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Wales eh? How good was that! Great performance, great result, well deserved. They’re virtually in the knockouts now and might just have a very winnable game against Russia or Finland if things shake out well for them. That was a cracking game with Turkey, who at least showed some signs of life after the limp corpse showing they turned in against the Italians on opening night. It was just a really entertaining game, with loads of good footy and plenty of chances, most of which fell to Wales. Ramsay looked like he was going to have one of those games he’d stress over for the rest of his life as he kept getting chances and missing them. Most of them were created by Bale, and when the two combined just before half time Ramsay finally put one away with a deft finish. They were always in control but couldn’t get the second goal and it could have become nervy late on. It’s easy for me to say as I didn’t have any real emotional investment in it (I wanted Wales to win but I wouldn’t have lost any sleep if they hadn’t), but at no point did I ever feel like there was any chance they were going to concede and not win the game. In the last ten minutes they were ripping Turkey to pieces on the break with the pace of James but the ball just wouldn’t go in. Then they got a corner in stoppage time and with the Turks expected Bale to keep it in the corner, he danced along the touchline before getting a shot in that was saved for another corner. Amazingly, they let him do the exact same fucking thing again and he picked out Roberts to put the cherry on top of the cake. Great stuff, I even shouted “get in there”. I’m happy for them and even if they lose to Italy (which I don’t think it a certainty) they should be through now. Bale and Ramsay are just different class and that’s probably the main difference between Wales and Scotland. The Scots two best players are both left backs, whereas Wales have genuine top class talent capable of making things happen at the top end of the pitch. Wales aren’t the plucky little underdog punching above their weight, they just look like a proper team. They made the semis last time so this isn’t a fluke. Bale doesn’t have that searing pace that once made him one of the most fearsome forwards in the world, but he’s developed his all around game now and he’s just a fantastic footballer on his day. You’re not going to get a full season out of him on top form but when he’s fit and firing he’s brilliant. I looked at how he played in this game and you know what my conclusion was? Bale is the player people keep trying to claim Pogba is. Strength, power, technique, vision, world class passing, composure, decision making. That put them on four points and in second spot, with Italy moving to six points after another really impressive win. Turns out that Italy are really fucking good and it wasn’t just that Turkey were bad last week. They made the Swiss look equally inept. They look like a proper team. Like a club side in fact. High intensity pressing, quick one touch passing, superbly organised. They’ve won both games 3-0 and they’ve now won ten games in a row without conceding a single goal. Incredible that, especially as they aren’t the boring defensive side of yesteryear, they’re actually really positive. Locatelli was the star of this show with two goals, but they’re just a proper team who don’t rely on any one player. Chiellini went off injured in this one after having a goal stolen from him by VAR. I hate that attacking handball rule, it’s such bullshit. And taking a goal from the most Roman looking man in history in the Olympic Stadium in Rome is just not cricket is it? Wishing the big fella a speedy recovery as I love watching him defend and he’s taken over from Buffon as the king of the anthem singing. What a man. The other game on Wednesday saw Russia edge out Finland 1-0. Population of Russia - 145m. Population of Finland 5m. 140m more people to choose from and they win by one goal. Fucking losers. The winning goal by Miranchuk was fucking brilliant though. That’s the only thing I’ve seen from this game and Ukraine v North Macedonia was another fixture I wasn’t wasting any time watching. I won’t waste much time writing about it either. It finished 2-1 to Ukraine with goals from Yarmolenko and Yaremchuk. Weren’t they the same two that scored against Holland? Pretty sure they were. Alioski pulled one back but Ukraine now look a decent bet to finish second in their group. Holland are almost certainly winning that group though after beating Austria to move onto six points. They never got out of second gear but they still won at a canter. Gini was a level above everyone else. What a fucking player. Arnautovic was missing through suspension after his excessive celebration in the first game when he yelled all kinds of abuse at Alioski. Don’t know what he said but it was deemed racist so he might be lucky he only got the one game. The cameras spent as much time on him as they did on the game though. Whats up with that? He’s not Ronaldo, he’s what you get from wish.com when you order Zlatan. Memphis Depay wasn’t at his best in this game but I do quite like him. Good player. He scored from the spot to set them on their way and Dumfries scored for the second game in a row to wrap it up. That goal was created by substitute Donyel Malen who did more in 30 seconds than that big yard dog Weghorst did in the whole time he was on the field. No way is he the best striker Holland have at their disposal. He’s shite. He’s what you get from wish.com when you order Lyndon Dykes. It reflects badly on the mancs they couldn’t get a tune out of Depay but then they’ve done the same to Martial, who should be well better than he is. Those two could have been phenomenal in the right environment. Mind you, they had Lukaku as well and for some reason fucked him off too. Then there's Van Der Beek who was great for Ajax. They’re proper clueless these days, thankfully. Tell you who I’ve never seen do anything but he’s meant to be dead good. Frenkie De Jong. Not saying he’s shit or anything, just that I don’t see what the fuss is about. I’ve never seen him stand out in any game I’ve seen him play. Of course even peak Platini would be overshadowed by Gini in this form, so maybe I'm being harsh on young Frenkie.. And all this stuff about the Dutch being suspect at the back. I know Virg isn’t there but they’ve got De Ligt from Juve and de Vrij who just won the title with Inter. Ake is on the bench so it’s not like they’ve got League One lads back there. Add them to the list of teams I’d fancy to beat England. Denmark’s misery continued as they lost to Belgium despite playing pretty fucking well. They have no points after two games but they’re miles better than loads of the sides on three points. Unlucky bastards. One of the lads in the group chat asked “what have Denmark done to deserve this kind of luck?” and the immediate reply was “well there was some raping and pillaging but that was a while back”. You’ll never believe this, but it was Stu Monty. Might be the funniest thing he’s ever said. Not sure it was worth the 20 year wait mind. I don’t know