There were six things that I learned from the Euros today. Or better, there were six things which I already knew but I was reminded of and will hopefully remember for Russia 2018.
1. If your feeling, your deep down gut instinct is that a match is going to be boring because it's between two teams who up to that point in the tournament have been, quite simply, boring don't build up the expectations in your head that all of a sudden they will play like Brazil, version 1982. Poland and Switzerland were boring to watch for three matches. Put them together=double the boredom.
2. Northern Ireland supporters are great, a lot of fun, yet most of their exuberance is based on one song....about a player who didn't play today, or ever in these Euros. How many of you know who Will Griggs is? Apparently he's on fire. He's so hot that manager Michael O'Neill has to keep him well away from the opposition, on the bench. The Welsh fans today picked up on this obsession with a chant of, "you've only got one song". To which the Irish replied with, "you've only got one player". Fair enough. But at least he was playing. At one point the legendary commentator, Martin Tyler, let out an embarrassed, exasperated laugh and said to his co-commentator, "here we go again...the Will Griggs song". So if Northern Ireland do pull off another miracle and qualify for Russia then Will Griggs had better be playing or the fans should learn a new song.
3. Previous results mean absolutely nothing, other than raising expectations. When Croatia beat Spain in the group stage, there was much talk of what a great team they were. Today, against Portugal, they looked nothing like that great team. This did not surprise me. Examples from the past that spring to mind: Holland beating Italy 4-1 in 2008, in a fantastic display of attacking football; in the quarter final against Russia they were abysmal; Denmark beat Uruguay 6-1 in 1986; in the next round Spain thrashed them 5-1; and there were many more. Take each match as it comes.
4. A spectacular goal, a moment of pure football genius, does not a football match win. The goal that Shaqiri! Shaqiri! scored today would have been, in many commentators' eyes, "worthy of winning any football match". Except it didn't win Switzerland the match. It only brought them level and to win you have to score one more than the other team.
5. Come Russia 2018 I have to be in one of two life situations to be able to watch the World Cup. I have to either be doing something that pays me to write daily musings about football, or I have to have found the answer to acquiring independent wealth status where I spend my days watching Northern Ireland play Syria and writing about it and not needing to get paid. Otherwise, I will have another day like today of trying to watch in between the annoyance of work.
And number 6 is that the BBC do indeed know who Marco Pacione is and understood my humour.
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