90' (+2): And it's over. Poland out. Croatia assuring the first position of the group to face Turkey in the quarterfinals.

90' (+1):

Shot for Croatia. Way over the bar. That a good moment to call the game over. Poland failed in doing their part. Well, Austria didn't help them either

89': Nope. They tried a set up play. But it didn't work quite well

89': Free kick for Croatia on the right side of their attack. It's going to be a cross into the box.

87': Another incredible goal chance wasted by Poland. The deserve to tie but they are not finishing well enough

84': Vukojevic saw a yellow for pushing Guerreiro.

81':

What a play for Poland. Great Shot!!! Over the bar 

79':

A free kick for Croatia! Far Far Far

74': Sub for Croatia: Kranjcar comes in for Petric

68': Great save by the Croatian goalkeeper now. And Poland wastes another chance. Time is running out

63': Great chance for Roger Guerreiro. Poland almost tie things up

60': Poland is toasted. Germany beating Austria, and the Polski are not being able to score on the reserves of the Croatian squad.

55': Smolarek with the chance to tie. But the shots goes wide. Off the left post

52': GGGGGGOOOAAAAAALLLLLL Klasnic buries Poland's hopes. Great counter attack ends with Klasnic shooting from inside the box and putting it away from Boruc!

Half Time: Croatia dominated about 38 minutes of the first half and then Poland decided to put some pressure and had one or two chances. Boruc made GREAT saves for Poland!

45' (+1): Great chance for Croatia now. Rakitic almost put it on the top left corner of the goal. Great opportunity

45':

Poland moving up now. They need score a goal. Actually the ideal for the Polish would be a win by two goals. Then a 1-0 by Austria would give them the second spot in the group. But they need to do their part first

42': Cleared by the defense

42': A corner for the Polish now

41': Poland with a free kick near the box

38': Roger Guerreiro tried a fancy Brazilian move and got fouled by Pokrivac. I'm sorry Bart but Croatia is still plying much better

34': Another corner for Croatia after a great save by Boruc.

31': Great opportunity for Croatia. Klasnic on a one-on-one but he missed

31': Roger who had a great game against Austria is not playing as well tonight

23':

A sub for Croatia early in the match.

21': There's nothing really going on on the match. I'm trying to watch both. Croatia is just administrating the match and Poland are not being able to attack

11': Just got here. Sorry folks. I don't even know what'sd going on in the match but I'm sure Croatia is playing better... hahaha

With 6 points and the top spot of Group B guaranteed Croatia will rest some of the main players for tonight's match against Poland. Too bad for Germany.

But blame on the crazy UEFA rule that uses as first tie breaking criterion the direct confrontation and not the goal differential. I was surprised after the Croatians beat Germany when I heard that with that win they had already won the group. I thought, "wait a minute? Can't Germany get to 6 points too?" 

Well, they can, but it won't make a difference if they beat Austria by 10 goals and Poland beat Croatia by 12 goals. Croatia will still be first of the group because they beat Germany when the two played each other. Crazy UEFA rules.

Croatia's coach Slaven Bilic then did what any intelligent manager would do: rest his top players. Six footballers will come out of the bench to have a chance to play. They are: Dario Simic, Hrvoje Vejic, Dario Knezevic, Jerko Leko, Ognjen Vukojevic and Ivan Klasnic.

Poland will have to play all they can to win and at the same time follow what happens in the Germany x Austria match. The Polish will need more than ever to cheer for a Austrian victory, but not by a large goal differential. 

That's the scenario for tonight's matches!

Probable Lineups: 

90' (+3): Now the referee calling one foul after the other. Good for Croatia

90' (+2): Scweini just saw a red card. A stupid one. He won the ball, he suffered the tackle and then he gets up and pushes the Croatian. Red! Early shower!

90': Three more minutes of added time. And Croatia got close to their 3 goal

87': Croatia controls the ball, controls Germany attempts. With three minutes to go this one might be over for Germany already.

82': The goal set the German team on fire. They just need to be careful with the counter attack

80': GOOOAAALLLL!!!! Another blaster by Lukas Podolski!!! The ball came from a bad clearance by the defender and Podolski with a lot of anger hits the ball as hard as he could to bring more excitement to the last 10 minutes of the match

76': I believe this one is over for Germany. And Croatia really proved they are a solid team even without Eduardo.

74': Lahm crosses and the referee blows the whistle calling a foul  on Ballack

73': Schweini had a great opportunity on the left. The shot was good but it went wide.

70': Srna on the ball again a Pranjic almost buries the Germans with another goal... Almost

69': The ball goes .... and Lehmann pushes it outside for another corner

69': Corner kick for Croatia and Srna is not in a hurry to take it.

68': Germany is desperate. The plays are not happening. The team is lost. And Croatia is using the counter attack very well

66': Another counter attack for Croatia. And a free kick them. Srna takes it and hits the wall

62': Lehman should have saved the first ball. Even tough it was deflected he had time to recover and save it. Well, now it's late. Germany trails by two

62': The shot from the top right side of the box is deflected and Lehman's doesn't react in time. The ball hits the post and Olic is at the right spot just to touch it into the net

61': GGGGOOOAAAALLLLL for Croatia!!!!

59': Srna went down after the tackle by Frings. The Croatian defender asks for medical help and limps out of the pitch

57': Lahm delivers the cross. Kloses heads to the center of the box but it didn't get to Gomez.