what to make of Belgium. They’ve won both games but they’re a bit flawed and I know Bobby Brown Shoes isn’t that good, but they’ve got as much attacking talent as anyone. Lukaku, De Bruyne and Hazard (when fit and on form) get in pretty much any team in the tournament which makes them dangerous and a strong contender. Mad that Chelsea had all three and lost them all, and Hazard was the only one they got anything out of. And now to Friday, and the most eagerly anticipated event of the tournament. The moment everyone had been waiting for.... Dejan Lovren finally graced the tournament with his presence. The big fella missed the England game but he was back for the game with the Czechs and it didn’t go well for him as Croatia were held to a draw after he conceded a penalty. What a bullshit penalty decision that was though. He wins the header cleanly and so what if his elbow inadvertently catches the striker. You can’t jump with your arms by your sides and it’s not like big Dejan moved towards the Czech lad. He jumped straight up in the air from a standing position and Schtick jumped into him. Fucking terrible that. The refereeing has been great so far but that was a bad one. That spot kick by Schtick cancelled out a nice opener from my boy Perisic. Poor goalkeeping that though, and Petr Cech’s take on it afterwards was great. Usually you get some slapdick like Jenas or Shearer saying “he’ll be disappointed with that” but this time we had Cech talking about him going with his fists and not with flat palms, and why that was not the right technique. He then explained why he would always use his palms and not his fists and I found myself nodding and going “yeah that makes sense that, big man. Thanks for the insight”. I’ve hardly watched any punditry so far so that’s why I’ve not mentioned them much but that was good from Cech as it was informative and it was the kind of thing they should be bringing us. Michael Owen does that all the time from a striker’s perspective and I like that, it makes me feel like I know something I didn't know before, which is surely the reason they are there and being paid so handsomely? There’s not enough of it because they have divs like Shearer or Vieira giving us the insight of a fucking lampost. Klinsmann can fuck off though. No idea why they hired him. I know he’s a legend of the game and he’s had an interesting career which makes him qualified to talk about all manner of things, but I can’t get past his annoying fucking voice. He sounds like a European tennis player who was forced to go to that Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy when he was six and ended up with that bastardised American accent with a little foreign twang. I still maintain that Hicks & Gillett trying to hire him was a worse crime than the leveraged buyout and almost putting us out of business. I'm taking ITV's pundits over BBC's all day, but Lineker trying to plug Still Open All Hours and Would I Lie to You because the game was on ITV was pretty funny though. Sweden v Slovakia was another snoozefest and the only goal came from the penalty spot, with Forsberg converting the pen to give Sweden three points they didn't really deserve. The only thing worth watching about Sweden is Isak, who was man of the match and has this week been tentatively linked with the Reds. He's one more decent performance away from securing 'my boy' status but he's not quite there yet. So to the big one. 0-0 but I thought it was a really intriguing watch and I enjoyed the game. Scotland were the better side and can hold their heads up. England were fucking shite but it doesn’t really matter because they’ll qualify regardless after getting a win in their opener. First decent side they face they’re out. They were booed off which when you actually stop and think about it is fucking mad. Who do these cunts think they are? The fans I mean. What exactly is it that makes them think they have some divine right to be winning games like this? England haven't won shit since the 60s. They haven't beaten anyone good in a game that matters since.... I don't even know. It's a long time. Yet every tournament we have to listen to the hype machine rolling about how "England can win it" and "It's coming home". Booing them off after a draw that keeps them top of the group and unbeaten is just weird. But then some of them were booing even before the game. I'm glad England are shite because this country doesn't deserve success. Southgate will get a load of stick for his team selection and weird subs. Again, this is just a result of the entitled mentality. He got an MBE for beating a few pub teams to reach the World Cup semi finals and people convinced themselves he was Rinus Michels. He's as average as a coach as he was as a player. But he seems like a decent guy and doesn't deserve the shit he's going to get when England lose in the first knockout game. As well as I thought Scotland played I have to re-emphasise that Lyndon Dykes is genuinely awful. I can’t believe they left him on and took Che Adams off (he was really fucking good). Almost as mad as Southgate subbing Foden when he was the only one doing anything. Not sure what’s going with Kane but he doesn’t look right at all and the fact he’s been subbed in both games points to a fitness issue. Still, never mind, eh. The best thing about this was Souness afterwards just going on a rampage. A particular highlight was “Football isn’t coming home. Not with this lot”, but I also enjoyed him taking issue with the patronising “Scotland worked harder” and “Scotland wanted it more” shite. That's insulting to both teams as there was nothing wrong with the effort and attitude of the England players. Scotland just played better football and created the clearer chances because they are a proper team and not a collection of overhyped individuals. I keep hearing about the 'frightening' talent in this England squad but I don't see it. Foden, Mount, Sterling, Grealish etc are all very good players but look around all the other 'major' nations and they have players just as good or better. Then look at that England midfield. Rice, Phillips and Mount is just a bang average trio. Phillips (who I like) has one good game and suddenly he's a superstar, while I genuinely don't know what Declan Dier does. Hendo must have had some kind of relapse to not be getting in ahead of those two. Scotland were the better side and if they had a number nine who doesn’t play like a hod carrier then maybe they’d have won, because there doesn’t look to be too much wrong with the rest of their side. How great does Souey look though? He’s in remarkable shape, the beard looks distinguished as fuck and he’s always the best dressed in any room he’s in. I was gonna say I hope I look that good when I’m 68 but fucking hell, I wish I looked that good now. Or when I was 30 for that matter. Other observations. Grant Hanley looks like one of Mel Gibson's trusty enforcers from Braveheart. John McGinn looks like a Philly Burkhill drawing of Robbo. Phil Foden looks like an albino marmoset and Harry Kane still looks like a young Bruce Forsyth.

