I'm pretty sure some of the big teams will fail. Everyone is counting out Austria, but they still are on home ground. Yes, they play pretty bad, but,.. Ivanschitz, Harnik and some others have potential.

i think the final will be played between portugal and one of the teams from group C.

anybody start buying their jerseys?

i'm buying pirlo away



and de rossi home



the one i'm getting obviously has a 4 in the front



along with an italy scarf



and i got a woolie recently




the italy home jersey isnt spectacular and i think for the first time ever the away jersey is nicer than the home but i think it will look better once i see it on tv with the players since the mannequin makes it look flimsy.
so i'll be wearing all of the above during the games.

The Italy home jersey isn't the nicest, and the away one has a collar, which is a big no for me!

I'll probably get a Mellberg or Ibrahimovic Sweden jersey for the Euro's.

FFS Italy. Sack Puma, get Adidas.



Mellberg? The new Juventus boy (rumoured)?
I'd go for the 2nd choice.

I don't know what's going on with Mellberg, it was almost a done deal that he was going to Juve, now I'm not sure what he's waiting for!

I think I'll get Zlatan anyways, he'll be top scorer at the tournement.

italy's away is nicer than any other away kit i've seen. and italy's jersey at the world cup was great and dint have 10 other teams with the exact same template like portugal,spain,france,germany...

btw kurt i fint the colar looks nice, has the italian colors and with nice gold trim.

i'll have a croatia shirt (#19 - Kranjcar) ) this years winners haha

Wanna bet?

Go Gila!!!



Might end up being one of the dutch players for all you know. Or ze Zhermans. Should start a poll I think...

I think collars looks horrible, regardless of what shirt they're on. But especially on football shirts, I think they look stupid.

Here are Scolari's call-ups to the Portugal national team for the Feb. 6 friendly with the Azzurri:

Quim – SL Benfica
Ricardo – Real Bétis
Rui Patrício - Sporting CP
Bruno Alves – FC Porto
Fernando Meira – VFB Stuttgart
Jorge Ribeiro – Boavista FC
Bosingwa – FC Porto
Caneira – Valência CF
Paulo Ferreira - Chelsea FC
Ricardo Carvalho – Chelsea FC
Deco - FC Barcelona
Petit - SL Benfica
Maniche – Inter Milan
Raul Meireles – FC Porto
Makukula – CS Marítimo
Cristiano Ronaldo – Manchester United FC
Nani – Manchester United FC
Nuno Gomes – SL Benfica
Ricardo Quaresma – FC Porto

Donadoni will make his call ups this Sunday, Feb. 3.

NT Coach Joachim Löw just announced Germanys squad for our game against Austria:



Ballack will have his comeback after his 10 month long injury crisis and Schalkes Heiko Westermann will have his debut in the "Nationaelf". Like always, many players are injured, most notably Thorsten Frings who might not even be back for the Euro Also out are Christian Pander (as always), Marcell Jansen, Serdar Tasci, Christoph Metzelder, Arne Friedrich, Clemens Fritz and Serdar Tasci. Lehmann will still be our first choice even after Wenger replaced him with that **** Almunia. What impresses me the most is that Lukas Podolski is noted as midfielder....someone at the DFB seems to talk too much to Galliani...

I'm surprised not to see either Neuer or Adler there. At least those two are playing regularly.

Is Sami Khedira hurt too?

Joachim Löw announced a few months ago that neither one, Adler or Neuer, would be called up for the NT before the EURO because he doesn't want any irritations. Lehmann, Hildebrand and Hannovers Enke will be the only choices till the EURO. After it Löw will most likely decide who'll be "the new guy". Neuers chances are worse than ever btw. He was responsible for Wolfsburgs late equalizer in Schalkes DFB-Pokal game yesterday. Schalke later lost on penalties. Right now Adler seems to be the man especially as he was voted the best goalie of the Bundesliga a few weeks back (by the players) with a huge margin between him and runner-up Robert Enke.

Khedira hasn't been on form recently. He was called up by Löw once but then he was injured, so he's still waiting for his first international game. Mario Gomez has an amazing comeback in Stuttgarts match though. He scored a hattrick after beeing out for 7 weeks (might be Germanys best striker right now)

Borowski? Injuried or out of form?

Out of form...he's been terrible lately.

Gabby Agbonlahor, Ashley Young, David Bentley and Matt Derbyshire not named in the England Under-21 squad.. a first team call up?

Fabio Capello's First England Squad


GOALKEEPERS
David James (Portsmouth)
Scott Carson (Villa)
Chris Kirkland (Wigan)


DEFENDERS
Ashley Cole (Chelsea)
Wayne Bridge (Chelsea)
Curtis Davies (Villa)
Rio Ferdinand (Man U)
Glenn Johnson (Portsmouth)
Ledley King (Spurs)
Jonathon Woodgate (Spurs)
Nicky Shorey (Reading)
Wes Brown (Man U)
Joleon Lescott (Everton)
Micah Richards (Man City)
Matthew Upson (West Ham)


MIDFIELDERS
Michael Carrick (Man U)
Steven Gerrard (Liverpool)
Gareth Barry (Villa)
Jermain Jenas (Spurs)
Owen Hargreaves (Man U)
Joe Cole (Chelsea)
Ashley Young (Villa)
Stewart Downing (Boro)
Shaun Wright-Phillips (Chelsea)
David Bentley (Blackburn)


STRIKERS
Emile Heskey (Wigan)
Gabriel Agbonlahor (Villa)
Michael Owen (Newcastle)
Wayne Rooney (Man U)
Peter Crouch (Liverpool)

A nice first squad from Capello. Congrats to Curtis Davies and Gabby Agbonlahor on their first call-ups.

