Day Twenty Four

Italy v Spain

Do you remember whenTomorrow's World had the first ever prototype push button phone? What's the point of that? we all thought. It saves about half a second a number. Is this really the future? It was, and that was the end of the line for the rotary dial.

Four decades later Spain have abolished the striker, and we can all instantly see the point. Instead, they have many, many shooting, dribbling and passing midfielders. Last night they fielded about thirty of them, all shooting, dribbling and passing at the same time, all of the time. How amazing are the laws of physics, that they can accommodate a team like Spain?

Which makes the Spanish gameplan sound complicated and hard to choreograph, but their first goal was simple enough. The ball came through to Fabregas, who outpaced the covering defender and got down the goal line. The keeper had to cover his run at the near post, so the cross effectively took him out of the game. Silva only had to head into an empty net, although his control and placing to put it past the covering defender were excellent.

Soon after that Italy had to take Chiellini off. They brought on Balzaretti, who I thought had done well against Germany. After he came on Italy started to look stronger, building some positive moves out of their back third solidity.

It was top quality stuff all round. Spain were always threatening, moving the ball about with their usual flair and going round players almost at will, but diligent and well-timed Italian tackles and interceptions kept them at bay for a while.

The gulf in class between either team and England was palpable.  As @ed_son tweeted, Looking at the teams, you can't help thinking how much more of a spectacle this game would be with Terry, Henderson and Milner involved. Ah, the English. When it comes to irony we're world class. In football - well let's just say games like this make me proud to be a European. If only there was a football Ryder Cup, we'd walk it.

Let's use the Spanish second goal to illustrate the gap between us and them. Imagine if you will a small rectangular savannah filled with mutually hostile gangs of primitive creatures, half ape half footballer. They call to each other in grunts and glottal stops, and one gang has crudely daubed three lions on their chests in charcoal.

The tallest of the these, let's call him Andy Carroll, is bashing a defender's skull in with a rock. We see him throw it triumphantly but aimlessly into the sky, and suddenly Xavi is launching it precisely into Jordi Alba's orbit to the tune of the Blue Danube. Alba's turbocharged shot fires it under the keeper, it docks seamlessly with the net and Spain are two up. My god, they're full of stars.

Italy had their chances in the first half as well. Montolivo, Balotelli and Cassano all had shots from distance. They might have troubled an English keeper, but Casillas wasn't really stretched.

At half time they treated us to the goals of the tournament, and Vialli compared Pirlo to Beethoven. I found this immensely reassuring. It shows it isn't just me, you see. If I choose to use a pointlessly elaborate metaphor to illustrate something I could quite easily just describe, I'm not being deliberately awkward, I'm being - European.

Italy brought di Natale on for Cassano, who'd been largely anonymous during the first half, and Spain replaced Silva with Pedro. Apparently wanting to win at substitutions if at nothing else, Prandelli took Montilivo off for Motta, who went down almost immediately with what appeared to be a hamstring problem. It was their third substitution, so Italy were down to ten men.

It was unfortunate really, as this extra blow seemed to drain all the drama from the game. With ten men Italy just couldn't get the ball back. Spain did all they needed to do, playing the ball around midfield for half an hour while Italy held the line.

With 15 minutes left Spain brought Torres on for Fabregas. It seemed a bit like going back to the dial phone, but it did lead to the first really good chance of the second half, as Pedro missed a sitter only to be given offside anyway. The game was starting to feel like the last day of term, with Spain killing time teasing the school pet.

Ten minutes from the end they showed us the possession stats, and it was exactly 50% either way. This was evidence if any was needed of the meaninglessness of simple stats, devoid of context. It doesn't prove that statistics is an empty science, it just shows that it's hard.

The commentators were wondering what Italy could possibly do, but then Spain went and did it instead. It was a straightforward ball through to Torres, who ran through Italy's wavering and irregular offside trap with the speed and timing of a European train and knocked it home in that nonchalant way that Henry used to. Of all the season's endings we'd imagined for Torres, I don't think anyone was anticipating nonchalance.

