Arrivederci, it’s one on one! Official Euro 2020 (2021) Thread
Sane
All Star
Its coming home
Low End Derrick
Veteran
Is Timo Werner becoming the worse finisher of all time?
The amount of evidence piled up from club and international play is staggering...
I want this doofus off my squad
New country
New league
Worldwide pandemic
No family
Managerial change mid-season
Played out wide for a large portion of the season
All that, plus 27 goal contributions (Goals+Assists)
And then theres this:
I'd say he's not done too badly.
I imagine shyt like this makes it so hard to be an England fan.
Scum.I said this in the main football thread.
His attacking play was incredible, but in the 89th minute of a knockout international game where your team is 3-2 up, he should've had more situational awareness to know not to take multiple touches in the midfield, where the Swiss were pressing heavy.
Bboystyle
Bang Bang Packers gang!
New country
New league
Worldwide pandemic
No family
Managerial change mid-season
Played out wide for a large portion of the season
All that, plus 27 goal contributions (Goals+Assists)
And then theres this:
I'd say he's not done too badly.
I imagine shyt like this makes it so hard to be an England fan.
I said this in the main football thread.
His attacking play was incredible, but in the 89th minute of a knockout international game where your team is 3-2 up, he should've had more situational awareness to know not to take multiple touches in the midfield, where the Swiss were pressing heavy.
Breh, i follow Chelsea. The amount of times he has missed easy goals is staggering. U cant count on moving to a new league as an excuse. Dude suppose to be a professional.
And he sure as hell aint the reason they won the CL so that picture was useless
Low End Derrick
Veteran
Breh, i follow Chelsea. The amount of times he has missed easy goals is staggering. U cant count on moving to a new league as an excuse. Dude suppose to be a professional.
And he sure as hell aint the reason they won the CL so that picture was useless
Him getting into goal scoring positions often is a good sign. If Tuchel can work on his composure, I'm sure he will come good.
And I agree, he wasn't the sole reason why Chelsea won the CL, but he sure was a major reason why we did.
Bboystyle
Bang Bang Packers gang!
Him getting into goal scoring positions often is a good sign. If Tuchel can work on his composure, I'm sure he will come good.
And I agree, he wasn't the sole reason why Chelsea won the CL, but he sure was a major reason why we did.
Chelsea has been shyt at the striker position since Costa left that its causing posts like this to exist
These World War II references... these tea crumpet crackas really think Churchill was any better
shyt like this is why I can't stand when y'all start playing "which cacs are better".
thats the funniest shyt about this to me, im sure the people tweeting that think the british empire was a great time and good for all its coloniesThese World War II references... these tea crumpet crackas really think Churchill was any better
They got too confident. From the getgo their performance had been lacklusterNew country
New league
Worldwide pandemic
No family
Managerial change mid-season
Played out wide for a large portion of the season
All that, plus 27 goal contributions (Goals+Assists)
And then theres this:
I'd say he's not done too badly.
I imagine shyt like this makes it so hard to be an England fan.
I said this in the main football thread.
His attacking play was incredible, but in the 89th minute of a knockout international game where your team is 3-2 up, he should've had more situational awareness to know not to take multiple touches in the midfield, where the Swiss were pressing heavy.
Nero Christ
Sniper out now on all digital platforms brev
Obviously those comments are fukked up/disgraceful and should be rightly condemned but people need to get off their high horses about people cheering when it came on the screen, or laughing at her etc
All part of the game, Brazilians got tormented for years by gifs of that little lad crying after Germany smashed them. There’s countless examples of PL teams fans crying and people using them.
She’ll get over it, and one day she’ll see English kids crying and I wouldn’t begrudge her laughing.
In summary:
that point you made about no body feeling bad about laughing at the Brazilian kid crying compared to now does go to show how much things have change
Low End Derrick
Veteran
Chelsea has been shyt at the striker position since Costa left that its causing posts like this to exist
Imma leave it to Wrighty to summarise my point:
It was their final meal together. Didier Deschamps had to find the right words to address a group of players whose tournament had ended in despair and acrimony. The manager of France rose to his feet and told the players that he would be the public face of this failure, that he would take the blame for everybody and that he wanted to thank them for all they had done.