Ah bloody hell Scotland. I’d really been looking forward to getting behind them and seeing them make some waves but they got off to such a demoralising start by losing to the Czechs. They played ok and gave it a go but a lack of quality cost them in the end. They’ve got some good players but they don’t have a striker and without a striker you’ve got nothing, as better teams than Scotland will also discover before this tournament is out. That really was the difference here. The Czech centre forward scored two great goals while the Scots had Sick Boy from Trainspotting bustling around up front looking like he was off his face on smack. Before the game I saw the team and asked in the group chat “who or what in the blue hell is a Lyndon Dykes?” The answer is he’s a crap striker who plays in the Championship. I can’t believe he started ahead of Che Adams, who isn’t great but he’s decent enough. The whole starting line up seemed weird to me though. Granted, Tierney was out injured (yet was in full training the next day) but Billy Gilmore was left out as well as Adams and Ryan Fraser. I wonder if anyone has told Steve Clarke that if Gilmore is good enough to be getting games for the European Champions then he’s good enough to get in the Scotland team. The Scots are up against it enough without leaving out their best players, but in fairness I can live with them losing this one and also the Croatia game if they were to beat England. With their best eleven out there they’ve got a chance, but it’s tough to see where the goals will come from. They played some good stuff against the Czechs and Robbo was fucking great. He could have even got on the scoresheet but as we’ve seen plenty of times he’s not great in that situation and his finishing is a bit shit. If he improved on that he’d be scoring half a dozen a season for us easily with the positions he gets into. Schik put the Czechs in front somewhat against the run of play with a brilliant header and then he added a world class second with a first time shot from halfway that looped over Marshall and left him in a heap in the back of the net. Keeper is too high up the pitch and Hendry should never have been trying to shoot in the situation he was in (leaving his defence exposed with a two v two), but fuck me that was a glorious strike by the forward. It’s unfair to blame Marshall for his positioning when he’s almost certainly been told to do that. Most keepers would rather be on the edge of the their own box and those who are pushed up usually aren’t that high through choice, but coaches no doubt feel the potential gains from them cutting out through balls is worth the risk of the occasional worldy like this one. It’s not the coach who ends up looking like a twat though, wrapped up in the netting and the subject of a thousand memes. They said on commentary that Schick was transferred between two Italian teams for £40m a few years back. That blew my mind. Is that where we are now, that players can go for that kind of money and half the football watching public have never even heard of them? Not just that, but £40m is actually closer to £80m when it’s Italian teams involved as they’re bad mingebags and don’t like spending more than they have to. Always crying poverty those fuckers. *Ok, so I googled that and it’s not true. Sampdoria signed him for €4m then sold him to Roma for €22m. In between that Juve activated a buy out clause of €30m but he failed a medical and it didn’t happen. Not sure where they got their €40m from but I’m relieved to know my stereotype of Italian teams being tight cunts has been re-enforced. The second goal was a killer really. Scotland had their moments but it wouldn’t go in for them. They waited 23 years for this and it was a bit of a damp squib. No-one will give a fuck though as long as they get something on Friday. Three points might be enough to qualify as one of the third placed teams so although this was a big blow it needn’t be fatal. Tell you what though, if the Scots are looking for inspiration they best get those Braveheart DVDs out because it ain’t coming from their coach. If there’s a more boring, uninspiring man on the planet than Steve Clarke then I hope to never meet him. Jesus he’s fucking hard work to listen to. Speaking of boring, Spain and Sweden are two of the dullest teams you’ll see albeit for vastly different reasons. Sweden are a Sam Alladyce wet dream, and Spain have bored the shit out of everyone for decades now where their tippy tappy possession bullshit. No surprise it ended 0-0 although in fairness to Spain they weren’t the reason this game was like watching paint dry. They tried to break Sweden down but it’s not easy when the whole team is camped on the edge of their own box. Sweden had no interest in doing anything other than defend, and they did it very well. It made for a proper shitty game though. Luis Enrique left Thiago out of the starting line up which undid all the goodwill he’d earned by dropping Ramos and not picking any Real Madrid players in his squad. As if they’ve got three midfielders better than Thiago! Or one for that matter. Their main problem is up top though. Alvaro Morata is the Spanish equivalent of Lyndon Dykes or Keifa Moore. How do Spain not have a better striker than him? I’ll tell you shall I? Because everyone over there wants to play tippy tappy five yard passes in midfield and no-one grows up wanting to be a goalscorer anymore. And what the fuck is Laporte doing out there? Declared himself French, couldn’t get in the French squad and now all of a sudden wants to be Spanish. Spain shouldn’t have lowered themselves like that, they’ve got plenty of players they could have picked instead. I don’t like this at all. Fuck him and anything to do with Man City. Sweden are shite but that Isak up front looks fucking boss. Really impressed with him and if he was playing for Spain this would have been an entirely different game. Can’t believe they subbed him, but so far one of the most glaring themes of this tournament has been coaches who appear to have been sniffing glue. The other game on Monday was Poland and Slovakia. There’s nothing that was going to make me sit through 90 minutes of those two so I’m basing this entirely on the highlights. Slovakia took the lead after Mak skipped past a couple of defenders and beat Szczesny (yeah I googled the spelling there) at his near post. The ball came back off the upright, hit the keeper and then went in. Goes down as an own goal but that was great play by Mak. Poland levelled with a total mis-kick from Linetty but then had a lad sent off for two yellows. The first was a blatant booking but the second is just a bit of an over zealous foul. Some proper petty Premier League shit that by the ref and completely out of place in this tournament. Slovakia won it with a nice strike by Skriniar but neither of teams look any good and Spain will go through easily. Slovakia are now in good shape to get second but this is a shite group and Spain have touched really lucky being drawn with these three stiffs. Looking forward to watching Isak for Sweden again though. There’s no Skrtel anymore for the Slovaks but Hamsik is still there. I’d forgotten how much he gets on my tits. He’s still got the same fucking