European champions Spain remain undefeated

Another European Championship has come and gone, and yes, Spain are still Champions. Italy flew under the radar to the final as Germany’s promising youngsters failed to live up to their billing. For Holland, overcoming their “anti-football” performance at the World Cup proved too much, and for England, well, it was penalties, wasn’t it…

The group stage started with co-hosts Poland taking on 2004 winners Greece and ended with Sweden shocking France to ensure England took top spot in Group D, meaning they missed Spain in the quarter finals. In between this, we had 60 goals, three red cards and an £80,000 fine for Nicklas Bendtner after he broke advertising rules displaying some Paddy Power pants. Holland left without a point, both co-hosts went out and the un-fancied Greece made it through the groups.

The quarter-finals saw Portugal take on the Czech Republic, where Ronaldo finally stepped up to the plate and headed his side into the semi-finals. Germany strolled to a 4-2 victory over Greece to ensure a repeat of 2004 was not going to happen. Spain played without a striker, still beat France 2-0, and Pirlo did this to help Italy progress against England:

 

The first semi-final had holders Spain against rivals Portugal, the Portuguese game plan worked and they themselves had chances to win, but it was on penalties that Spain prevailed, with Fabregas taking the deciding kick, denying Ronaldo his moment of glory.

 

The second semi-final was pre-tournament favourites Germany, up against the Pirlo. Not many gave Italy a hope but it was the pantomime postman Mario Balotelli who delivered, his two first-half goals were too much for Joachim Low’s side, who repeated their World Cup showing by bowing out at the semi-final stage.

 

 

And so, it was Spain vs Italy for the 2012 European Championships, and some even thought Italy could pip the Spanish. After all, they had hardly dazzled so far and some were questioning the “tiki-taka” method that produced boring football. On the night, it was one step too far for Italy as Spain played a master class, producing the type of football that left everybody astounded.

 

David Silva opened the scoring after good work by Fabregas, Barcelona’s latest signing Jordi Alba made it 2-0. Fernando Torres then got in on the act, before setting up his Chelsea team-mate Juan Mata, whose first touch of the entire tournament was a goal.

 

The 4-0 victory was the largest score line in history; Spain became the first team to win two European Championships and a World Cup in consecutive years, Fernando Torres became the first player to score in two finals and Iker Casillias still hasn’t conceded a goal in the knock-out stages of a major tournament since 2004.

Credit must go to Cesare Prandelli and his Italian team for reaching the final, but in the end, Spain were simply the better team. The best ever even.

 

 

 

Winner: Spain

Runners Up: Italy

Dark horses: Italy

Biggest Flop: Holland

Top scorer: Fernando Torres

Star player: Andres Iniesta

 

 

Well done to Alex Smith, Matthew O’Brien and James Fuller, who all predicted that Spain would win the tournament. Myself, Adam Appleton, Leke Sanusi and editor Ramis Cizer all proved how much we know by backing Holland to win.

 

Not one member of the team had Italy down as the dark horses, but Raffi Salama, James Fuller, Derek Baker and Joanna Kamenou all had Italy as the biggest predicted flop of the tournament. Infact, all of the sports staff’s biggest flop predictions all made it past the group stages.

 

After just 189 minutes of action, Fernando Torres took home the golden boot with three goals and an assist, and Joanna correctly predicted El Nino would win the gong. Special mentions go to Ramis Cizer and Laurence Taylor who both had Mario Gomez as top scorer who also finished with the same figures as Torres, but missed out due to playing more minutes.

 

The star player award could so easily have gone to Pirlo, but Iniesta stole the show when it mattered most and was the stand-out player in Spain’s “boring” route to the final. Laurence and James rightly put the Barcelona man down as the star man, while the majority had one of Holland’s flops as the player of the tournament.

 

The Upcoming’s Mystic Meg: James Fuller (2 correct predictions)

The Upcoming’s Mark Lawrenson: Raffi Salama, Ramis Cizer, Dean Mears, Derek Baker, Leke Sansui, Adam Appleton and George Milburn (0 correct predictions)