The all-in-one consolidatory football thread Page 383

Loving the over-head camera shots.

What the hell is that blue tape on the back of the Croatian player's neck?

I was rather hoping Spain would go out and Croatia through. Spain looked rather ordinary today apart from the odd bit of silky flair.

You can never rely on anything as far as England are concerned and they are by no means certain of getting out of the group yet but I really believe that there's nothing to fear if we make the quarter-finals.

If we get Spain I wouldn't say they looked too scary against Croatia and they could even have got knocked out last night. The fact it was 0-0 until the last five minutes should show that it's possible England could hold their own.

Should we top the group and play Italy then again they are beatable if we're on our game. I'm not saying we're better but there's no reason why we can't match them.

Personally I don't think penalties would be bad thing, especially against the Spanish. The mental effects of the previous encounter would be at the back of the mind for both countries. Everyone knows how bad we've been so the pressure is more on Spain not to lose to us twice that way. The fact is, the law of averages states that our losing run has to end sometime so after four in a row surely we are due some luck.

So should we get through by being second in the group and should we negotiate the quarters we will be faced with either Portugal or the Czech Republic in Donetsk which England know well but the other two won't. The Czech's are definitely beatable and a match against Portugal could be truly epic. The players would certainly want revenge in that one and again, you have to feel that to lose three knock out games against the Portugese (especially if it's penalties) seems unlikely - they're not that much better than us.

It's the same if we play Germany though they clearly are better than us. We've lost two semis on penalties and some of the players will be hurting after the mauling they had in South Africa. We were totally outclassed that time but I can't help wondering what would've happened should Lampard's 'over the line' header had stood. It should've been 2-2 and we had momentum behind us.

Interestingly we could see a repeat of the Euro96 semi-finals and we've already got at least one quarter final match up from 16 years ago (Portugal v Czech Republic). Maybe this time it will be England and France that will triumph. Maybe we should look at the 2012 final as the third/fourth place play off for that tournament. Perhaps not...

So it's quite simple really; England to play France in the final in a repeat of the opening game. That's also a repeat of what happened between the Czech's and Germans at Euro96 where the Germans won both and it also panned out that way when Greece beat Portugal to win in 2004.

But England and France drew, what then? OMG Penalties...again!

Ukraine 0-1 England

Couldn't really give a f**k if we win or lose tbh

I'm still coming to terms with Bolton being in the fizzy pop league next season

I'm bolloxed if im gonna waste any tears on arseholes like Gerrard, Terry and Rooney

Come on England

But I could care less If we go out

Come on England!

Matt Lofthouse??

Keeper?

Are u pulling my pisser?

NAT Lofthouse was a striker

Hmmmm

I think you are..

Rooney misses a sitter from 4 yards

World class my anus

I blame his Elton John weave

Not great so far.

Haha!

Aye

He's got a shredded wheat glued to his noggin

Great decision. :D

This is agonising!

If they get a goal it's going to be torture