The goal gave him the Golden Boot. He had three goals and one assist, just like Gomez, but had played less minutes. Without wanting to be churlish, he scored two goals against Ireland and one against an already defeated team, so may not be the most deserving winner ever. Ronaldo, Balotelli, Mandzukic of Croatia and Dzagoev of Russia also scored three goals, and any of those five might be argued to have contributed more. Like I said earlier, statistics is hard.

They brought Mata of Chelsea on for Iniesta, purely as a charitable act. Llorente is now, I believe, the only Spanish outfield player not to get on. In any other squad he'd be in the first team, but Spain only play the most accomplished astrophysicists.

The fourth goal was just cruel. Bosquets played a long hard pass along the ground but through the Italian line to  Torres. He might have shot but instead passed to Mata, who had an open goal. Made in Chelsea, as the commentators inexplicably forgot to say. It made Spain the only team ever to win a major international tournament final by a four goal margin.

The referee put Italy through every second of the allocated three minutes of extra time, but no more. Balotelli stormed off the pitch in a sulk, which is very like him, but then recovered himself and came back out, which isn't. He's only twenty one, maybe he's getting a grip.

Alan Shearer summed the winners up. The Spanish team, they've had an unbelievable amount of sex. He corrected it to success half a second later, but if that kind of performance doesn't get you a shag there's no justice in the world.

Anyway, that was Spain beating Italy. Now when's the next game?

AAAAARRRGGHH!!

Day Twenty

Portugal 0 Spain 0

Penalties 2 - 4

We're through to the semi-finals now, and soon this wonderful, special time will be gone for another two years. Meanwhile there seems to be some tennis on. It isn't terrible, but it fails the crucial quality test, which is can you be offside in it? If you can't, and to my knowledge there's no offside in tennis at all, then it's clearly a sport that needs to work on its zoning principles.

When we got to the semi-finals in the last World Cup the surviving teams were Holland, Uruguay, Germany and Spain, which gives us the acronym HUGS. It was a poignant moment when I realised this, almost as if the World Cup was saying goodbye to me with a last fond embrace. This time it was Portugal, Italy, Germany and Spain. And the Iberian Derby Started us off.

Everyone complained about it, for some reason. Hansen, Shearer, Dixon and Lineker all tore into it at full time like it was Kendo Nagasaki and they were Giant Haystacks. Twitter resounded with the moans and groans. Actually that's too low-pitched a verb. We want something less like a bass drum, and more like the sound of millions of tiny insects. Chittered. That's it. Twitter chittered like locusts in a field of disappointing maize.

Their main objection was the lack of shots on target, but it's worth remembering that efforts like Iniesta's shot just over or Ronaldo's free kicks don't count towards this total. We've all seen games that probably looked better by shot count than this one,  because of all the feeble efforts that roll comfortably to the keeper without drama, but count towards the stat.

It's true that there were some lacklustre performances. Spain went with a striker, but the striker they went with was Negredo, who seemed to have a very unforwardlike reluctance to get in the action. In the end they took him off, but replaced him with Fabregas rather than Torres. It seemed surprising, but then there were some who were surprised when Torres even got in the squad after the season he's had. You can't have it both ways.

For Portugal, Almeida did poorly. This was a shame, because for much of the game Portugal were getting at least as much of the attacking play as Spain, but instead of getting Almeida to lay it off to Ronaldo or Nani they kept laying it off to him instead. You could put this down to poor attacking strategy, but you could just as easily credit the strong Spanish defensive play. They knew Ronaldo and Nani were the danger men, so they screened them more effectively than they did Almeida. When Almeida did get chances, there was always a defender on or around him to make his shot harder. Eventually Bento replaced him with Oliveira.

Portugal started with a high pressing game, harrying Spain on the ball, and it was eight minutes before Spain managed to string some passes together. When they did, Arbeloa and Iniesta both had shots over from the edge of the box. You get the feeling if they want to turn it on they can, said Keown.

I started to wonder if there was an element of smoke and mirrors to their passing game. They made a couple of misplaced passes in successive moves, and it struck me that if I saw that down Ashton Gate I would instantly identify it as an error. When it's Spain, we somehow want to see a failed move as a near success.

