR-consultants in coloured scarfs and the like - although the stalwart alcoholics are still around as well). And then one which everyone hates. Their profile is the kind of club who relies on expensive foreign purchases from before that became kosher.

None of them appeals to me, although I like Hammarby's tradition of prefering stylish play and losing over bad play and losing over stylish play and winning.

[Gustaf]

Gustaf, you're just proving Al's original point: You are not a real football fan. There's nothing wrong with that, and people like you are what we have the World Cup and the Euros for, but it's a fact.

Nah, I disagree with that. I know the kind of people who only follow World Cup and Euros. They're certainly not real football fans.

[Gustaf]

O.K, so I want three of the four sides in Group D to lose all their games. Fyck.

What have you got against Sweden? (Or Ukraine?)

I've nothing against Sweden.

Yeah, I sure hope Sweden is the approved of team.

I'm not too disappointed with the draw. This was realistically about as good as we could hope for. Ukraine is arguably the weakest team from pot 1 and I think England might be the best team for Sweden from pot 2 (even though Russia is clearly weaker in terms of players). Getting France was bad luck, but still.

And group A...jeez. Talk about the worse imaginable group.

[Gustaf]

So, predictions:

Group A:
Poland
Russia

Group B:
Germany
Netherlands

Group C:
Spain
Italy

Group D:
France
England


That would give:

Poland v Netherlands

Germany v Russia

Spain v England

France v Italy

Semi-finals:

Spain v Netherlands

Germany v Italy

Final:

Germany v Spain

I think that is pretty much the boring prediction. Probably won't be true, of course. I do have a hard time seeing anyone challenge the big 3, although behind them pretty much anything can happen.

[Gustaf]

Italy losing a quarterfinal against England or a semifinal against Germany feels less realistic than them going out in the group stage, somehow.

That is definitely very, very true. It'd probably have to be Croatia in that case, although they have not looked all that strong in qualification and feel decidedly worse now compared to a couple of years ago.

It's also true that Italy tends to beat Germany in big games. On the other hand, Germany feels SO much better than Italy right now. Like, really, really. So that's what I based my prediction on. I generally have trouble seeing Germany lose against a team that isn't Spain or Holland.

[Gustaf]

And as to Holland...

You're thinking about the traditional Holland meltdowns? They tend to do reasonably at the Euros though, compared to worlds.

[Gustaf]

I don't think Italy can win this time, and given that they're also unlikely to go anywhere, so will it really matter?

[Gustaf]

Another chapter of Italy's betting scandal opens hours before the final 23 are selected for the Euros - http://iphone.france24.com/en/20120528-italy-football-mauri-betting-fixing-corruption-serie-a-european-championship

Investigators arrived at the training camp as players were asleep. Before the Italy haters start jumping for joy, remember what happened the last time a betting scandal took place right before an international tournament.

Wasn't there something like that before Italy won in 1982 as well? Can't remember exactly.

[Gustaf]

Austria v Ukraine seemed to have some hilariously bad goal keeping.

And just by watching the goals Italy's defense and backup keeper looked shaky, to say the least.