RealGM

@ndrew wrote:Россия! Россия!

Russia vpered! Bring Those Istalians!

Or Spain, Come on man, i got Spain on my brackets

I was trying to mix it up - Ispaly - that's better

I feel bad for Dutchies. They constantly bring up helluva talent, play amazing football early on but cant seem to finish the job later stages. Especially feel for Van Basten, one of my all time favorites. Still, their group stage performance will stay as greatest ever.

Russia was very impressive, it seems like they get better as tournament progress. I expected a boom from them sometime soon but not in this tournament. It seems like eastern European teams becoming big force in European football, you ll hear lot more upcoming years from teams like Russia, Turkey and Croatia. All young, courageous, good attacking teams.

Russia-Turkey final, you heard it here first

oh, and Hiddink=GOD. Somewhere, Abramovich must be second guessing himself.

Russia-Turkey final, you heard it here first

My head will explode if that happens.

Man russia is playing amazing. They tottaly outplayed the dutch in their own game.

Im glad I share the same name as Roman Pavlyuchenko. lol

The Russians did out play the Dutch, and really the Russians IMO missed some scoring opportunities in regulation time I feel they should have converted.

ElTurco wrote:
oh, and Hiddink=GOD. Somewhere, Abramovich must be second guessing himself.

How is that ? You mean that he didn´t get him to Chelsea ?

Abramovich also played a large role in bringing Guus Hiddink to Russia to coach the Russia national football team.[24] Piet de Visser, a former head scout of Hiddink's club PSV Eindhoven and now a personal assistant to Abramovich at Chelsea, recommended Hiddink to the Chelsea owner.[25]

Russia national team >>> Chelsea on a russian´s "what is important" list

Outstanding play by the Russians and a well deserved win. They did exactly that what other teams should have done before. Put pressure on the entire team and leave Boularouhz open. Early on you saw that Boularouhz had no clue how and were to pass the ball to and made a lot of mistakes.
This gave the Russians the time to get their rhytm and flow going.

The Russians forced the Dutch into errors and moved incredibly well (all of them) as opposed to the Dutch showing the vulneribality of the Dutch defense. Their defense is fully able to handle to handle some very great strikers as long as they do not move to much or face players like they have themselves (Robben and Van Persie for Example).

Some great efforts by Van der Sar and good play by Nigel de Jong this game I would say. The rest not too impressed.

The ref lost it by the way from minute ninety. He absoluty should have sent Kolodin off even if he awarded the goal kick to the Russians. The guy committed a nasty foul which was worthy of a yellow card and I do not see any reason why he should witdraw that.
Then in regulation time Heitinga committed a foul which was clearly a penalty I would say and the ref did not award that (maybe he knew he wrong with the yellow card?)

All in all a deserving win for the Russians though and they are team I will root for the remainder of the tournament.

On Hiddink;
If you do not know his trackrecord as coach of national teams;
Quarter finals EURO 96 with the Netherlands
4th place finish WC 98 with the Netherlands (some outstanding play that tournament)
4th place finisch WC 02 with South Korea (a true achievement with granted him honary citizenship of South Korea I believe and a lot other nice goodies like free flying with Korea Airlines the rest of his life)
Second round WC 06 with Australia (1-0 loss to Italy I believe in the second round, first world cup appearance in the 32 years for Australia)

And now Russia Semi Finals at the EURO 08

In the period in between WC 02 and WC 06 he coached PSV Eindhoven and led them to three consecutive national championships and some very good play in the Champions League as well.

Dutch wrote:On Hiddink;
If you do not know his trackrecord as coach of national teams;
Quarter finals EURO 96 with the Netherlands
4th place finish WC 98 with the Netherlands (some outstanding play that tournament)
4th place finisch WC 02 with South Korea (a true achievement with granted him honary citizenship of South Korea I believe and a lot other nice goodies like free flying with Korea Airlines the rest of his life)
Second round WC 06 with Australia (1-0 loss to Italy I believe in the second round, first world cup appearance in the 32 years for Australia)

And now Russia Semi Finals at the EURO 08

In the period in between WC 02 and WC 06 he coached PSV Eindhoven and led them to three consecutive national championships and some very good play in the Champions League as well.

yeah hiddink really amazes me. that run in 2002 by korea was reeeeeaaaaally impressive.
I'm not sure how the shape of the players is prior to Hiddink's arrivals but he's emphasizing physical fitness. the koreans back in 2002 were in a great shape. they probably had the best stamina of all teams recently.

Beatiful match , the better team this time won . Congrtas to Russia , they played incredible football . They coul've score atleast 5 goals , they have problems with scoring the easy opportunitys.