Portugal can string a few passes together themselves, although the difference is that Spain could carry on doing it even if you took away any single player. They may be missing Puyol or Villa, but they're still in the semifinals. If Ronaldo had gone down with gastroenteritis the night before their first game they'd all be on the beach at Faro by now. He'd be the Groucho to their lesser brothers, if you were constantly filled with the desire to punch Groucho in the face.

We had a Lynne Truss moment in the first half. Are you watching, England? said Martin Keown. We're definitely not watching England said his colleague, having apparently heard Keown speak without the comma. I once ate a sandwich apparently made of dolphin, friendly tuna and sweetcorn, so I feel quite strongly about commas.

At one point, Spain were so unnerved by Portugal's pressure they took the highly unusual step of lumping it forward. It nearly worked out for them, bouncing handily to Negredo on the edge of the box. With his back to the ball he laid it back to Silva, who knocked it sideways to Iniesta. His shot flew just over, but it seemed ominous at the time. It seemed just as ominous the other way when Ronaldo had a shot two minutes later, which shaved the edge of the post. Ronaldo claimed Casillas had saved it, but a replay showed otherwise.

After the break both sides proceeded through the medium of the corner for a while. There was a sense that the balance of power was once more - well, in the balance. It would be something of a misnomer otherwise, like a standee, or the Ministry of Defence.

Almeida had a shot after 57 minutes. He's not missed by all that much, but he did have Ronaldo to his right and Nani to his left, said the commentator. On the hour mark, Pepe got booked for flattening Alonso with knee and elbow simultaneously. Yet still people said it was a game with nothing to see. Go out on the street now and hit someone with your knee and your elbow at the same time, then come back and tell me about the lack of skill on display.

On 72 minutes Ronaldo earned and took a free kick, which flew over by about a foot. On 82 minutes he was fouled again, thirty yards out in a good shooting position. Arbeloa got booked for handling the first free kick, and Ronaldo got another go, that much closer. It was too high again. If he'd had his original position, it might have had time to get it down.

On 85 minutes Alves was booked for a poor tackle on Jordi Alba. The entire Portuguese back four were now on yellow cards. It's perhaps not surprising that Spain dominated the play from here on. Veloso also got booked for a routine challenge bang on full time. It was the eighth booking, in a game that hadn't been especially dirty.

Spain took Xavi off for Pedro. It struck me that for a player like Xavi, substituted in a semi-final when you're 32 years old, you must leave the pitch entirely uncertain whether you'll ever get back on the biggest stage of all again. He knows now that he will, but we all remember Gary Lineker getting substituted against Sweden, in what turned out to be his last England game.

The full time whistle went, to apparent universal disdain. I was having fun even if nobody else was. I 'd already written this in my notes by then.

Spain weren't playing terribly, but the delicate little flicks and dummies, the pinpoint passes that bisect the defence, all this was missing. But the overall quality of the game was so good that you started to hope no-one scored, because it was the kind of game that one goal would win, and a single goal would deny us extra time.

I should add two caveats at this point. It's certainly true that towards the end of normal time the quality of play declined. This isn't unusual, as players often start to worry about making the mistake that would lose the game. When Portugal broke from a Spanish free kick on the stroke of full time, we all assumed Ronaldo would raise the quality for that crucial split second with his shot. It didn't work out that way.

It's also true that my beer drinking strategy hadn't taken extra time into account, and to be honest there came a point at which the quality of my note taking went into something of a decline. I did notice the way that Spain seemed to take over. There's a desperate look about the Portuguese, said Martin Keown just before Ramos blasted a free kick just over. Shortly before that Iniesta had had a shot saved when he was clear through.


Portugal must have been glad when the whistle blew for the end of the first period of extra time. They brought Custodio on for Veloso, then Varela on for Meireles. They were trying to hold on by this point, and did a reasonable job of it. Pedro nearly got away in the 23rd minute, but the Portuguese defence just recovered in time and were able to put it out for a corner. There was a lot of Spanish huffing and puffing (well I was drunk, what do you want me to say), but then it was penalties.

Both teams missed their first, then scored their next two. Weirdly, Alves walked up to take the third for Portugal, then got sent back by Nani. He'd clearly got the order wrong. From that, and the look on his face, it was no surprise when his effort was saved. As @michaelhogan tweeted, Alves has left the building.