We know now that Deschamps intends to remain as manager despite all the stories linking Zinedine Zidane to the role since France were eliminated from Euro 2020. But that would not have come as a surprise to Deschamps’ players because he had already told them, over lunch at the Athenee Palace Hilton in Bucharest, that he had no intention of walking away.
He told them to remember the disappointment and make sure they put it right next time. He would see them in September, he said, to start again ahead of the World Cup. “Respect each other, always.”
It sounded like good advice at a time when stories were already beginning to circulate of an extraordinary scene in the moments directly after France’s defeat by Switzerland in a penalty shootout.
Television footage had caught Adrien Rabiot’s mother, Veronique, exchanging words with Kylian Mbappe’s father, Wilfried, about the penalty that had sealed France’s exit. She was doing most of the talking and it did not look too friendly.
Reports in France say she accused Mbappe of arrogance and said, in the bluntest terms, that his failure from 12 yards should bring him down a peg or two.
“It is embarrassing how he struck that, for a player of his level. He hit it too lightly. I hope you are going to scold him.”
Other witnesses reported that Veronique had already clashed with members of Paul Pogba’s family and informed them the Manchester United player was culpable for Switzerland’s late goal that drew the sides level at 3-3.
There have been other stories about divisions within the dressing room, friction between players and a lack of togetherness that can be demonstrated, perhaps, by the fact Raphael Varane, Antoine Griezmann and Clement Lenglet were allowed to fly off on holidays rather than travelling back with the rest of the squad, as is the norm.
These always tend to be the moments when the finger-pointing starts and the players try to find excuses, but the players of France always seem to find a way to take it to the next level.
One of their issues from Euro 2020 was that they did not feel settled at their Marriott hotel in Budapest and, barring one evening on the rooftop bar, did not have enough opportunities to relax together. Apparently, some of the players were unhappy about their city-centre location and wanted more luxurious facilities. One complaint was that the bedroom windows did not fully open.
The squad were initially meant to move to Gardony, 40 miles south, after their group game against Hungary and take up residence in a hotel on the shores of Lake Velence. Instead, they remained in Budapest to play their final group game against Portugal. According to a near-forensic post-mortem in the French sports daily L’Equipe, Pogba had made it clear to Deschamps that the players “hated” the accommodation and wanted to leave as soon as possible.
That in itself is typical of what can happen when a group of elite footballers who are used to a certain kind of luxury do not have everything exactly as they wish. And France are certainly not the only football nation that leave themselves open sometimes to accusations of being prima donnas.
When England stayed at the £500-a-night Auberge du Jeu de Paume in Chantilly for Euro 2016, one member of Roy Hodgson’s staff complained that — no kidding — the pillows were too plump. New pillows were found. Then the same member of staff turned up at reception to say he had another issue. This time, it was because the air conditioning was too fierce for his liking.
With France, however, the recriminations after a bad tournament always go that bit further and, in this case, involve some remarkable scenes in the part of the stadium where the players’ families and friends had tickets.
“Rabiot’s mother is known to be very sensitive and very close to her son and she didn’t appreciate what Pogba’s friends were saying about one of Adrien’s touches,” says one well-placed source with inside knowledge of the French camp. “So she blamed Pogba for the loss of the ball in midfield (leading to Switzerland’s third goal). Then she went to Mbappe’s father, ‘You better take care of your son because he has a big head and too much protection from the press and I think he’s arrogant’. So it’s a mess and she is well known for that at Paris Saint-Germain and Juventus.”
If you know the recent history of the France team, perhaps it should come as no surprise that Rabiot has been brought into it.
This was the player, after all, who reacted to being left out of Deschamps’ squad for the 2018 World Cup by refusing to go on an 11-man standby list and sending an email to the French football federation to criticise the manager’s selection process.