50': Germany has more possession now but it's not going to be easy to break through the Croatian defense. In counter attack modric shoots and Lehmann saves it.

49': Free kick for German after Simunic tackled Klose

48': Pletikosa punches the ball to the front. That's not a clearance that a goalkeeper should do. Ballanck tries to shoot. Too high

46': The second half starts with Odonkor replacing Jansen for Germany

45': And we're back!

45' (+1): And the first half is over. In the last play we could see that the Croatians will not make it easier for Germany, 5 Croatian forwards moving up!

44': Super Mario Gomez is caught offside again but this time the linesman called it wrongly in my opinion

43': The ball in inside the Croatian net. But the referee called a foul on the goalkeeper. The referee saw it. I didn't

42': Lehmann!!! Amazing save! Croatia attacking with 4 players .. But Lehmann saves Germany

39': Metzelder heads it. It flies over the bar

38': Corner for Germany on the left side

34': Jansen falls in the box. nothing but a clumsy play.

32': He shoots and Pletikosa had trouble holding it. Germany pressuring now!

32': Free kick for Germany. It's far but we all know Ballack.

30': Kranjcar had a great chance to put this match away. He misses the ball ... But the Croatians are looking very dangerous in counter attack now

27': Frings shoot the ball straight on the wall and it goes out of bounds for a throw in.

26': Nasty sliding tackle by Dario Srna on Podolski. Free kick and yellow card for the goal scorer

23': Great cross from the left side. Great set up and Srna streches his foot to reach the ball before Jansen. With the tip of his boot he puts Croatia ahead, 1-0.

22': Good set up by Podolski but the ball is recovered by the Croatians

21': Gomez receives a long ball in the box and.... Oh no the flag is up. He's offside

18': The referee didn't call a foul on Jansen. Kovac gets a foul for the Croatians and sends the long pass. The ball is perfectly cut by the defense

16': Corner for Croatia. The balls crosses the whole extension of the box but nobody was able to head it in.

14': Both teams are actually playing pretty pffensive football... to my surprise honestly

11': Free kick for Croatia on the right side. The ball is sent to the box good ball but immediately cleared by the German defense

10': After Germany attempt to attack Modric is fouled in the midfield when he was trying to start the counter-attack

9':

Sorry folks... I had to pee! I hate when I have to leave the room during the match!

4':
Nice running by Klose on the right side. Gomez receives the pass and tries to serve Podolski. The defense clears it

1': I'm betting on a 1-1. It would be a satisfactory result for both teams

0': The Game is on

VS

Podolski is not really the nicest of the players. I have German friends who actually hate the kid. But at age 23 he has definitely gained the respect of the world of football with 49 caps and 27 goals for the National Team since 2004 when he had his debut.

He rarely misses a chance to score and even though he doesn't have the dribbling ability of a Cristiano Ronaldo or the drama factor of a Zlatan Ibrahimovic the Germans can always count on the young striker to decide matches.

Germany also has other great players to work the ball with the typical discipline and efficiency that already gave the country three titles in the competition, the last one in 1996. Ballack, Lehmann, Frings, Klose, Neuville; represent the experience and Mertesacker, Schweinsteiger and Mario Gomez join Lukas Podolski on the young and talented side of this well balanced team.

As for Croatia, the team once known by playing a style closer to the South American football in times of the defunct Yugoslavia, qualified for the final stage of this Euro as one of the possible surprises but the injury of their Brazilian-born striker Eduardo came as an enormous bucket of icy cold water on the Croatian squad. The team is still dangerous with the brothers and long-time team leaders Robert and Niko Kovac. On the youth side the most dangerous player is Tottenham midfielder Luka Modric.

Both teams won their opening matches. Croatia beat co-hosts Austria by the minimum score on a penalty executed by Modric and the Germans beat Poland by 2-0 with Podolski scoring twice and showing respect to his Polish descent and refraining from celebrating.

Whoever wins this one will have their ticket to the quarterfinals almost guaranteed but I'm predicting a 1-1 score for this one.

The first weekend of the Euro 2008 can be summarize like this: Great Saturday, Boring Sunday.

The opening match between Switzerland and Czech Republic had tears, strategic battles - Switzerland playing offensively and Czech Rep. all the way back in defense - and an undeserved Czech goal scored by a substitute player. It was great.

Then we had Portugal vs. Turkey. A very interesting match. Portugal hit the Turkish post three times, Cristiano Ronaldo made his traditional funny/frustrated faces and defender Pepe scored his first goal with the National shirt after an excellent one-two play. Turkey has a good team but not good enough to beat one of the favourites to win the title and at 93rd minute Raul Meirelles sealed Portugal's triumph.

Then on Sunday Croatia and Austria played one very boring match. The goal scored by Croatia on a penalty kick on the 5th minute set the final score and for the other 85 minutes I had to force myself no to fall sleep.

The so expected clash between Germany and Poland was a little better (or less worse). Podolski respect for Poland (he was born there) and for his Polish family was admirable. He didn't celebrate the two goals that seal Germany's victory and what a beautiful goal was that second one. But besides that none of the teams really impressed me.

But monday has finally arrived (football is the only reason to make me happy on a Monday morning) and right now I'm here at OleOle's HQ sitting next to my friend Frenchi just waiting for the (hopefully) two great matches of the day...