haircut too. Reckon he’ll still have that when he’s in his fifties and working as a pundit on Slovak TV, the fucking weirdo. He left Napoli to take the money in China but within two years he was playing for Gothenburg and now he’s just signed for Trabzonspor. That’s some Rafa Benitez style career trajectory that. Rafa managed him at Napoli and maybe they’ll both be reunited circling the drain at Everton. Moving on, reigning champs Portugal got off to a winning start but they left it late inside a full stadium in Budapest against Hungary. Mad seeing a game played in front of a full crowd wasn’t it? Hopefully won’t be long now until it’s the norm again. Portugal’s starting eleven is probably second only to France. Really strong and well balanced. They found it hard to make the breakthrough even though they created plenty of chances. Spider Gulacsi in goal for Hungary was class but Portugal’s finishing wasn’t great. Ronaldo put one over the bar from four yards in the first half and it looked like it wasn’t going to be his day. With seven minutes left it was still 0-0 and Hungary had given as good as they’d got in the second half, even having a goal disallowed (rightly) for offside. Then a deflected strike by Guerreiro finally broke Hungary down and then Ronaldo bagged a couple late on. One from the spot and the other after a couple of nice one twos. The celebration after the pen was a bit OTT but that's Ronaldo for you, self indulgent cunt. Big fan of Jota just refusing to pass to his team-mates because he knows they’re all wankers though. Ronaldo and Fernandes (hate his fucking rat face) both lost their shit with him for not playing them in and having a shot instead. That’s our boy right there. Good work son. I enjoyed France v Germany even though it was far from a classic. It was two world class heavyweights facing off and although there wasn’t too much in the way of fireworks I found it to be a fascinating battle. Germany played quite well but had no cutting edge and there has to be major question marks over their forward line. That being said, the French are brilliant defensively so I’ll reserve judgement on Germany’s forwards until after they’ve played the other two group games. Not sure about Gnabry as a centre forward though? Boss little player but not a number nine. Why not stick Havertz there with Gnabry and Sane either side? Mind you, Sane was fucking shite when he came on and seems to have lost his way a bit. Werner wasn’t great either but on the plus side he wasn’t as useless as that Kevin Volland fella. Fucking hell, they’d be better off dusting off Mario Gomez and throwing him up there. Sure, he may be sixty years old now but they were still picking him when he was fifty so why not? Old Yogi Love has to stop sniffing his fingers and fix that forward problem if Germany are going to do anything, but they do have quality everywhere else and with three teams probably qualifying from the group they could still be able to make some noise in the knockouts. Rudiger bit Pogba and nothing was done about it. It was laughed off by most people and described as ‘not a full on bite’. Nah, it defo was. It doesn’t look like much but Pogba immediately yelled out in pain and he couldn’t have been faking that as his back was to Rudiger and he wouldn’t have known he’d been bitten unless he felt it, which he clearly did. He told the linesman but it wasn’t looked at by VAR, or if it was they did nothing. That’s a clear red card and a suspension, but it looks like nothing will be done. Huge difference in reaction to when Suarez did it, but I guess Rudiger doesn’t have a history of sinking his chompers into the opposition when he gets frustrated and it's therefore not as big a story. It isn’t an apples to apples comparison but even so, you can’t allow that to go unpunished, even if it was on Pogba. Speaking of Pogba, what the fuck was going on with his shirt? One long sleeve and one short. One wristband. The haircut. Everything about him screams out “LOOK AT ME!!”. He should have that tattooed on his fod. He looks like a 10 year old created him on FIFA., the fucking tit. He played well though and clearly when he can be arsed he is a talented player. As usual though, any time he does something decent it gets massively overblown. He was given man of the match (when really Ngolo Kante was the best player on the pitch, as he is virtually every time he plays) and he was the main focus on the BBC highlights package. Yawn. If he’s as great as people keep saying then how come the cunt can’t play a pass on time and kept delaying until Mbappe had ran offside? Fraud. The only goal of the game was an oggy from Hummels. Bit unfortunate really as he had to try and cut out the cross or Mbappe had a tap in behind him. The ball bounced up and he shinned it past his keeper. That poor bastard will be having ‘Nam style flashbacks for a while about trying to chase after Mbappe. What a mismatch that was. Hummels isn’t the quickest but I’m not sure there is any defender who can match Mbappe in a 30 yard sprint. He was lucky not to concede a penalty in the second half when he had a 15 yard start on Mbappe and still got burned off. It was incredible speed that. Hummels did well to make a last ditch recovery lunge and nick the ball away from him but he went through Mbappe’s legs to get it and he brushed his foot on the way through before winning the ball. That’s usually given as a penalty and if it had been I don’t think there would have been too many arguments, but I’m glad it wasn’t as to me that’s a good tackle from a player who looked like he’d been completely beaten. I loved that little 5 seconds of play as it was just great from both of them. Mbappe is fucking terrifying. Imagine him playing for a coach other than that boring little water carrying muppet show Deschamps. He’d be unstoppable. As it is he’s just relying on counter attacks all the time because France are just so fucking pragmatic under Deschamps. I mean, it’s effective so he’s doing a good job, but from a neutral’s perspective it’s frustrating as there’s so much talent in that squad. Their subs would probably make the quarter finals. Mbappe had a goal ruled out for offside and then created one for Benzema that was also ruled out for offside. Both correct decisions, one made by the linesman and the other by VAR. The first one was annoying because he was offside when he received the ball well away from goal and the flag should have gone up then. They’re told not to though so play went on and about 10 seconds later Mbappe is bending one into the far corner out of nothing. Stunning finish, but THEN the flag goes up. I get it. It was a close(ish) call and if the linesman had flagged earlier the goal never happens. That’s fine if he gets it right, but if he’s wrong then they want the goal to stand, hence the late flag. I just don’t like it, I prefer the way it used to be, mistakes and all. The second one was offside but difficult to spot in real time. VAR chalked that one off, but it was close enough that would we really be up in arms if that goal had stood? France were celebrating and it was cut short by VAR. I say they were celebrating, but no doubt fucking loads of French fans watching weren’t celebrating because they were waiting to see if it was given. This is becoming the new norm now That’s why I hate it. That said, so far VAR has done exactly what it is supposed to do and it hasn’t ruined games the way it did so many times in the Premier League. The refs have been fucking terrific too I have to say. There’s still time of course and I’m willing to bet that a really important game is going to be tainted by some VAR bullshit before the tournament is out. I just hope it’s England on the receiving end.

