The Press Box - Ep. 137: The Ringer's Euro 2016 Week 3 Recap

Episode Date: June 24, 2016

Chris Ryan, Ryan O’Hanlon, Micah Peters, and Kevin Clark reflect on the group stage’s most compelling performances and discuss what will be a completely different tournament going forward. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today's episode of the Channel 33 Soccer podcast is brought to you by Seekkeek, our presenting sponsor in the only fan-friendly app for buying and selling sports and music tickets. Seekek makes buying tickets on your phone a total snap. With just two taps, you can instantly buy tickets to an event the same day, have your tickets delivered to you straight to your phone, and enter the event without ever having to print anything out. And if you can't go to the game or show, you can sell your tickets directly from the app in less than 30 seconds. With Seekkeek, there's no guesswork.

you'll know exactly where you're sitting, what you're going to pay, and whether or not you're getting a good deal all right from your phone. So drop your old ticket app and experience buying and selling tickets the way it should be. To start using Seatgeek, download the free Seatgeek app or go to seekeith.com. Welcome to the Channel 33 soccer podcast. We're talking Euros 2016. We are brought to you by the Icelandic Football Association and Roy Keen's sense of sportsmanship. My name is Chris Ryan. I am joined by Ryan O'Hanlon.

What's going on, Chris? Kevin Clark. Hey. Micah Peters. The three-man midfield. I don't know which one of you is the playmaker, which one's the engine room, and which one's the defensive midfielder.

Who's the McAlelele here? I don't know. I'm the sub who leaves the bench after every goal to sell a lot. You're the guy I make warm up 10 times in a game and ever play. I'm wearing a bib and I'm out at midfield for no reason.

Guys, we've come to the end of your group stages of your 2016. We're into the knockouts, into the round of 16. And to get us started, Ryan, we're going to start with you. I wanted to ask you. Let's say I just woke up from a coma. Nothing like traumatic, just one of those usual comas. And I've only been out for like a month, so I know about soccer. But I ask him like, I missed the euros so far. What happened?

What is the thing you tell me? This is directed to you personally because I know that you're a soccer purist. You describe yourself as that. It's the rebirth of soccer on the British Isles, Northern Ireland, Wales, Ireland, England. Where the game is played the right way. Yeah, man. 4-4-2, kick the ball up the field, run after it, put it in the goal. Yeah. So all those teams are into the knockouts?

All those teams are in the knockouts, and they're really uninteresting, actually, to me, for the most part. But the team I find most interesting is Wales. For a guy we've talked about before, they were led by Gareth Bell. They won their group with England, which I don't think many people expected. I guess some of us expected because England kind of always fucks things up. and they have again. Everyone in England expected it. Yeah, everyone in England, everyone in this room, maybe.

But I find Wales the most interesting team because they sort of, they kind of remind me of Wester this season. Yeah. They've been getting outshot in every game. To me, through the group stages, sort of every team has kind of been what we thought they were for the most part. But Wales is interesting because of the way they play.

I think they sort of sit deep and then they create a lot of high quality chances for themselves. Kevin, I'm a Hollywood executive. I want you to pitch me a movie, movie on Euro 2016. What's the elevator pitch? What's the tagline here? The tagline? What's the theme of the tournament? A lot of shit. Okay. I don't know if that's going to fly. Michael Bay directing? Yeah, Michael Bay. Yeah, no. After this section, I'm going to go up and down Santa Monica Boulevard going, would anyone like to make my movie called Lot of Shit?

Take it over. So for me, I think we're looking at the end of the Euros as a typical international tournament. This used to be a compact tournament where if you, you know, eight of the best teams in the world would be in the knockout stage and you would just, it would just be nothing but quality. Now, third place teams get in. If you score two goals like Switzerland, you can get in. You know, Switzerland's being rewarded by scoring two goals by getting in a bracket that they have a fairly decent chance to make the semis or the finals, okay? Belgium happens to be one of the only good teams in their bracket. They finish second to Italy. They have, if you look at the betting odds right now, The top three most likely finals all include Belgium, okay?

France being number one, Germany number two, Spain number three, but they're all playing Belgium in the most likely final, according to the odds makers. That tells me that... Do you have a preferred odds maker? Just out of curiosity. We're not sponsored content. Ladbrokes, right? Ladbrokes, Skybet, any of those.

I don't... Which one is Mike Ashley used one? Which one's the advertisers for Newcastle? That was the payday loan place. Never mind. Keep going. Which services Mike Ashley used to bet against his own team, Newcastle? Oh, Newcastle is playing today?

