Spain (2) 4 Russia (0) 1

The moody microclimate in this beautiful Tyrolean valley reverberated with thunder and rain and Spain provided the lightning strikes. In weather better suited to Siberians than Iberians, Spain still made light of the inclement conditions to exploit Russian naivety with a series of wonderful counter-attacking raids, three of which were finished off by the terrific David Villa.

Arsene Wenger picked the wrong day to bemoan the quality of Euro 2008. After Roman Pavlyuchenko showed what could be achieved by pressuring Carles Puyol and his fellow defenders, one of Wenger’s Arsenal glitterati, Cesc Fabregas, restored Spain’s three-goal lead with a simple header.

	Killer Villa: Spain’s David Villa scores his side’s second goal past Russia’s Igor Akinfeev

So Russia, the team who deservedly pipped England to the second Euro 2008 ticket from qualifying Group E, were soundly thrashed and one dreaded to think what damage Spain would have inflicted on England. Technically and tactically, Luis Aragones’ men were magnificent.

Spain often manage one eye-catching display in a tournament, and they will surely not encounter defenders as poor as Denis Kolodin, yet if they maintain this level of performance they may be set for a longer stay than usual. As well as Villa, who can now expect to be linked with every wealthy Premier League club again, Spain boasted individuals like Fernando Torres and particularly the Barcelona pair of Xavi and Andres Iniesta. All excelled. Valencia’s David Silva also impressed on the left.

Wenger’s comments earlier in the day that players at Euro 2008 lacked sparkle and stamina hardly fitted in with Spain’s performance here in Innsbruck, let alone the fireworks launched into the Berne night-sky by Holland. Moving the ball quickly over a surface slickened by a torrential downpour, the Spaniards seemed to be playing football at ice hockey pace and accuracy.

The lesson in the art and craft of possession began after 24 minutes. When Torres ran at Kolodin, the Dinamo Moscow centre-half went into meltdown, surrendering the ball. Russia’s defence lay in shreds.

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    Thanks to Poland-born striker Lukas Podolski’s two goals, Germany beat Poland 2-0 on Monday, while Croatian midfielder Luka Modric’s early penalty kick smashed co-hosts Austria’s plan of winning their opening match.

    For Germany, this is the first victory at European Championship since 1996 when Germany took the tournament title.

    At present, all of their 23 players are in the forms, even midfielder Bastian Schweinsteiger sealed the rumor of poor performance by creating many opportunities for his team at the battle against Poland.

    German team manager Oliver Bierhoff was thus upbeat over Germany’s prospects.

    ”We are so eager to taking the title that we are more hungry than 1996,” Bierhoff said.

    At the European football championship in 1996, Bierhoff, then the striker of German team, scored the first golden goal in the world’s football history to help Germany seal the top title.

    ”Our team have already found our own style. Maybe it is difficult for me to compare Germany with other squads, but just like 12 years ago, we are a top-level team,” he added.

    He was of course optimistic over Germany’s next group match with Croatia.

    ”We know Croatia is a strong rival, the match will be tough, but we will do our best to crush them to win,” he said.

    Croatia is by no means a minnow for Germany.

    The team coached by former Bundesliga player Slaven Bilic eliminated England during the qualifying round, and many experts see them as the dark horse in the 2008 tournament.

    ”Croatia are great tacticians while they also have great individuals who can beat you one-on-one. They know how to control the pace of a game,” said German coach Loew.

    As both striker Gomez and midfielder Schweinsteiger performed good in the first match, it is widely believed that Loew will makea minor change to send both to the pitch, while putting speedy Podolski backward as a winger to create more scoring chances for teammates.

    Croatian striker Mladen Petric was confident in his team.

    ”We’re confident in ourselves, we know we’re strong enough, and we have the quality to beat any team,” he said.

    Germany took the third place in 2006 World Cup as the host, while Croatia ended up with the same place in 1998 World Cup, during which Croatia beat Germany 3-0.

    ”We would love to be as successful as they were in 1998,” said Petric.

    However, Germany has won five out of seven games against Croatia so far.

    ”The Germans are always favorites - and not only in the group. It could be possible that our last game against Poland will decide who’s going to the quarter-finals, but I hope we can secure our passage before that,” Petric added.

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    Sweden coach Lars Lagerback selected Henrik Larsson to play up front with Zlatan Ibrahimovic from Inter Milan, and two forwards’ fine cooperation generated the opener for Sweden in the 67th minute.

    Ibrahimovic dribbled forward fast to cracked the renowned Greekdefense line, with a one-two trick with Larsson, he found the far corner of the net with a powerful shot.

    As the Greeks were still stunned with the shot, Hansson came upwith another blow to Greece five minutes later.

    Sweden midfielder Fredrik Ljungberg had a shot blocked by Greekgoalkeeper Nikopolidis but in the following chaos, Hansson got in the right place to net Sweden’s second of the night, a decisive goal to Sweden with a sweet sleep.

    Tuesday’s clash was the first time for the two teams to encounter in a formal competition. In 1920, the two sides met in Olympic Games - a day Greeks want to forget- they were beaten 9-0.

    The overall pace of the match was not as low as many expected for this match, and the battle was tough.

    In the second minute, a very early yellow card went to Greek striker Angelos Charisteas for a foul on Hansson.

    In the seventh minute, the Greece’s Euro 2004 hero created their first chance.

    Charisteas, who plays for recently-relegated German club Nurnberg, battled his way into the penalty area and had the following shot stopped by Isaksson.

