Welcome to the preview of Group C (Group of Death) of Euro 2008
France: Ranked 7th on the world according to FIFA world ranking. Qualified to EURO along with Italy from a group consisted of SCO/UKR/LTU/GEO/FRO. France are facing Italy again after a heated rivalry in qualification stage and the World cup 2006 final. Soccer analysts thought that the French legacy will disappear after the retirement of their legend Zinedine Zidane, but France proved all the doubters wrong by showing a great performance during their qualification stage. Not only France were drawn with Italy, they will also face the Netherlands and the emerging Romania. The question is will Frank Ribery cover Zidane’s place and add a 3rd European trophy to France?
Italy: Ranked 3rd on the world according to FIFA world ranking. Qualified to EURO along with France from a group consisted of SCO/UKR/LTU/GEO/FRO. The world cup champions will enter this competition under the pressure of being the world champions. After being drawn in the toughest group in EURO 2008, the Italians will rely on their defense and the best goalkeeper in the world Gianluigi Buffon to win this competition. Italy were always criticized of not having a consistent goal scorer, but this year they have the on fire Luca Toni who scored 24 goals in the Bundesliga and 10 goals in Uefa cup competition finishing the top goal scorer in both competitions. The Italians are looking to win this competition since they only won it once and it was long time ago (1968). The question is will Italy continue their glory and win EURO 2008 just 2 years after winning the world cup?
Netherlands: Ranked 10th on the world according to FIFA world ranking. Qualified to EURO along with Romania from a group consisted of BUL/BLR/ALB/SVN/LUX. Although the Netherlands have never won the world cup and only won the EURO once in 1988, they were always considered as one of soccer giants. The Dutch always produced a fine performance in most competitions they participated in. Some say that Holland lack of luck is the reason of not winning major trophies. Before the announcement of the Netherlands squad, the Dutch were rocked by the announcement of Clarence Seedorf who said that he won’t be participating in EURO 2008. Recently the Dutch were also shocked by the injury of Ryan Babel, which ruled him out of this competition. The question is will the Dutch find the remedy to cure their curse of bad luck and win EURO 2008?
Romania: Ranked 12th on the world according to FIFA world ranking. Qualified to EURO along with Holland from a group consisted of BUL/BLR/ALB/SVN/LUX. Romania are being drawn with three soccer giants (France, Italy and Netherlands) and most of the world think that Romania will not be capable compete with these teams. In fact Romania drew 0-0 away and won 1-0 home against the Netherlands during the qualification stage and they finished as the group leaders. With the likes of Cristian Chivu and Adrian Mutu in their team, Romania are the black horse of this tournament and they may go far in this competition. The scope will be on Adrian Mutu who helped Fiorentina to clinch a champions league birth over AC Milan with 17 goals in Serie A. Romania were drawn in a group of death in EURO 2000 consisting of Portugal, England and Germany and they were able to escape this group by clinching the 2nd spot over England and Germany. The question is will Romania prison break EURO 2008 and escape from Group C prison?
Saturday, May 31, 2008
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