Flipping Gareth Bale. Sure he can do an overhead kick in a Champions league final for Evil Madrid but a tap in past the goalie for Wales? Not a chance.
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Wales weren't good enough at all tonight. Too many passes were misplaced, many of them fired at teammates while crosses were put in far too weakly and inaccurately. There was a lack of organisation, composure and basic idea of what kind of football we want to play.
I'm not sure how much can be blamed on Giggs and how much the players (a lot of whom seem to be off form at the end of a long season or simply playing too few games for their clubs) but the former could start to come under a lot of pressure now.
The bizarre insistence on playing Brooks wide right for much of the game when he's a central playmaker and Ramsey replacement (albeit a lesser one) seems a managerial misstep and never allowing James to swap wings and play off his stronger right foot for even short periods of the game is perverse.
The goal was a series of errors; Szalai had got nothing out of Williams all game but managed to get himself against Lawrence who he held off too easily. Even then the otherwise impeccable Davies managed to crash in to the tangle of those two players rather than deal with the loose ball. He still managed to get a head to it but to no avail.
We'd had our best period of the game for twenty minutes prior but let ourselves down with a lack of quality, for the Bale chance, Lawrence should have shot first time himself or put in a quick, low, accurate cross but did neither - even then Bale should have done better with it.
Gareth needs a summer off, to get the fuck away from Madrid (a season too late, it's now clear in retrospect), sign for a Champions League team and hope he gets his fitness and mojo back.
An absolutely fantastic five day trip but going home with no points from it when we might have had four is galling. Teams will all take points off each other in this group so it's not over for us yet but we can't afford to lose another game and might have to win all of them to qualify.Last edited by Ray de Galles; 12-06-2019, 01:01.
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Italy and Finland seems sewn up in their group. Portugal need to avoid defeat in both Ukraine and Serbia then win their other 4 games v Luxembourg and Lithuania. Netherlands v NI H&A might be a virtual play-off.
ROI, Denmark, Switzerland looks a weak trio fighting over two combs.Last edited by Satchmo Distel; 12-06-2019, 01:04.
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With the Wales group, it's worth noting that no side has yet picked up an away point other than in Azerbaijan. In fact, any side dropping points against Azerbaijan will probably struggle to qualify. Slovakia won 5-1 there last night, to complete a satisfactory enough few days for them.
Marek Hamsik's fortunes are an interesting contrast to Bale's ; he scored his 23rd and 24th international goals last night to add the Slovakia all-time goalscoring record to the appearance record he already held. Of course, Hamsik is a player who did decide to leave a Champions League club - quitting Napoli in January after more than 11 years in order to play in China.
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Ha ha, that bemused me too. I was sure/hoping that we'd launch a new change kit (ideally in yellow and green which Adidas could do a lovely job with) for these two games but it didn't happen, (even though the current change shirt is being knocked out for £20 everywhere).
Given that, I can understand why Croatia wore their change kit given our two options are red and white but surely Hungary would have insisted we wear white/green/white (or all white if this one block of colour thing is still being forced on us).
I imagine a lighter coloured kit may have helped marginally with the temperatures, particularly for the afternoon game with Croatia in a stadium completely exposed to the elements and 30 degree temperatures (not that I'm offering that as any excuse).Last edited by Ray de Galles; 13-06-2019, 08:54.
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Originally posted by Ray de Galles View PostSpain 0-1 up in Romania through a Ramos penalty.
Have now watched the last ten minutes of the first half notable mostly for a great save from a shot byAlcacer and Reading's Puscas giving Busquets a really unpleasant elbow in the mouth
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I've been flicking between the matches and the T20 quarter-final but the one angle I've seen on the Puscas elbow it didn't look deliberate.
I didn't see the penalty incident either, just it being converted.Last edited by Ray de Galles; 05-09-2019, 19:54.
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