Two months ago I’d made up my mind I wasn’t going to watch a single minute of the Euros, other than maybe Scotland games. I just wanted the season over and then the plan was to forget about footy completely until August. Then the Reds went on a run, we finished the season well, fans were back in stadiums and suddenly… well, footy didn’t seem quite so bad. Plus I need you to keep subscribing over the summer and I have to give something back in return, so here we are with the round ups again. First off, and long time readers will be expecting this, the thing I’ve been looking forward to the most - the Italian National Anthem. Fucking sensational. After watching that before the opening game I toyed with the idea of switching off as that was definitely going to be the highlight of the whole tournament for me. Hopefully they go all the way to to the final. Not arsed if they win it or not but the more times we see that the better. I have to say the Turkish players belted out their anthem with just as much gusto but the tune was shit so it’s entirely forgettable. Makes me laugh whenever I see the Italy anthem trending on twitter and you get all these flag shaggers complaining that England players never show that kind of passion singing their anthem. Just a thought, but maybe them having to sing about God and Queen just doesn’t really stir the old passions in the way an Italian or French anthem does? Plus there’s the other issue that being English absolutely fucking sucks as the country is populated by morons who number sufficiently to ensure that it’s governed by cunts. It’s mainly just the song being shit though. You’ve got to have Stuart Pearce levels of Brexitness to be able to get passionate about that. Anyway, the opening game got under way when the ball was driven onto the field on a remote control car. What the fuck? I think I liked it though if I’m being honest. Looking at the team line up on the screen I didn’t even know half the players in the Italy team because I don’t watch Serie A and other than Juve, Italian teams have done fuck all in Europe for years. The first take I had from this game was that Chiellini thinks he’s Joel Matip with all those little forward forays. The second take I had was that Turkey aren’t going to score a goal in this tournament. Not with that big old statue up front. He’s the captain, he’s 35 and he kept getting caught offside all the time even though he wasn’t trying to run in behind. He was just stood offside every time the ball was played up to him and the one time he tried to run he was outpaced by Chiellini and threw himself to the floor looking for a pen. He looked like a Sunday League player but he’s just won the farmer’s league with Lille so he must have something, I guess. Italy looked good in the first half but struggled to break down Turkey’s blanket 11 man defence. Fuck me they were negative weren’t they? Turkey looked so scared I can only think someone must have told them Christmas was coming. The opening goal eventually came early in the second half when Berardi fired in a cross and it hit one of the Turkey defenders in the chest and bounced in. Immobile made it 2-0 with a rebound and the lively Insigne added a third. He was subbed immediately afterwards, which wasn’t a surprise as he’d ran his tiny little legs off. They should have sent that remote control car back on to give the little guy a well deserved ride off the field. I was pleasantly surprised by how good Italy were, especially as I knew so little about them beforehand. There are three players in their squad from Sassuolo, whoever the hell they are. I don’t know where Sassuolo is or if indeed it is even a place, or just a name like Lazio, Juventus or Sampdoria. Not sure if the inclusion of three of their players shows how strong or how weak that league is now. Used to be that their entire squad would be taken from the Milan clubs, Juve, Roma and Lazio and they were all household names. There are no stars in this team. Not one. Yet I’ve rarely seen them play as positively as this. This was the first time ever they’d scored more than two in a game at the Euros, which is an incredible stat really. They don’t look like Italy any more, either in playing style or visually. The Italian side lost a lot of its magic for me when they stopped having the best hair in these tournaments and the team started to look like extras from Gomorrah. Every one of the fuckers is covered in tattoos and they all have the same haircuts. If UEFA allowed it they’d be wearing bubble coats, smoking ciggies and riding onto the pitch on scooters too. They get a pass on all this though because… well, the anthem. I thought the atmosphere in the stadium was shite. Virtually no singing and the only noise came from Turks who were booing whenever Italy had the ball, which was pretty much all game as Turkey couldn’t put more than two passes together all night. It remains to be seen whether Turkey are this bad or if Italy were just really fucking good. I suspect a little of both. Italy played with a pace and intensity I don’t think I’ve ever seen from them before. Their pressing was great and even at 2-0 they didn’t sit back and kept looking for more goals. The only thing that stops me going all in on rooting for Italy to win it is Mancini. I’d forgotten how much I disliked him but seeing him preening on the touchline brought it all back. Pretentious wanker. Based on this though he’s completely transformed how Italy play, so I’ll praise him through gritted teeth. Final one on this. The ref was outstanding. Just highlights even more the absolute bunch of stiffs the ‘best league in the world’ has in the middle. Ok, so day two. Jesus, how fucking traumatic was that? I wasn’t watching the Denmark game but then I looked at my phone and couldn’t believe what I reading. The assumption seemed to be that Eriksen had died on the pitch. WHAT THE FUCK!!! I put the TV on but they’d gone off air (not before time, apparently) and the only update on the news was that he’d collapsed on the pitch and the game had been suspended. It’s hard to describe how I felt about it. I have no attachment to Eriksen or Denmark but it really felt like I did. It really shook me. It was fucking horrible and genuinely upsetting. His team-mates having to see that, his wife in the stands… fucking hell. For a while it felt like he hadn’t made it and it was such a horrible, sick feeling. At that point I knew I wouldn’t be doing these round ups as it just wouldn’t have been right me going on about trivial shit like how I can’t stand the face of the Slovakian right back or that the Russians all have