5 Villa players!?

Only downside in my opinion is that Kirkland was picked as a GK ahead of West Hams Robert Green. Also that players like Nigel Reo-Coker, Michael Johnson and Tom Huddlestone - who have been playing very well each and every week - have missed out to the likes of Owen Hargreaves (Who hardly plays) and Michael Carrick (Who has been very average this season). Shame Becks wasn't picked, too. He only needs 1 more cap to have 100!

As a whole, a decent squad from Fabio, well done.

No Beckingham for his 100th match?

Heskey?

Heskey is good. He is 10 times better than the joke of a player that Defoe is. Or who was he gonna call?

Heskey isn't a good player. But it's not good players that make a good team, he just works well with Owen, so it's a bonus to have him.

Not really much else anyways. Defoe, Bent, Ashton & Walcott.

Good enough to be included is what I meant.

Anyway... Forza Capello!

Ahem guys...isn't this England talk a bit off-topic? I mean...this thread is called "The Road to the EURO 2008" and not "The Road to the EURO 2008 and all the other teams that didn't make it.".
It's not like we're talking about every little NT here, were not talking about Latvia either aren't we?









(Hides from every english member of milanfan)

It would have made sense if it was a competitive game. But this is just a week of friendlies, nothing to do with Euro2008, so..

Ok ... When I saw the list (thanks Kurt ) ... I thought how on earth did this happen !!! Not in this thread .. Then ..





LaPalma !!! U ruined it for me, as I was thinking what to post, I saw this ..





He's toying with u

It's only jealousy

Here are Van Basten's call ups for the upcoming Netherlands-Croatia game:

Goalkeepers:
van der Sar, Stekelenburg.

Defenders:
Bouma, de Cler, Heitinga, Mathijsen, Melchiot, Ooijer.

Midfielders:
Afellay, van Bronckhorst, Landzaat, Engelaar, de Jong, van der Vaart, Seedorf, Sneijder, de Zeeuw.

Forwards:
Babel, Huntelaar, van Nistelrooy, Vennegoor of Hesselink.

No Kuyt. And, btw, Van Basten confirmed that he'd had very preliminary talks with Ajax about the coaching job there.

Kuyt is having a mediocre season. Pure garbage.

Yay for Bouma!

That's a very average looking squad though.

I can't wait till match start,..

The tradition says we'll loose, cause we play in Split. Last time we won there,..it was against Denmark I belive in 1997. After that we didn't played a lot there but also didn't win.

But on the other hand we are fully prepared and still in form. So I expect a 2-2 draw,..

Here are Donadoni's call ups for the Italy-Portugal game:

Goalkeepers: Marco Amelia (Livorno), Morgan De Sanctis (Sevilla)

Defenders: Andrea Barzagli (Palermo), Fabio Cannavaro (Real Madrid), Marco Cassetti (AS Roma), Fabio Grosso (Lyon), Marco Materazzi (Inter Milan), Massimo Oddo (AC Milan), Gianluca Zambrotta (FC Barcelona)

Midfielders: Massimo Ambrosini (AC Milan), Alberto Aquilani (AS Roma), Daniele De Rossi (AS Roma), Simone Perrotta (AS Roma), Andrea Pirlo (AC Milan), Franco Semioli (Fiorentina)

Forwards: Marco Borriello (Genoa), Antonio Di Natale (Udinese), Raffaele Palladino (Juventus), Fabio Quagliarella (Udinese), Luca Toni (Bayern Munich)

Is the game against Portugal going to be Boriello's debut?
I hope Pirlo doesn't play cuz I want him to rest ahead of Siena game but he's indispensable for Italy ... without him Milan and Italy lack creativity

The only Juve player called up is a benchwarmer, Palladino ..

this squad is quite weak.. give some youngsters a chance I guess

Commander Löw and his first officer Ballack on their way to conquer Europe.

GMT today's friendlies:

19.45 - Portugal x Italy
19.45 - Ireland x Brazil
20.00 - England x Switzerland
20.00 - Spain x France

19.35 - Austria x Germany

19.30 - Croatia x Holland

Portugal x Italia underway in Switzerland.

Geez. The new italian home-jersey is f ugly.

@ Porty

It's not that bad...

Italy is playing MUCH better.

Ambrosini is such a useless player... geez.

Doesn't Quaresma deserve to play in a bigger club?

Here you go again,..

Croatia down by 2 goals. Heitenga scored after a free kick taken by VdV. The second came in from Huntelaar. What an bad match for Croatia.

Simic,. ..ruined.

nice skills by Quaresma

Di Natale with the shot. good save from Ricardo.

ooooooooooh Di Natale!! good shot

I don't know if it's just me, but Ronaldo has been average till now... I'm not sure if he can play THAT good outside of Man United.