YOBBO ON EURO: GROUP STAGE DAY THE END
Russia suck at football. The last time they lasted beyond the first round of any international tournament, they still had 'CCCP' on their shirts, most of their 2008 starting side were in Communist standard issue cloth nappies, and President-For-Life Vladimir Put In (named after what his under nines union coach used to scream when he was late turning up to the breakdown) was still applying high voltage to dissidents' undercarriage in the name of information gathering for the KGB. That's twenty years of biennial tournaments since they've done anything other than turn up, play three bad games of football, go home, have potatoes thrown at them. And having been torn an exciting range of new arseholes by the Spanish in their first group game, then flatulated past the Greeks with of the dreariest 1-0 wins since old-skool Italy were punishing their way around the world, any change in plan looked unlikely at best. Prognosis: fucked.
However three men conspired to avert yet more potato abuse for the Russian side, leading them to a dominating two-blot win over the stagnant Swedes this morning and with it depositing the pride of Mother Russia into the quarterfinals. One you may remember as Aussie Guus Hiddink, Dutch coaching veteran with a knack for taking unfashionable teams deep into the knockout stages of international tournaments. Guus' work in turning a horrible side in the Spain game into one which made the well-credentialled Swedes look like England without the talent (i.e. England) ranks alongside his transformation of the South Koreans from tardy Asian middleweights to World Cup giant-slayers in 2002.
A Russian bloke called Roman figures as the second key man, though it's not Abramovich of Chelsea - though the buckets of coin he chipped in to pay Guus were probably useful - but Pavlyuchenko of Spartak Moscow, scorer of half Russia's goals to date. Which is two of four. Not exactly Archie Thompson against Samoa then, but just see how far the bastards would have got without him.
The last is probably the most significant, and not because he's clear favourite for the Stefan Kuntz award - Zenit St Petersburg playmaker Andrei Arshavin. His influence can best be outlined by the difference between the side's performance while he was suspended in the first two games (fucking dreadful) c.f. on his return from suspension overnight (could/should have beaten Sweden by double figures if not for their strikers developing a chronic touch of the Luca Tonis in the second half). Arshavin is getting bigged up massive in the football press, his hype distorted by the fact not that many peeps have seen that much of him, but judging from his show against Sweden he's all that and quite a bit more. He was the single-handed reason that his abject no-name hometown club Zenit not only scythed through the knockout stages of the UEFA Cup, laying to waste club after club from the second least mediocre tier of European club football, including running into the only proper big-name Euro club in the tournament, Bayern Munich (who somehow got lost on the way to the Champions League knockout round) in the semi-final - and farken smaaaaashed them. Five-one on aggregate, for Christ's sake. Then they made Rangers look stupert in the final, which Rangers' fans didn't take too kindly to, so they went into the centre of Manchester after the game and farken smaaaaashed it. Still, Zenit were UEFA Cup Champions, making them the best team in Europe that season that weren't good enough to qualify for the Champions League in the first place.
Now you can take it as read that the UEFA Cup is pants. But it's often a bellwether of European football trends to come and properties to watch. For instance, the rise of Jose Mourinho began with Porto winning the UEFA Cup in 2003 - they won the Champions League the year after, then he was off to Chelsea, and now Inter. Current Spurs coach Juande Ramos built his profile on Sevilla's consecutive UEFA Cup wins in 2005/06 and 2006/07. Add to that the reams of players for pissant clubs like Odense Boldklub, Liepajas Metalurgs and Excalibur Tractor Zagreb (note: only one of these teams are ficticious) and who've used the shop window of Thursday nights in Europe when fuck-all else is on TV to get on the radars of bigger clubs and get themselves PAYYYYED, G. Not only were Arse Shavings' string-pulling efforts in midfield THE reason Zenit won the UEFA Cup, it'll probably get him a massive fuck-off contract with some cash-bloated, clueless Premier League club like Newcastle or Man City.
But first, the small matter of a quarter-final against the monumentally scary Dutch, in what amounts to a rematch of the EURO 88 final - the last tournament the Russians didn't have to go line up at the AEROFLOT departures counter immediately after their third group stage game. The final, which the Dutch won on the back of a bullshit van Basten volley, was itself a rematch of the opening game of the tournament, which the Russians won. Any reason they might do the same in four days time? Only that the Dutch would not have been remotely concerned by the prospect of playing Sweden in the quarters - 4-2-2, handy and workmanlike, but more predictable than a Desperate Housewives plotline. You know exactly what you're going to get with the Swedes. Usually bored. However Russia, with their squad of pre-pubescent kids spearheaded by Captain Unpronounceable and the Shaven Arse, and coached up by Russkie Guus, one of their own (indeed, their own coach as of ten years ago in France), might give them a few darker concerns.
Then again it could be another 6-1 pantsing like their EURO 2000 quarter against the Yugos.
In the other game, Spain proved that Portugal are gay by being another already-qualified side to field their 'B' team in the last match of the group stage and still win comfortably. Just like the Dutch did, Croatia did, and Portugal didn't.
Tomorrow: Quarter Final 1, Portugal vs Germany. Where Cristiano Ronaldo learns all there is to know about the Crying Game.
The Doctor is OUT.
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