Fabregas' penalty wasn't great, going in off the post, but it won the game for Spain. What was going on with Alves? I've never seen that before.

Ronaldo, meanwhile, never got to take one. Fabregas said afterwards that he was down to go second, but had asked del Bosque if he could go last because he had a premonition that he'd score the winning goal for Spain. If Ronaldo had thought something similar it was too late now.

So Spain against Germany or Italy. If they win, they become the first team ever to lift three trophies in a row - The Euros, the World Cup then the Euros again. You wouldn't bet against them.

Day Sixteen

Spain 2 France 0

With the possible exception of Holland v Germany this was perhaps the most galactic fixture so far. Unfortunately it fell so far short of its billing that frankly I can find little to say about it.

It was very cagy for the first 15 minutes, then all caginess suddenly and briefly vanished. Jordi Alba somehow eluded the French defense down the left, Reveillere being paradoxically a little sleepy, and crossed to Xabi Alonso, alone in the penalty area. He headed it back across the goal, which was the correct thing to do as Lloris was moving the other way, and his momentum then carried him away from the ball.

The French were rocked, but they rallied, and Cabaye had a good effort from a free kick after half an hour, which Casillas had to tip over for a corner. We hoped it would mark a turning point in the game, but instead it was France's best moment.

In the 38th minute Pique had a free header in the box, but it flew over. The commentator forgot himself sufficiently to start talking about Barcelona, then suddenly remembered he was actually covering a Spain game. In fact five of their eleven starters do play for Barcelona. With four from Real Madrid, that's fully nine out of eleven from two clubs. Add in Silva of Manchester City and every player in the Spanish team finished in a top 2 league position except Jordi Alba of Valencia, who had to settle for third.

I typed and fact checked all that between Pique's header and the half time whistle, and wasn't distracted by any significant action. After the break France came back a bit, and Spain were a bit sloppy at times. By the standards of Spain, that is, we're not talking about balls going through the keeper's legs, but it was enough to give the French hope.

Debuchy had a header on the hour mark, which he had to lean back to get onto and couldn't then keep down, but it was a chance. Soon after there was a goalmouth scramble at both ends. Which is two goalmouth scrambles all told, obviously, not just one very large one. That would be to stretch the definition of a goalmouth scramble to breaking point.

Apart from that there was little else to say. Not that it was boring, it just wasn't the kind of thrill-a-minute action we'd had with Germany and Greece. It was the football equivalent of a long bout of safety play in snooker. Plenty to admire, very skilful, but it isn't going to make the highlights reel. Except that football is limited by time rather than pots, so there may not be much else to put on it.

It was probably in an attempt to give their respective forward lines the cutting edge they lacked that Spain brought on Torres and France brought on Giroud. It didn't work. Torre's one decent shot was saved, and it turned out he was offside anyway. Giroud didn't even manage that. He's done alright for Montpellier, with 33 goals in 73 games, but we didn't see any evidence of that last night.

In the last minute of normal time Pedro won a penalty for Spain. Reveillere challenged him clumsily, there was contact, he went down, job done. Alonso scored, and that was the end for France. Reveillere was left to rue his role in both Spanish goals. I was going to say never mind lad, you'll learn, but it turns out he's 32, so probably won't.

And that was that. Spain and France meet again in October, when they play in the same qualifying group for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil. It's an unlucky draw, which means one of them might miss out, but it might at least save us another game like this one.

Day Eleven

Croatia 0 Spain 1

Italy 2 Ireland 0

 

For some teams, the end of the group phase presents a challenging problem of stats and psychology. Croatia, for instance, had a tricky problem going into the Spain game.  They knew Italy would probably beat Ireland, so containing Spain was never going to be enough, as a 0-0 would see them eliminated. 1-1, on the other hand, would very likely see them through.

This meant that a single Spanish goal would effectively be irrelevant. A second Spanish goal, though, would actually count for something, as a 2-1 defeat would put Croatia out.