    During the first half, Zlatan Ibrahimovic also got several good chances but lost.

    In the 32nd minute. Ibrahimovic was very close to the opener. Alooping pass from the back ended up on the forward’s head and the ball went just over the crossbar.

    The first half of the game ended with a 0-0 draw.

    As both teams are known for formidable defense, a goalless draw would not have been a surprise and both sides had difficulty in breaking through the opposing defense.

    During the second half, Greeks turned up to be more offensive.

    In the 62nd minute, however, slackened Swedish defense gave Greek midfielder Georgios Karagounis two chances to shoot, but the Scandinavians blocked both attempts.

    Four minutes later ,danger was close to the Swedish goal as a Samaras cross was almost headed into his own goal by Hansson. Fortunately for Sweden, it went wide.

    Then it was high time for Ibrahimovic and Hansson to stage their show.

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Liverpool striker Dirk Kuyt is aiming to continue his recent good run of form to cement a place in Holland coach Marco van Basten’s Euro 2008 squad.

Kuyt was overlooked by Van Basten when he struggled for goals at Anfield earlier in the campaign but, if selected, would relish the opportunity to shine in Austria and Switzerland this summer.

“It happens only once every four years. It was no fun to me to not be selected for some games after three years. But I still hope to be there,” he said.

“I myself feel I am in good form. I had a lesser period, because of personal things. But I have put that behind me and it’s going fine again now.”

~Thank you breakingnews.iol.ie for the story

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Euro Cup - Spain Vs.
Russia    Stadion Tivoli Neu
Innsbruck, Austria    Tuesday
6/10/2008
6:00 PM
Euro Cup - Sweden Vs.
Spain    Stadion Tivoli Neu
Innsbruck, Austria    Saturday
6/14/2008
6:00 PM
Euro Cup - Greece Vs.
Spain    Stadion Salzburg
Salzburg, Austria    Wednesday
6/18/2008
8:45 PM
Euro Cup - Greece Vs.
Spain    EM Stadion
Wals-Siezenheim, Austria    Wednesday
6/18/2008
8:45 PM

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Uefa Champions League Final
Luzhniki Stadium
Moscow, Russia
Wednesday
5/21/2008
8:00 PM

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Switzerland Vs.
Czech Republic
St. Jakob-park
Basel, Switzerland
Saturday
6/7/2008
6:00 PM

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Euro Cup - Portugal Vs.
Turkey
Stade De Geneve
Geneva, Switzerlan
Saturday
6/7/2008
8:45 PM

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Euro Cup - Austria Vs.
Croatia
Ernst Happel Stadium
Vienna, Austria
Sunday
6/8/2008
6:00 PM

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It might have been under the radar but hey folks EURO 2008 is less than two months away.

Yeah I know what you’re probably saying, “Who cares it’s not the World Cup,” on the contra-ire, other than the World Cup this tournament has such spectacle that it comes a worthy second in the soccer tournament rankings, because let’s all be honest other than Argentina and Brazil who is a soccer powerhouse with tradition like the Europeans?

This tournament will kick off with the huge shocker coming from England who as you all know failed to qualify for the tournament that will kick off on June 9th and give room to some of the already favorites to take the European crown.

On this article I would like to concentrate on who will be winner in Austria & Switzerland with the top five of the Euro cup:

5. SPAIN: You know it has become kind of sad trying to criticize the Iberian side, after all of the great squads put in the World Cup and Euro Championships, but it seems like this team can’t win in a big stage not even if they paid off the refs.

But speaking also as a football expert this team is always so dangerous and … well can this be the year Raul, Fabregas, Torres and Casillas win something, watch out for the red fury, I pick them to go to the quarters.

4. FRANCE: Yes I said France, well I put them in number four as one of the favorites, of course never count out the French, but  I have to be honest this team has lost much of their juice from the 2006 World Cup, not to mention many players from that tournament.

They do have some interesting young players but it just might not be enough to match up with Europe’s best… then again BEWARE OF THE FRENCH!!!

I pick them to make the semi finals.

3. PORTUGAL: This team has been just phenomenal to be PORTUGAL.

Now let me explain something, I’m not knocking down the country and their football, but we all know that tradition wise Portugal is zero compared to: France, Italy and Germany just to name a few.

But in this past few years it has established itself as a football powerhouse, making the final in EURO 2004 in home soil  (loss to Greece) ,and the semi finals in the 2006 World cup (loss to France), plus having Cristiano Ronaldo can change your team just like that, I pick them to go to the semis.

2. ITALY: The World Champs… you all will think why aren’t they the number one favourite? Well I’m Italian… and I don’t mean son of Italians Italian, I mean born and raised so trust me it hurts me to say this, but I can’t see this team to repeat as champs, even though the competition is very slim now, Donadoni doesn’t really have a set squad yet, he changed too much and never formed a solid group.

On the other hand Toni has been on fire in Germany with Bayern Munich the same way he was the year before the World Cup, can this be deja vu all over again I hope so FORZA AZZURRI!!!

I pick them to be in the Final.

1. GERMANY (WINNERS): I think this time (unless things go wrong) Germany will take a title this year, because this team has been forming since the 2002 World Cup in Korea & Japan and it has grown so much, making the final that year (loss to Brazil) and making the semi final on home soil (loss to Italy).

Podolski, Klose, Ballack and company have no one else to match their group’s strength.

I pick them to be the European Champs!

~http://bleacherreport.com/articles/19021-EURO-2008-Preview-Who-will-Win-and-Who-Won-t-210408

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