The Dutch were more Sunny Delight than Freshly Squeezed!
10/06/12 02:28
Footcall 2012 Day 2...
Well here we are, day two of Euro 2012 and day two of Footcall VII. Hopefully you all received the email earlier regarding the new features of the Hall of Fame on the website along with the added dimension of the new divisions we have put you in to give you a more focused view of just a few fellow Footcall competitors. I've had one feedback message from one of our Scottish players regarding the names assigned to each division (being the England World Cup '66 winning squad) I can only apologise for this and I wish that player all the best for their success in this year's Footcall as I know that will be the only comfort for him at the end of the tournament :-)
And so to the matches...
The early kick off saw red hot favourites the Dutch take on outsiders Denmark. Despite having much of the possession, the Netherlands huffed and puffed without blowing the door down only to see Michael Krohn-Dehli take a rather surprising lead for the Danes. He latched on to stray ball in the Dutch box, rounded the desperate defender and nutmegged the keeper. Not too sure this was his intention but it was effective none-the-less! Now came 65 more minutes of the Dutch pushing for an equaliser but to no avail. Sneijder, Van Persie and Robben all had their chances, even hitting the woodwork at one point but sadly no goal came and Denmark have caused what must be one of the biggest upsets in the tournament already.
Of course 99.99% of Footcallers had their faith in the Orange army and only three (yes three) players had Denmark to win so Simon Clark, Leanne Maloney and Chris Read took any points from this match. Well done guys, those points picked up where nobody else scores are quite valuable at the end of the day. As for the rest of us, we can only hope Holland pull their socks up as the general consensus has a lot of backing behind their results.
The evening match saw the star studded Germans take on Portugal who really only have Ronaldo to orchestrate their attack. The Portuguese looked as if they were parking the bus with 10 men behind the ball soaking up the German onslaught. Fair play to Germany they took the fight to them by spreading it wide and eventually carving out an opportunity for Mario Gomez to tuck one away. Maybe this would open the floodgates but the opportunities came and went with the Portuguese hitting the underside of the bar then down off the line a-la England 1966 the only difference was there was no Russian linesman to award this one and this time round the Germans got away with it (the fact was the ball never crossed the line anyway). Gomez had another chance to put the game out of site but Portugal rode it out. Finally the whistle blew and it remained 1-0 to Germany.
Well despite many of us having Germany to win, only 9 players predicted a one nil scoreline. The perfect threes include William Relf, Steve Russell, Mark "the tweet" Pedler, me ol mucker Matt Green and Mick Mallion strides into the top 20. Richard Goodwin also picks up a red square along with new boy Tat-Wah and they are pushing into the top 10. But two players stand aloft the Footcall table, Nathaniel Ridley and Spencer "I can't believe it" Collins (he really can't believe it it). Let's see if they can consolidate their positions tomorrow.
That'll do for now, it's been a long day!
Dj