I'll put a million dollars on them to lose. So what I'm getting at here is it's going to be so diluted that you're going to get to maybe next euros, guys resting for the entire group stage or only playing one game or a little bit more targeting towards, oh, we want to finish here. I think people at the beginning of this tournament were treating it as the euros of 20, 2012 or 2008 or World Cup. That's not going to happen anymore. It is so easy to progress.

There's going to be a little more of like, let's tinker in the group stages, let's try to get second or third to get this match up because it's a little bit easier. There's always been... What a shock that UEFA has managed to suck the life out of a competitive tournament. There's always been those situations where, oh, these guys drew because they were afraid of this guy in the knockout stage or whatever. But you're going to see it a little more because it's easier when you're playing a northern in Ireland. It's easier when you're playing a crap team that just qualified but by, you know,

because it's 24 teams. So I just see a little bit less of competitive juices going forward in this tournament in the next three or four euros. Micah, I've just gotten back from a trip from Hawaii where I've been training for a triathlon for the last six weeks. I haven't had my phone with me because I'm committed to physical excellence. As you can have seen for my three-point shoot out, what are you going to tell me about what I've missed in the euros? I would say that you have basically missed the Euros being, the group stages being a very hodgepodge and having these teams that are normally very good intact being broken down by well-jilled, very unified discipline teams.

Right. So team over stars? Is that what we're saying? Team over stars is what I'm saying, just like I was saying last week. Because now we're heading to the group stages and England is playing Iceland. And I think that it's totally possible that Iceland beats England. because, I mean, like, they've been basically... It's totally possible that we can have an Iceland-Ireland order.

You guys are possible. You guys are insane. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Well, yeah, a little bit. Take it to Skyline, boys. I'll take it to O'Hanlin bet right now if you want. Put money on it. How much?

Yeah, how much? Let's run back the Thunder Warriors bet. Just for reference. $50 bet straight up Chris gave me. and I took the Warriors over the Thunder. No, I want to get some odds on that. Let's keep going with Micah. I'm sorry.

No, but it is okay, though, because, okay, so in, if Iceland can survive through the first half, there's a good chance. They are, like, surprisingly competent in the second half. When Hodgson uses his first three songs in the 50th minute. Exactly. I get the feeling that they're going to nick a garbage time goal, like, in stop or something. One of those games is upset, for sure. There's just no question that France and England are, they would be two.

much, that would be too good, that would be too much fun for France and England to play in the quarters. They have, Iceland or Ireland is going to win that game. I've, and like, I kind of want it to be Ireland just because of the whole Tierie like handball thing. Oh yeah. That's a good point. That's great.

I think that, you know, like they're just going to be very extremely pissed off, you know, and then France is also France. They're going to let us down. I want to see it just because Roy Keene has officially started to lose it with the refs. He almost killed a fourth official against Italy, and you know that the calls are going to be a little France-centric. Yeah, now is the time Roy Kien has lost. Yeah, he's so calm.

For my part, if I was coming in off of a cruise ship where I dropped my phone off the side of the boat three weeks ago, I would tell people, well, actually, I wouldn't know because I was on the cruise ship. But if the rules were reversed and somebody was getting off a cruise ship, and I was like, hey, man, guess what you missed? It's a tournament of parody. Maybe it's the, maybe it's set up that,

way. Maybe it's just the end of a long competitive cycle for a lot of these star players who've been playing in European domestic competitions for a long time, racked up a lot of games. But this has been exactly what the organizers wanted. This is what Platini's vision of UEFA was when he started trying to tinker with Champions League a little. This is why you have to play a hundred games to get through Europa League is because they want all the countries in this conference in this uh con like what is it the association i mean across the continent they want competitive balance they want albania to have a shot they want switzerland to do well they don't want to have it just be france germany and italy it's weirdly not like the way we conceive of

american sports where i think we all imagine commissioners would rather have it be new york versus los angeles every year in whatever sport it is yeah it's like i think that they actually enjoy and that they there is incentive for the northern ireland for the first Republic of Ireland's for the Iceland's and the Hungries to do well here. It's also just weirdly counter to how soccer typically works. Yeah. Because, you know, there are no playoffs in every domestic league and you play 38 games or whatever to figure out the best team.

Are you suggesting the tournament has been set up so well by organizers? We should drop all the criminal charges against them. Well, no, not at all. I mean, if anything, I think it's criminal that Belgium will probably be in the final. I don't think that they're the second best team in Europe. Do we charge them with that? No, but I mean, I think that what you want to see when you're watching a European championship is something like what we saw

with Russia in 08. Something where your team gets on a run and is hot and has the hottest player right now which is Arshaven back then. I'm so sold on 08, Russia. I don't know why. But that you want to see greatness. And right now what we're seeing

is people hedging a little bit. Anyway, let's go into this round of 16. There are some interesting matchups, but a lot of them I mean, I think we have things like we have games like Hungary in Belgium. We have games like, I don't know, I mean, Wales, Northern Ireland is hard to call. You know, I mean, that's a, that's a one-oh right there.