terrible hair which is probably a result of the steroids they are forced to take. More than that though, I was thinking that the whole tournament needed to be scrapped. It wouldn’t have been, but it should have. Then the great news came through that he was awake and stable. What soon followed convinced me even more that the tournament would never have been abandoned if Eriksen hadn’t pulled through. Denmark were made to play the game a couple of hours later. What’s worse, it was reported by UEFA that the decision was made by the players after speaking with Eriksen. Technically that was true, but only because they were given a choice of playing it straight away, at mid-day on Sunday or forfeit the game. They wouldn’t have wanted to sleep on that trauma and then go out and play again early the next day, so the logical thing to do was get it over with. And that’s all they did. It was just a case of getting it out of the way as their minds were clearly not on the game and how could they be after what they went through? Schmeichel had been absolutely distraught and it was no surprise to see him blunder for the only goal of the game. Of course he has those moments in him anyway and we can’t say for certain it was because of his mental state, but chances are that mistake was a direct result of his head being cabbaged. Same with the dreadful penalty by Hoijberg. Denmark’s players just weren’t there in the big moments and how could they be? It was an impossible task for them and while it’s easy to slam UEFA for how they handled it, I can see both sides. This isn’t a scenario they will have planned for and given the tight schedule the tournament is on any postponement is going to have massive knock on effects. I don’t know what the right thing to do was, but it didn’t feel like this was it. There’s no way Denmark would have lost to Finland had the Eriksen thing not happened but hopefully they can regroup and win their next two games. I was rooting for them to do well even before this, but now I’m defo pulling for them and Scotland. And Italy. And anyone who isn’t England really. Also a word for Finland too as it can’t have been easy for them. First time in a major tournament and they find themselves in that situation. They weren’t the villains but it will have felt like that as everyone will have been wanting a Danish victory. They did what they needed to do but it will have felt like a hollow victory for them, which is unfair really. There was nothing fair about that whole situation though. I’m just thankful Eriksen pulled through thanks to the heroics of the medical people (and Simon Kjaer who was fucking ace in how he took control). Doesn’t even bear thinking about if Eriksen hadn’t made it. Terrifying that was. The early game on Saturday saw Wales come from behind to get a draw with the Swiss. Not a great performance by them and they could easily have been hammered but for Danny Ward. Switzerland paid the price for sitting back and trying to protect the 1-0 though and Keifer Moore (who I’d never heard of until this game) headed in the equaliser. Good result really as if they can beat Turkey (and based on Friday night I reckon I could rustle up ten other lads and beat Turkey) they’ve got a good chance of going through even if they lose to Italy. And Italy may have already qualified by the time they play Wales and could be resting people. Tell you what’s proper shit though. Wales having to play in fucking Baku. What’s that all about? England paying at Wembley. Scotland at Hampden. And Wales, who made the semis of this tournament last time, have to go to the arse end of nowhere to play their games. Really unfair on their fans (as well as the Swiss) as it’s virtually impossible to get there under the current situation. Still, as long as UEFA get their thirty pieces of silver. The night game saw Belgium comfortably dispatch the Russians. Good. The Russian fans booed the Belgium players taking the knee and the Russian players didn’t do it. Their players not doing it is up to them. You can’t force people to do it but booing those who are doing it just makes you a bad racist cunt. But there’s no surprise that Russia and England are the two doing it. They won’t be the only ones but they are the most predictable. Russia are fucking shit though aren’t they? Relatively speaking I mean. It’s a fucking massive country but they’re shit at everything and the only things they ever succeed in are the things they can win by doping. Considering the size of their population they’re a fucking joke. I don’t understand why they aren’t better than they are, and don’t give me the whole “it’s because of the Soviet Union break up” because even if you include players from all the breakaway nations they’d still be shite. They’re 38th in the FIFA rankings, which is 14 spots below Ukraine even though they have a population that is 100m more. I feel as though they get away with their shitness far too much. It should be more of a talking point. They’ve got the biggest population in Europe and they have at least twice as many people as everyone other than Germany, who are just the 60m behind. Fucking losers. If Russia were a Premier League club they’d be Everton. Day three saw England enter the fray. I didn’t watch most of it as I’m giving them the Manc treatment. I don’t watch City and United and I’m not watching these cunts either. They won 1-0 with a goal from Sterling, who most of the nation wanted dropped beforehand. I put it on with 88 minutes gone just to see if Croatia could grab an equaliser but they didn’t even look arsed. Knocking it round at the back and showing no urgency. At one point Perisic got in behind and headed the ball across the box and there was no team-mate within 15 yards of it. None of them had been arsed to run into the box. Anyone would think they didn’t want to win the group and that second place is better than first as it means avoiding France, Germany or Portugal. I’ll be honest, I didn’t know Austria or ‘North’ Macedonia were even in this tournament and when I found out they were playing each other I wasn’t exactly exited to tune in. I did watch some of it live but I wasn’t committing two hours of my time to it so I waited until the highlight show to catch up on what happened. It was a decent game to be fair and Austria looked lively. I don’t know what the whole ‘North’ thing is with Macedonia but I do know it’s related to some beef with the Greeks. Probably goes back to the days of Alexander the Great so someone should ask Goran Pandev about it, as he’s so old he was probably there for the initial quarrel. Are Greece in this too by the way? *googles* No, they’re not. So that’s them, Norway and both of the Irish who didn’t make it, but everyone else in Europe is here by the looks of it. Crock of shit this format, especially with half the teams getting home advantage for two games. What’s that about? Is this a Covid thing or are UEFA once again trying to fix what ain’t broke? Arnautovic came off the bench and scored. His celebration was a bit angry wasn’t it? Dunno what that was about but he was yelling at the Macedonia players and then pointing at the Austria badge. He was always a