Rabiot, who had six caps at the time, had been omitted in favour of Steven N’Zonzi, the former Stoke City and Blackburn Rovers player, and made his feelings clear with a post on Instagram: “Since my first call-up, I’ve played 88 matches for PSG, a big European club, including 13 in the Champions League. I’ve scored nine goals and won seven trophies… there is no sporting logic behind the coach’s choice.”
Deschamps called it an “enormous error” and punished the player, now of Juventus, by leaving him out for two years. The matter was discussed as high as the France president, Emmanuel Macron. And if you have always found it strange that Deschamps was so reluctant to select Aymeric Laporte, it is worth noting that the Manchester City centre-half, who has now switched allegiances to play for Spain, publicly backed Rabiot with an emoji applauding his former France Under-21 team-mate.
“For a professional footballer, playing in a World Cup is the pinnacle,” Matt Spiro, the Paris-based author, wrote in Sacre Bleu, his book about the evolution of the France national team. “That Rabiot had sabotaged even a slender chance of fulfilling that ambition incensed Deschamps. It was impossible for him to comprehend.”
It is also fair to say that Madame Rabiot has a reputation in French football for being difficult, to say the least, and that the media in her country have caricatured her — unfairly, you might believe — as a result. One cartoon in L’Equipe, published just before the World Cup, shows her and her son on the beach, discussing France’s 2-0 win in a pre-tournament friendly against the Republic of Ireland.
Veronique’s speech bubble says, “If you had played against Ireland, you’d have caught a really bad cold.”
For a large part of Rabiot’s career, she has acted as his agent. Rabiot reportedly ended that arrangement after a move to Barcelona fell through in 2019 and there have been numerous stories of her taking on the football establishment.
At one point, she wrote to Deschamps to complain that her son was not being picked enough. Or there was the time when PSG would not let her accompany her son on a trip to Qatar midway through his first season. Outraged, Veronique took up a position outside Carlo Ancelotti’s office, waiting for the coach to arrive so she could let him know exactly what she thought of it.
One report of the confrontation on Monday night suggested that it may have started after members of Pogba’s entourage reacted so aggressively to a mistake from Rabiot, the stewards inside Bucharest’s National Arena had to tell them to calm down.
The dispute involving Veronique is said to have lasted, on and off, for 20 minutes, including a “heated exchange” with Mbappe’s mother, Fayza Lamari. The families of the other French players were reportedly “shocked” by Veronique’s conduct and particularly the timing of it, having just watched the team crash out of the tournament.
But it is also worth knowing the background here and one of the reasons, perhaps, why she is so protective of her son and takes such a prominent role in his career, representing him in all his contract negotiations and regularly speaking on his behalf in the media. She, indeed, negotiated his first professional contract when he was a teenager, sitting face-to-face with PSG sporting director Leonardo.
In 2007, when Rabiot was a 12-year-old in the youth system at US Creteil, his father, Michel, suffered a stroke that left him with locked-in syndrome, a condition that meant he was completely paralysed. Michel, a PSG supporter who used to run his son to youth-team matches, was left in a wheelchair and could communicate only by moving his eyelids. He died in January 2019.
“What you have to understand here is her background,” says one person with close knowledge of the family. “She singlehandedly raised three boys with a handicapped husband, and I mean seriously handicapped. Her husband was in hospital most of Adrien’s life. He was very poorly. He had his brain but could not talk. He was in a coc00n. This woman suffered a lot.
“She stands her ground. She goes overboard but she raised her boys and took her son everywhere for football, no matter if it was minus five degrees and snow. And she is an honest woman. She gives money to church. She was (from a) very poor upbringing. She is really hard-nosed. She is not a prima donna. She gives back to people who helped her before. Is she too loud? Yes. But she has a lot of baggage. The context is everything. She is not a bad person. And she will always defend her son to death.”
For her part, Madame Rabiot told confidantes on Wednesday that she felt she had been unfairly treated and stitched up by the French media.