Just thought it'd be a good idea to have one topic for in-game discussions of all the matches at Euro 2008, saves space in the forum!
Haven't seen much of the action so far, but Romania are my favourites to do well as a dark horse, and they take on France today.
Lobont for Romania appears to be wearing the new Adidas F50 gloves and is sporting the popular F50 3/4 sleeve jersey in black/orange.
Coupet for France is wearing the new Uhlsport Akkurat glove.
France's team is quite surprising with Abidal picked over Evra, Malouda in and Anelka replacing Henry who had been an injury doubt.
As I type, Lobont has claimed an early high ball on the edge of his box, and looks comfortable.
Lobont takes another good cross, and that shirt looks so good!
the referee must have some sort of sponsorship deal, he's brandishing cards like nobody's business and won't let the game flow more than a minute without finding an infringement
Nothing Domenech does is surprising to me. In the past he's picked players based on astrology. Seriously.
it's been quite a dull match, but benzema looks a great talent.
lobont's just had to hustle to keep a wayward backpass from going for a corner, but neither keeper has made a notable save yet
Here in the Netherlands v Italy game, Buffon is showing off the new v1.08 tricks glove as mentioned in another thread.
He looked uncertain when challenging Van Nistelrooy for a high ball early on, then was somewhat fortunate not to concede a penalty as RVN rounded him in the box and opted to stay on his feet.
My reservations about Buffon were well founded - an awful punch from a free kick fell straight to a dutch player whose shot was turned in by an extremely offside Van Nistelrooy.
2-0 now as Buffon is beaten by a Sneijder volley at his near post
van Nistelrooy's goal wasn't offside - there was an Italian player behind the goal line, the one that Buffon blundered into. All the commentators seem to have missed that. If you're behind the line you're considered to still be in play, as far as offside is concerned, yes? Otherwise you could pull an offside trap simply by stepping off the pitch.
yeah, i was wondering what they were going on about. Nice 1v1 save by buffon just now.
- Aaron Vaught -
now of Roanoke Star Premier U18/19
as i posted on another forum:
still not sure if that's actually the case though.
that said, the offside law states that to be offside only one defending player must be closer to the goal than the attacker. technically panucci isn't closer to the goal if he's off the pitch.
all i can say, is that the oranje are playing with pure class. and have defantly outplayed a rather poor italian side.
and the dutch part of me is exstatic atm!
cardiffkeeper: that said, the offside law states that to be offside only one defending player must be closer to the goal than the attacker. technically panucci isn't closer to the goal if he's off the pitch.
The FIFA Law 11 states a player cannot intentionally go across the goal line to put an attacker in an offside position. Panucci didn't do it intentionally - but Buffon DID push/sling him across the line. So maybe that's the intent the ref saw. For me that's a perfectly good goal. It would seem massively unfair if you could put opponents offside just by shoving your defender off the pitch.