fucking head the ball him though. Really talented player but clearly a knob. I liked Austria’s approach though. Get it wide and just whip in great balls. The first goal was fantastic. Great cross, great finish. The second goal was very similar, and they were doing that all day. Great delivery, players flooding the box, three goals. I might watch the full game next time they play. Finally, Holland v Ukraine. Cracking game and both teams gave it a right good go. The Dutch went 2-0 up through Gini and Weghorst, but Ukraine hit back with a worldy from Yarmolenko and then a lovely header from Yaremchuk. It looked like Holland had blown it and there were predictable shouts of “this would never have happened with Van Dijk” but you can’t really make that call. The first is a 25 yarder into the top corner and the second is a set-piece. Maybe Virg deals with the set-piece but I’m not prepared to completely write off the Dutch defence as being garbage based on this small sample size. We’ll see though. Gini was brilliant playing in a completely different role to the one we’ve seen him in for five years. We’ve seen glimpses of this Gini and when it was really needed he channeled his attacking side to great effect, but mostly he just sacrificed himself to allow everyone else to look better. Fucking love him, one of the most unselfish players we’ve ever had. I miss him already. *wipes tear*

Sunday Jun 6: Hendo plays 45 minutes and misses a penalty in a 1-0 friendly win. He shrugged it off afterwards saying “I’ve missed more important ones than that” and all hell broke loose amongst the Union Jack nonce crowd. You can virtually guarantee that all of these tits who see “England” and “Englishness” as the most important thing in life have Union Jacks or a George’s Cross in their twitter handles. Hendo is a disgrace to his country apparently because he doesn’t see missing a penalty in a warm up game as being anything to lose sleep over. This is one of many reasons I’ll be rooting for Scotland in the Euros. The only people on earth who hate England fans as much as I do are the Scots. According the Mirror, Big Dunc has turned down the chance to go to Real Madrid with Carlo because he wants to manage Everton. In similar news, I’ve turned down the chance to play in this year’s British Open at Royal St George’s because I’ve joined the Beacon in Skem and want to focus on playing there. Monday Jun 7: So Gini’s reported wage with PSG is going to be around 250k a week. It’s easy to say “that’s why he left” but that doesn’t tell the whole story, as if PSG hadn’t come in at the 11th hour he was joining Barca for half that amount, so 125k a week. He was worth at least 150k a week to us as that’s what Hendo and Milner are/were on (I assume Milly took a pay cut when he signed his last deal). We don’t know what the club offered or what Gini was asking, but I don’t think whatever deal he’s signed with PSG gives us any indication of anything really. We’ll probably never know exactly why they couldn’t agree on terms, it just frustrates me that it came to this. Losing Emre Can on a free was one thing, this is another entirely. Meanwhile, Calvert-Lewin pledges his (very short term future) to the Blues. “I am happy at Everton. I worked hard to become number nine & score goals like I did recently. Personally, I have the ambition to one day play in the Champions League & win titles. But for now, I'm happy at Everton." He’s too good for them now. He should be playing for an Aston Villa or a Leeds. Not that he’d get in the Leeds team as they have my boy Bamford, but you get my point. Calvert-Lewin is too good for Everton but not yet good enough for the very top teams. He’d be good for Spurs if Kane were to leave but Kane isn’t leaving so it’s moot. Mind you, maybe City should be looking at him as Aguero’s replacement as most of his goals come in the six yard box and no-one creates more tap ins for forwards than City. Calvert-Lewin and Sterling would be falling over each other to get on the end of all those cut backs. And I’m sure Everton wouldn’t mind allowing him to join their pals and fight the good fight against us. Probably even give them mates rates on the fee. Tuesday Jun 8: Kenwright apparently wants Moyes or Martinez to come back and manage the Blues again. If he wants to go down the nostalgic, bring back a former boss route, he’d have more luck trying to lure Mike Walker out of retirement, as why on Earth would Bobby Brown Shoes or the Chosen One leave their current jobs to go back there? Maybe Big Fat Joe will take it? If it was up to Bill he’d have the urn containing my mate Howie’s ashes on a seat next to Big Dunc. It’s not up to him though, unfortunately. City are still being linked with Kane and Grealish, United are reportedly ready to go big on Sancho and Chelsea are ‘close’ to landing Haaland. As for us? Can’t wait for the reports that we’ll be selling Shaq, Wilson and Origi to fund the new Anny Road and that we don’t need to replace a midfielder who played 50 games last season because “Keita is going to be like a new signing”. Transfer windows are a depressing time. Lots of stuff on LFC social media today wishing Mascherano a Happy Birthday and showing some clips of him when he played here. I have no issue with this whatsoever despite the way he acted in his final days here. They do similar for Torres and Suarez so why not Match too? I will however, be curious to see whether Michael Owen gets recognised in a similar fashion or if they’ll just completely ignore him as they’ve done since 2016 when they tweeted happy birthday to him and a load of virgins kicked off. Speaking of virgins kicking off, Rashford had to speak today about the fucking losers booing the taking of the knee. He pretty much said “we’re going to carry on doing it so fucking deal with it”. Good for him. It’s genuinely staggering to me that anyone feels it’s ok to boo it. If you think it’s pointless and it’s little more than a token gesture that doesn’t change anything, that’s worthy of a conversation. But booing it is just completely fucking nuts to me. “Keep politics out of football” they cry. Until James McLean doesn’t wear a poppy and then there’s a stampede to get to their twitter accounts to call him a cunt. Wednesday Jun 9: “Maybe where they might have thought I was just going to do a job and then they would be able to sell me and I would move on, now they’re having second thoughts. I’m not sure. I still need to have the conversations with them and just see if there is a role for me there and what role they would want me to play. “It would depend on if they saw a role for me at Liverpool and then what role that would be. I would have to decide what is best for myself off the back of that. I have loved all of my time at Liverpool up until this moment, to have been taken in by the fans so much this year and have loved having the opportunity to play for the club. I have loved every minute of it and would love to carry on playing for the club. “But I’ve also got to take into consideration what is best for my career, and that will depend on what role Liverpool see they do or don’t have for me and I’ll have to go from there.” That sounds