Euro 2008 Group D Jun 2

[aliando]

Wales v Czech Republic (15:00 BST)

5.60

3.75

1.80

101%

Germany v San Marino (18:00 BST)

1.01

85.00

320.00

101%

[aliando]

Re: Euro 2008 Group D Jun 2 wales v czech republic well what can be made of the 2-2 draw with new zealand last saturday? it was a friendly, but one that featured probably close to our best team given current availability. likely team to start v czechs (assuming we take a 5-4-1 formation) GK: Coyne LB: joe ledley RB: sam ricketts CD: danny gabbidon CD: james collins CD: lewis nyatanga LW: ryan giggs RW: simon davies CM: carl robinson CM: jason koumas F: craig bellamy :unsure oh dear! GK coyne is carrying a knock and is a slight doubt. should he not be fit, the choices are wayne hennessey (wolves keeper who went to stockport and kept the record number of consecutive clean sheets), lewis price (ipswich) or jason brown. hennessey, despite looking promising, is a rookie who is likely to lack the experience needed in a game like this. Price had similar expectations a couple of years back and has not appeared to have continued progressing as wished. Brown missed the friendly due to family reasons and ? will be match-sharp following warming blackburns bench for so long. If coyne is fit, then he should be first choice, which is a shame cos he aint that good anyway! defence gabbidon was shocking against new zealand but this doesnt surprise me - having watched him so many times for the city (cardiff) when he was with us, he played well in the big games and shite in the little ones - he needs the pressure to perform. However, it was clear to everyone that he desperately lacked first team games following returning from injury. As much as toshack is a complete twat, he was right to get gabby playing 90 mins against the kiwis for the interest of gabby's fitness - he knows as well as any welshman that gabby is the key to wales defence in this game. collins too is returning from injury but does not look in quite as bad a shape! having played at the city and the hammers together, they should be able to organize the defence between them and should have lewin nyatanga alongside them to help out. He's a good young player and hopefully his age wont count against him, but with the experience of gabby and collins, he should be ok. RB is a tricky one and perhaps sam ricketts will fill in here - normally plays on the left but can run all day luckily as he cant do fcuk all else. joe ledley will probably sit in the left back role - normally a midfielder but can do a decent enough job back there and has done so fairly regularly for the city. Bale is almost certainly out of this game. midfield defensively, savage will play no part due to toshack being a twat so carl robinson will cover this spot. robinson was praised for his good performace against new zealand but having watched the game, i can only assume that he was rated this highly because he was awake. Giggs will play left wing/supporting striker and should be motivated (he says politely) because its his last game (good riddance). Simon Davies I expect to play on the right, but may as well just sit down and watch the game as he is so often anonymous in a welsh shirt. Carl (shit) fletcher played (i use the term loosely) against new zealand sitting in central midfield with robinson (perhaps thats why they gave robbo such high marks) and was inneffective. I'm assuming that given the 5-4-1 formation, a more attack/mobile/useful player will be picked and koumas (unavailable due to play offs last weekend) should fill this role. He's had another good season at club level, but still just needs that extra something at international level against top sides. forward craig bellamy - you know the one, plays for liverpool, very fast, gobby and throws his toys out of the pram if the supporting play aint up to his standards. He's also 4 foot nothing, so given a lone striker role, we can assume there may be a touch of 'long-ball' about wales technique. at this point, i shall surprise you all and state that i feel the czechs may win this! There is little class amongst our ranks at the moment that can be classed as experienced and fit. The game against new zealand was nothing other than embarressing and I fully expect wales to shift up a gear or two for this game. but that wont be enough i feel. we have a good record in big games at home over the years - but that was under managers not called john toshack. his home meaningful home results are follws; 0-2 v austria 0-0 v slovenia 0-1 v england 2-0 v azerbijan 1-5 v slovakia 3-1 v cyprus 3-0 v san marino impressed? i thought you would be! should we call on other players, then we cannot be assured of quality - of the players not mentioned above, we have a selection of young players from leagues 1 & 2 who are not all highly thought of in their own leagues nevermind against the czechs. looking at the czechs (although hopefully someone like tulenos can give us good info re: their team), their away record of late looks a tad better; 0-2 v belgium 1-1 v ireland 0-3 v slovakia plus friendly wins. In fact they have not been beaten away since sept 05 when losing to romania (although they've not had that many away games). the czechs currently sit second in the table;

