So it was probably the most anticipated day of the competition so far – the (third) rematch between the two World Cup finalists. It was hyped pre-tournament as the group decider – but for first and second place, rather than potentially as low as third, depending on Holland and Romania. I was thrilled to see the game meaning so much to both teams, but once again France showed just how inflated their expectations were.
To be fair, they had a disastrous start. Franck Ribery was the one player they absolutely couldn’t afford to lose, but he succumbed to what looks like a really nasty ankle and knee injury (there’s no word yet on how long he’ll be out, but I’m guessing a good couple of months at least) after only seven minutes. The second disaster was entirely their fault, however – Eric Abidal (who despite noises from the BBC has proved himself in the past to be a competent centre-back as well as left-back) made a rash, doomed-to-failure challenge on Luca Toni in the penalty box for the clearest straight red I’ve seen in a while. It was at that point that Raymond Domenech proved there was no way back – he brought on Jean-Alain Boumsong to solve all their problems.
We should have seen this coming. France rested on their laurels far too much after a flattering trip to the World Cup final and relied on fast-fading old hands like Thuram, Makelele and Henry. The former two have now announced their international retirements (again), in the first of what must be a series of radical overhauls of the team. Benzema, Ribery and Nasri must become the focus, and Henry, Vieira, Govou, Sagnol, Coupet et al must be jettisoned.
In the game I didn’t see so much of (I caught a few minutes after it became clear that France-Italy wasn’t going anywhere), Holland’s second string (and what a second string it is, by the way) cruised to a 2-0 win over Romania, slicing through the defence that had caused so many problems to the French and Italians to further boost their hopes of going all the way. Their goals were far too easy, showing up the Romanians a tad, but Mutu et al will remain threats in World Cup qualifying.
So Italy set themselves up a mouth-watering quarter-final with Spain in what is probably the best result for the quality of the tournament. From what we’ve seen so far, though, you’d bet on Spain.