I don't know how that's going to work out. But I do want to talk about some of these matchups because we have some tasty ones, right? Italy, Spain is probably the marquee match of this round. And Mike, I want to start with you. How are you feeling about these two teams? Because they both went out of the group stages. They both ended the group stages on a whimper. Spain beat Italy in both 2008 and 2012.

I mean, like, they've met 35 times. and it's pretty evenly split down the middle. I think there have been 10 wins. I'm sorry, 10 wins for Spain, 14 draws. I honestly think it's a toss-up. I mean, I don't know. Neither one of them has been that convincing. I mean, like, Spain has been, they've been possessed on the ball well.

Italy has been defending really well. Defending really well. Looking, again, like I said last week, like very 2006-ish. So maybe it's 2-1 Spain. I feel like it's going to be close. Okay. Ryan? I think it's definitely the most interesting matchup of the round of 16, I think, because, you know,

Spain has such a distinct style and so does Italy. And that's something we've talked about a little bit. Like a lot of these teams don't necessarily have a style. So seeing the team that's going to try to possess the ball and essentially walk it into the goal against the team that's designed to protect their goal at all costs, essentially, will be fascinating. I think Spain, to me, they've been one of the most impressive teams so far. They're playing Italy because Sergio Ramos missed a P.K., essentially, in my mind. And the margins are super tight in a tournament like this, and that's what happens.

And I think Italy, the game against Belgium was great, but even then we sort of talked about how that sort of defensive reactive style maybe didn't have that long of a shelf life. And these guys are a little bit older. Conte's played, hasn't rotated. He played some kids in the Ireland game, but for the most part, he took Buffon out, but he played the same defense. And we've talked about it before again beyond the backline in Buffon. Like these guys in Italy are there's nothing special, nothing scary. If Simone Zaza had connected on his volley, it would have been the LeBron block of the Euros.

Kevin, any feelings about Italy, Spain? No-n-nil-draw. Italy wins on penalties. That's really depressing. Yeah. To have the marquee matchup of the round of 16 fall like that? Spain and Italy have played games like that before because Italy has the defense where unless you have an incredible talent, unless you have 2008, 2010 type Spain team, how are you going

to unlock that defense? Marada is really, really good. But I don't see him as a type of person who's just going to be able to take a ball and get it past those guys. The midfield passing is not what it was four years ago. I just don't see anyone. You can't discount the idea that Conte could go. go up to Marada before the game and just like stare into his soul.

And then Marado would be like, I can't do this. Well, there's also like a weird dynamic of the rumors came out today that Chelsea is interested in Marada and Conte will be managing Chelsea come. I like that line. We had that with Van Hull in the last World Cup. And it was like he'd already been named Manchurch United Manager. And so when they were, when the Dutch were playing certain teams, it was like, oh, he might try to buy this guy.

I think they played Costa Rica. And there was actually a theory that like they played. they put in Tim Kruel in one game, late in a game, one game just to screw with, like, Newcastle or something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The conspiracy theories,

switched out for the penalty kicks, right? The conspiracy theories. It was so, yeah. The conspiracy theories were just amazing. And so I kind of like this extra wrinkle that Marana might be going to Chelsea and Conte is just going to be fucking with it. All right, let's speed it up a little bit,

and I want to, Mike, I want to ask you what team you feel best about going into the knockouts here. Croatia. Yes. And it's not close. I agree to you. For one, thing they managed to beat spain without luca madrich um they also managed to split possession with a team

that literally uses possession as a form of defense i believe that was your point ryan sorry to steal that from you um but honestly it's like having bill james in the room yeah you know like you just got i'm sorry but they also their record would have been a hundred percent if not for that weird collapse against the check republic which is not their fault is their fans of it yeah yeah yeah so i mean like some of their fans Yeah, if their fans managed not to do something that is abhorrent like tar and feather the referee or something

like I think that they'll go I mean I think they'll win the entire thing You think they're gonna win the final? Yeah. That's a shout. The thing though with this with Croatia they win a group with Spain which is great and like they deserve

to be rewarded but because of the I feel like you're not going to reward it. Because of the fuck no because of the fucked up structure of the tournament they're playing Portugal and against Cristiano Ronaldo. Guess what? They'll be fine. Portugal sucks. Croatia... Do you think Portugal's good?