		Team	Total	Won	Draw	Lost	GS-GA	Pts.
1.		Germany	5	4	1	0	21 - 3	13
2.		Czechia	6	4	1	1	15 - 4	13
3.		Ireland Republic	7	4	1	2	12 - 8	13
4.		Slovakia	6	3	0	3	15 - 11	9
5.		Wales	5	2	0	3	8 - 9	6
6.		Cyprus	6	1	1	4	9 - 16	4
7.		San Marino	5	0	0	5	1 - 30	0

whilst themselves and germany are expected to go through, i cannot see the czechs wanting to risk an unfancied irish team challenging them for second spot - they will want 3 points here (and really speaking they should be expecting 3 points here). Overall, I expect wales efforts to be significantly improved from last saturday. Key players are returning/playing and its at home for giggs last game in a welsh shirt. However, there are fitness doubts through the welsh team and defensively the side looks shaky at present. The czechs are a vastly superior side overall and will be looking for the 3 points. Wales do not tend to get beaten badly in the big games - underdog is a tag that suits us. Therefore, I'm suggesting bets on the correct score market to gain a bit of value (the 1.80 offered as best odds, is a little lower than i'd have liked) - the czechs to win, but marginally. Correct score: czechs to win 1-0 - 7.40 @ betfair Correct score: czechs to win 2-0 - 9.00 @ betfair Correct score: czechs to win 2-1 - 9.00 @ ladbrokes

[nastro 1888]

Re: Euro 2008 Group D Jun 2 just wait a minute ali !!!!!!! you get a section with a piss-up in dublin, a piss-up in prague, a piss-up in germany ( cheap flights as well btw !! ) and a week in cyprus for away games and your worried about formations ?????????????? :spank :dude worra section !!

[aliando]

Re: Euro 2008 Group D Jun 2

just wait a minute ali !!!!!!! you get a section with a piss-up in dublin, a piss-up in prague, a piss-up in germany ( cheap flights as well btw !! ) and a week in cyprus for away games and your worried about formations ?????????????? :spank :dude worra section !!

:lol:lol:lol we got toshack :cry

[kelven]

Re: Euro 2008 Group D Jun 2 i believe in giggs and bellamy, they can at least help wales to get one point at home

[nastro 1888]

Re: Euro 2008 Group D Jun 2 Carlsberg dont make up Euro-championship sections for the best piss-ups in Europe.......... but if they did...... :lol

[888]

Re: Euro 2008 Group D Jun 2

Sport	Football (Internationals)
Event	Wales vs Czech
Selection	Over 2.5 Goals
Strength	8/10
Date	02/06/2007
Bookmaker/Price	Pinnacle Sports @ 2.04 (Back)
Reasoning	Last game for Giggs and Wales' chance to qualify is quite tough I would say. However, this is good for Wales since they would not need to play this one under pressure. Wales also have a good tendency to score a lot when playing international games at home, just look at their latest 5 matches at home all over 2.5. Moreover, they met Czech republic earlier and the TG was over 2.5 too ( Czech win 2 - 1 ) 26.05.2007 Friendly Wales - New Zealand 2:2 28.03.2007 Euro 2008 Qual Wales - San Marino 3:0 14.11.2006 Friendly Wales - Liechtenstein 4:0 11.10.2006 Euro 2008 Qual Wales - Cyprus 3:1 07.10.2006 Euro 2008 Qual Wales - Slovakia 1:5 Its very hard to see who will win this match but goalfest can be expected with Giggs will give all his best today and Wales defender should have some problems against Czech giant strikers in the air.

[blackcrow]

Re: Euro 2008 Group D Jun 2 Germany -6.5 The Germans have already smashed San Marino by 13-0 in the away game and now will look to better that score. The coach has gone on recorsd that he wants to beat the record number of goals scored by Germany of 16, so there is an incentive for the Germans to go out there and score at least 7 for us

[Punto Banco]

Re: Euro 2008 Group D Jun 2

Germany -6.5 The Germans have already smashed San Marino by 13-0 in the away game and now will look to better that score. The coach has gone on recorsd that he wants to beat the record number of goals scored by Germany of 16, so there is an incentive for the Germans to go out there and score at least 7 for us

Ouch.... Germany win 6-0....:eyes

[deeloughran]

Re: Euro 2008 Group D Jun 2 Add to that San Marino played a long period with 10 men...They seemed to be putting up a good fight with the 11 men with it being 1-0 up to a minute before they had the player sent off (after half time). What a result for us the Irish, would like to thank all the Welsh :nana:ok:cow

[aliando]

Re: Euro 2008 Group D Jun 2 listened to bits of the game on the radio in work - sounded like the czechs showed up to take a point :@

[deeloughran]

Re: Euro 2008 Group D Jun 2 They sure did, though the Welsh didn't really push forward much either, leaving Bellamy upfront on his own until the 88thmin bringing Earnshaw on (probably just to give Giggs a standing ovation). The match itself was pretty dull, though Wales defensively were pretty solid and had Koller man marked out of the game.