to me like Nat is on his way. Hope not as I’d like him as the fifth member of the centre back stable because we definitely need five. Whether that’s enough for him I don’t know, but the injury records of the four in front of him suggests he’d get a fair amount of playing time if he did stay. Either way, I love him and support him whatever he wants to do, the fucking hero. Meanwhile, the Italian press say we’ve activated a release clause for Roma midfielder Lorenzo Pellegrini. No idea who he is or if he’s any good but I doubt it matters as it’s most likely a load of bollocks anyway. We’re also supposed to be in for Jeremy Doku (I know that name, I think we’ve been linked to him before) and Patson Daka from RB Salzburg. I remember him too, he scored twice against us in a pre-season game when it looked like our lads had put bets on him scoring a hat-trick. I doubt we’re in for either of them as I’m not sure they’re even an upgrade on Origi let alone being close to the level of the other four. Elsewhere, Nuno’s move to Palace falls through over the amount of backroom staff he wanted to take with him. That surely means he won’t be going to Everton either as they’ll pull the plug when he says he doesn’t want Dunc the lunatic to be kept on. Graham Potter is the leading candidate for the Blues now but they’d be better off appointing Harry Potter as you’d need to be a fucking wizard to succeed there. What? I know it’s a shit gag but this is the summer now, I’ll have my “A Game” ready for August, don’t you worry about that. I like Potter though, Palace should try and get him. In fact, even Spurs could do worse. Makes me laugh seeing Everton fans turning their noses up at him. Who do they think they SHOULD be appointing? Antonio Conte isn’t walking through your door lads. Not unless you pay him the same salary “Carlo Fantastico” was on, and even then he’d probably say no as he isn’t in his sixties and looking for one last big pay day for him and his jabroni son. Wolves do have a new manager though. He’s a Portuguese fella no-one has heard of and he’s a client of Jorge Mendes. I don’t think anyone saw that coming. Hendo responds to comments made by Roy Keane about his role at the Euros. Keane basically said he doesn’t look fit and if he isn’t fit they shouldn’t take him. He dismissed the argument that he’d be useful to have around the squad and said “I’ve heard a lot of people say they want him around the place. For what? Does he do card tricks? Does he have a sing-song? Does he do quizzes in the evening? What does he do? Surely Jordan doesn’t want to be around the place either being some sort of cheerleader. You want to play and he’s clearly nowhere near it.” I reckon that’s all fair except the “nowhere near it” part. If the season was still going Hendo would be back in our team now so there’s no reason he shouldn’t be playing for England. He’s fit and ready to play, so therefore he should be picked. Keane is great entertainment but you generally have to take what he says with a pinch of salt as he’ll always put a funny take over a correct one. That’s why he’s compulsive viewing. Hendo just doesn’t give a fuck what people say about him anymore though. He takes every bit of criticism with a smile and never gets arsey about it. “To be fair to Roy, he can say what he wants about me,” he said. “He gave me my debut and I wouldn’t be here without him giving me that. He can say whatever he wants about me. I found it quite funny, actually. “So, yeah, listen, we know a little bit more detail, I know more detail and so does the manager, which Roy may not. But in terms of stuff like that, everyone’s going to have an opinion, everybody’s going to think they know better than everybody else. “Yeah, and the card tricks he was on about – I’ve got a few of them up me sleeve! Listen, as a player you want to play and I’m not coming here just to be around the camp, like Roy was saying. “I want to come here and I want to contribute in the games. How much of that is not really down to me, it’s up to the manager to make a decision.” Love him, but that love is negated by what I feel about Kane, Sterling, Pickford, Maguire, Walker, Foden etc and that’s before I even get to the other stuff. So sorry Hendo lad, but fuck England. Thursday Jun 10: The big six punishment is in. Fines of £3m or so and an agreement for a 30 point deduction if they ever try anything like that again. Seems pointless to me as I don’t think there should have been any punishment but whatever. The other 14 though can fuck right off. Apparently they were arguing among themselves as to whether the money should go to them or to grass roots footy. Say what you want about the greed of the owners of the big six but most of the others are just as bad and in some cases (West Ham) worse, they just don’t have the same opportunities to show it. Meanwhile, VAR offsides will be judged differently next season. The lines will be thicker, which I admit does make the situation a little bit less shit, but it doesn’t fix the fundamental issue of not being able to properly celebrate goals for the fear of it being ruled out. I always knew where I stood before and I hardly got caught out celebrating an offside goal as I had a sixth sense for a Lino’s flag going up. I was always the smart arse still in his seat telling everyone else to settle down because the flag was up. Now you just have no idea what is going to happen. Even when it’s not offside they’re still pulling it back for random shit. Remember Bobby’s ‘handball’ at Spurs? Just fuck VAR off completely and let’s live with the mistakes. Some of the most iconic goals in history would not have counted if VAR had been around back then, including both Maradona goals against England. The handball one is obvious, but the greatest goal ever scored wouldn’t have counted either because seconds before Diego picked up the ball an Argentina player absolutely hammered one of the England midfielders. Get rid of it and let’s have the beautiful game back. Friday Jun 11: Fucking hell, the Athletic doesn’t half talk some shite. Saw a tweet promoting a piece on Harry Kane and the bullet points included: * Kane wanted to be THFC’s’ Michael Jordan - to dominate every aspect of the game. * THFC finished 7th - now set on MCFC Fuck me. He didn’t try particularly hard to be MJ did he? I mean Michael Jordan didn’t get immediate success with the Bulls either. He was the best player in the league only he kept losing in the playoffs. But he stayed where he was and eventually beat everyone. He didn’t throw his toys out of the pram and demand a trade to Larry Bird’s Celtics or Magic Johnson’s Lakers. So don’t ever mention that fucking slobbering goon in the same sentence as Michael Jordan. I’m irrationally wound up by this you know, it’s proper put me in a foul mood. Finally, over at the Pit the Blues are reportedly close to agreeing with Nuno. They’ve got no shame have they? Sloppy seconds after losing out to Palace. Nice fella but he’s not going to do anything with Everton. Probably still end up managing Portugal, Brazil, Juventus or someone based on the track record of their previous failed managers. …. and that was the week that was.