Romania - France .. What happened?

A game that was promising to be full of excitement, speed, show and class turned out to be the worst game of EURO 2008 so far. Romania - France, in the group of death, what a game it could have been! But it wasn't, so I'll try to see where it went wrong. 

From the moment the first touch on the ball was taken, the pace was slow, the players were tentative, and no one really seemed too into it. The way I saw the Romanian players yelling out the national anthem, I though we would have a bit more sting in our game to begin with. Some motivaion. We haven't been in a major competition for 8 years for Christ's sake, you'd think that would motivate the players a bit. 

In all he games I've seen Romania play in the past 8 years, this might be the worst game I've ever seen us play. It was embarassing honestly. We play a dynamic 4-3-3 every game except this one apparently, with an attacking trident that sit up, put pressure on defenders and score a ton. For some reason, Victor Piturca decided to go with a 4-5-1 for this game, leaving Daniel Niculae completely alone around 3 defenders up top. I've never seen Mutu defend so much in my life, he was near our box more than near France's. He's our best player, he's the creative mind, he always had the free role. Now he was sidelined with two players marking him constantly. It's not his position and his role, why the hell change it up when it matters most?

We were inviting the French to attack us all game. There was no pressure on the defenders when they had the ball, everyone just dropped back. It looked lazy. I don't know what Piturca was trying to do, but we didn't beat Holland, Spain, Russia, Turkey, Czech Republic like that in the past two years. We took the games to them, and hit them in attack. I really don't understand it, it's cowardly. 

1017 - that's the amount of passes that were passed during this game. The most passes in a EURO game so far. 

12 - that's the amount of shots towards goal all game

1 - that's the amount of shots on goal all game.

This was a complete mess, just a passing exercise  that was carried out at a jogging pace. But Romania wasn't the only team to blame for this. France did nothing. Benzema had some golden opportunities in front of goals that he completely ruined. Otherwise they did nothing all game either. The teams completely neutralized each other. 

The players that did well for Romania were: Chivu (outstanding), Nicolita (ran 12 km. and worked his ass off), and Goian (made some crucial stops). 

Otherwise it was quite the mess with the other players. Daniel Niculae had some good moments, but it's hard to play between 3 good defenders on your own. Radoi had some good ones as well, but he's not fully fit. 

Romania had about 10 minutes each half when we played our usual atractive football. We got pressure on France and kept them in their own half. We needed that all game, but the instructions were to get back. Also, switching Mutu was a bit stupid. He's our best player, why take him out and put it Marius Niculae to play that winger position. It's not that smart. 

For the game with Italy, we need to start with Codrea in the middle instead of Cocis, and with Marius Niculae up top so he can do some of the same thins Ruud did tonight.  The Netherlands beat Italy with pace and quick play, that's the key. That's how they will beat France as well. We play like that as well usually, if we stop retreating and defending, we can take the Dutch example. The next game is crucial, if we win it, we could qualify, if not, it would be very hard and unpredictable. We can't play for a draw. 

Chivu promised that the second game would be more open, and I hope that it will be. We need it to be. The French have even more work to do i think, because we allowed them to attack, gave them spaces and time, and they did nothing with it. At least I know that we are capable of attacking well and hard, which we chose not to do this game, but France were allowed to do it and couldn't make anything happen.

The first draw of Euro, the first complete bore of Euro and hopefully both teams play better next game. The group looks like this now:

1. Netherlands ..3 pts
2. Romania........1 pt
3. France...........1 pt
4. Italy..............0 pt

 I'm excited for Friday, hopefully a better game from us!