Yeah, I do. I think any team with Christiana Ronaldo is. Sure. Yeah. I agree. Croatia won the group in 08 over Germany, by the way, and then Germany got to the final. There's really no correlation if you look historically between who wins the group and who gets to the final. And I love the Croatia vibe right now. Rackettich is probably one of the top five players in this tournament. And he's the second best midfield. Loving the Croatia vibe is not the great. greatest look right now.

Madrich, by the way, it was credited for the win even though he didn't play against Spain. Did you guys see this? No, what happened? So Madrich approached the keeper before the Sergio Ramos penalty and said he's going to hit it to his right.

Oh, yeah, I saw... A little teammate thing. A little teaming thing. Was it Bousquet's caught that he said it and whispered it into Ramos' ear, which I think probably just totally messed with Ramos. You're telling me that Ramos couldn't handle

like a complex intellectual exercise? that he just slapped it right up the middle. It doesn't really matter. I feel like every single important thing in a game I've ever seen Ramos play him with the exception of like, I think he won the Champions League a couple years ago.

But, you know, every time I've ever watched Ramos in an important situation, he has either gotten a red card or almost gotten a red card or missed a penalty kick or something like that. No?

I don't know. I just want to know. I want to know what Biscuette said to Ramos. It's like the end of loss in translation. They were just like, Real Madrid. Yeah. It's probably some anti-real-Madrid shit.

Guys, what, what team do you feel like going into the best about going into the round of 16? I'm feeling best about France just because I think the draw has sort of gone their way. I'm going to die on that hill for sure. And, you know, Didier Deschamps is leading me up it, which is, you know, someone you don't, I don't think I really want to be following. And I talked about how France was maybe my disappointment through two games. but I think they're playing Ireland. You know, Roy Keane, you never know what he's going to do. But otherwise the team is not good.

They're just not. Like, they wouldn't have advanced if the structure was different. They have the Irish Joe Allen, West Hulahan. That's true. That's true. Stand up. And, you know, you guys are, I don't believe this, but you guys are talking about Iceland, maybe beating England.

So if France has to play Iceland and Ireland in their first two games at home, they're France. They have Paul Pogba. I think they're going to be fine. and you're basically walking into the semifinals. Otherwise, they're playing England in the quarters. We know England, you know. England is already self-destructing.

It's incredible. When you say you guys are talking about Iceland beating England, I want to go on a record to saying, I am not one of those people who's talking about that. I think I'm the only person you said that. No, I'm also saying that because I also believe. I want to talk about Ireland really quickly. So Robbie Brady scored that goal,

and then he went into the crowd to kiss his girlfriend. And there's an amazing photo where it looks like all. I wish the reader should seek this. out, all of the entire crowd wanted to kiss him as well. There's like five guys leaning in trying to kiss Robbie Brady. I don't know if you guys saw it, but I was kissing the TV. Did you guys see the after the game, Roy Keene had his arm around Brady and then was literally choking him with his other hand and it was like, it was a side of affection.

But it's like the full, it's not like, ah, I got your neck in my hand. It's like full choke. Imagine if Roy Keene was your dad? I can't. I can't do it, man. Kevin, what team do you feel best? It's not going in. The people I felt the best about going into the tournament, which was Germany.

Germany had 79% possession against Northern Ireland. The last time they did that in a Euro game was 1980. That's a sign to me. I like when teams just have a plan and do exactly what they do well. Italy's doing the same thing. So you like when teams are like, let's follow the plan we had in 1980. Yes, exactly. Good teams stay good.

That's my NFL thing and that's my Euro soccer thing. Italy is also following the Italy plan. Right? And so they're going to meet in the quarterfinals and there's going to be, you know, two great plans meeting. But I think Germany is going to win the entire thing. I think you're seeing signs of just vintage Germany. I think we were a little bit sleeping on it. I think watching them watching them the other day. We got a little too caught up in France. I don't believe in France. We'll get to that in a second. But when Germany just has the ball all the time, you can read the tea leaves and say, okay, this is, we're back.

Germany's back. All right. Well, we'll get to your negative France feelings. But what I want to find out from you guys now is the team that you think can still turn it around. Because I think that weirdly in this round of 16, we have a lot of underperforming sides, both big ones and smaller ones. And I'm curious about which ones you guys think might be able to turn it around.

I'm going to just say quickly, I feel like England had their crisis early. Usually, like, you know, I know that they just are just not a good tournament team. Let's just put it that way. And they qualify really well when they went 10 out of 10 getting into this thing. They're just generally a little bit of front runners when it comes to getting into these tournaments.

And then inevitably there's media pressure. We got Rahim Sterling, Instagramming after a match, like hashtag the most hated one or something like that. And apparently he's being rattled by trolls. I will just say that I don't enjoy that whole like argument about we're just not good at tournaments because that's like

saying that you're a good student but bad at tests. Yeah, I'm not saying it. You only play tournaments as an international. That's the only thing. I'm not saying that England deserves anything better than what they have. I'm just saying that I think England got their crisis out of the way. I still think, I even wonder whether Roy Hachin rotated in that last game, much to the chagrin of a lot of media who thought that Slovakia was there for the taking,

they could have won the group. I think that they could, you know, if they get past Iceland, which in all seriousness, I think that they really should. I think that they are in a good situation. Then they have nothing to lose. If England gets to the quarters, I feel like they're playing with house money. I mean, think about it. They came in second in their group.

Spain comes in second in their group. They're playing Italy. And England's playing Iceland. It's a good situation. And I also, I think England has relatively played well on the whole. A lot of shots? They dominated well. A lot of chances created?

Yeah, exactly. And those numbers tend to re-result. Exactly. Exactly. All you can do is create a ton of shots and not give up a ton of shots and hope that they go in. That's my soccer, overall arching soccer philosophy. Michael, what's a team that you feel like you'd like to see, you think they could still turn it around?

I want to believe that something good is going to happen with Belgium. Just because they... They started to turn around. I thought that last performance was pretty good. Yeah, I mean, like, you know, they got the goal late against Sweden, got through and managed to stay off of like the literal valley of death on the other side of the bracket. So I think that maybe they could sneak into the final.

Huh. Over Croatia. This side of the bracket is so bizarre. This side of the bracket that we're talking about is Switzerland and Poland, Poland, which were Kevin's dark horses before the tournament. How are you feeling about them? Feeling pretty good, but Belgium's going to make the final. Okay. Switzerland and Poland, Croatia and Portugal, Wales, Northern Ireland, Hungary, Belgium. Belgium should probably walk over Hungary. They get Wales, Northern Ireland in the quarters.

Then they just have to get through Croatia, Portugal, or probably Poland in the semis. I think if Belgium is going to be favored in all of those games, I think. You don't think Croatia is better than Belgium? I read the bets. They're all favorite. Belgium is heavy favorites to get out of that group. I'm not saying I would pick them, but I think they're going to be favored. Okay.

All right. They're the team, I think, that's been by far most favored by the draw. Kevin, do you have a team that you think is still got some room to grow? Well, first of all, in a weird way Poland does because Levantowski hasn't broken out yet. They've done it with other guys. Levin Dowski can have a moment or two where he just takes. over a game and if he does it in the quarterfinals all of a sudden they're in the semis. For me, though, it's Portugal because I think that they were operating with a very tired.

I just won the Champions League, Cristiano Ronaldo, two days to rest now. He's going to be recharging the batteries. I just think they can play better than three draws. And they're on that weird side of the bracket. I think that they could be running a much better rate than they, in the knockout stage and the group stage. All right. Give me one prediction before we go.

Ryan, start with you. Just give me a prediction from a game. give me a prediction from a big performance you think is coming. It's a little bit of a wild card question. My prediction is that Spain makes the final. Okay. Despite the ridiculously tough drawl of they have. SESC?

I think Marada. Okay. Micah, give me a big prediction player or team coming into this knockouts. Hmm. It is definitely what I've already laid out there. I honestly believe that Iceland is going to beat England. Okay. I honestly believe that with all of my heart.

With all of your heart? Yes. Okay. Yes. Kevin, with all of your heart. Give me a prediction going into the knockouts. France is going to lose in the quarterfinals. To England.

Yes. I feel like there's two types of not knowing your best 11. I feel like there's experimentation, which is what Roy Hodgson's doing. He's resting guys. He's rotating guys with France. They're trying to go from good to great. And they're really, I think this is the bad time to be tinkering with that sort of midfield, not knowing.

I know it sounds ridiculous, but I still think they have too much. talent to win. Like you, they, they just, they sort of sorted it out two months ago, three months ago. This is our 11. You should not be dropping Pagba. You should not be playing around with Griesman. You should just know those guys' roles. And I think that now is not the time if you're going out. If content was managing France, this would not be a tournament. No, oh, no, be over. Yeah. France, I just, I just don't believe in France. That's my prediction. Okay. We'll be back next week to figure out whether any of our predictions were right. Go Iceland. Go Roy Keen. This has been the Euro's 2016 pod.

Thank you.