So they made a plan, to contain Spain in the first half and get at them in the second, by which time Spain were statistically less likely to have enough time to score twice. It's exactly what anyone else would have done in their position, but it meant the first half of Croatia v Spain was by some margin the dullest half so far. This is a sort of compliment to Croatia - to make Spain boring is really quite an achievement - but it's also 45 minutes of our lives we'll never get back.

There were two games, of course, and both were televised, but unfortuntely this was the one with the greatest number of permutations hanging on it, so your diligent reporter was kind of stuck with it. Both teams seemed afraid of losing. Spain had most of the possession, as you'd expect, but the knowledge that they would be through if they didn't concede may have hung heavily on them.

Here's my first half notes. After 26 minutes Mandzukic was tackled right on the edge of the box. It could easily have been a foul, and therefore could easily have been a penalty, but in the end it was given as a corner.

That was it. Nothing else of any note happened, except that after half an hour we heard that Italy were a goal up against Ireland. They showed us the goal, in a highlights box in the top left corner of the screen. It was a routine goal, but a goal nonetheless. As things stood, Italy were top, Spain were second and Croatia were out.

Oh yes, and David Villa. You may have wondered where he is. His tibia is all better now, nurse having adequately kissed it in the oxygen tent, but he was laid up with it so long he failed a pre-tournament fitness test. The commentator was clearly missing him, as he managed to say his name instead of David Silva several times. That commentating error was the other first half highlight. You may scoff, but it was all over Twitter.

The Barcelona player I was missing was Messi. Yes, he's Argentinian, but he seems Spanish, and you have to admit he'd be a good fit for their team. Frankly, if they can pick Catalans I don't see why they can't pick anyone.

Things picked up a bit in the second half, and in the 59th minute Croatia had their best chance of the game. A Spanish attack broke down, and Modric skipped past the covering midfielder to find himself in space. He held it up long enough for the surprised looking Croatian forward line to catch up with him, then crossed to Rakitic, whose header was just kept out by Casillas. He should have headed it down, but instead it came at a convenient height for the keeper.

Bosquet decided he needed to make a change. He took Torres off, and brought on Navas of Sevilla. Croatia, not to be outdone, brought on Jelavic. They were out if things stayed as they were, and according to their plan it was time to have a bit of a go.

Silva went off for Fabregas. Twitter folk with no grasp of statistics suggested that they should be bringing on a striker, but in the real world with all the atoms in it the laws of probability were swinging the balance of the game. Spain were through as long as they didn't concede, and given that nobody knew what order group D was going to finish in it didn't really matter who was first and who was second.

So every time Croatia broke, Spain were quickly back in numbers. Croatia, meanwhile, brought on Eduardo, who had a stonewall penalty turned down when Arbeloa pulled him down from a corner with a move accurately analysed by Alan Hansen as a judo throw. Arbeloa managed to do it at an angle where all the officials were unsighted, which I guess is a kind of footballing skill in itself.

Three minutes from time, Spain scored. Fabregas lobbed the ball over the Croatian back line to Iniesta, who wasn't offside, although Navas was. Both players were clear. Navas held back behind Iniesta, who passed across to him, and he tapped it into an empty net. It should be offside, but according to the actual rules it isn't.

What no-one in the stadium seemed to realise, neither commentators nor Croatian fans, was that it only mattered for Spain. Croatia were still in the same position. If they scored, they went through, if they didn't they were out.

Meanwhile we heard that Balotelli had scored to double Italy's lead. That didn't matter either. Croatia could still go through with a goal. They got a free kick, and even the keeper went up for it. The referee whistled for a Croatian infringement in the Spanish box, and that was it.

In the end, and after all the calculations, every country in the group ended up with a different points total. Spain had 7 points, Italy 5, Croatia 4 and Ireland 0.

It was harsh on Croatia, who had beaten Ireland, got a draw out of Italy and only just lost to Spain. It was only harsh on Ireland in the sense that the fans probably deserved a better team, but you can only select the players you have. Spain and Italy, meanwhile, lie in wait for the top two from England's group.

Day Seven

Poor, poor Ireland. The first team to have their fate decided. To be honest, their fate was decided as soon as they drew Spain, Italy and Croatia, but technically speaking it has to be confirmed on the pitch, and now it has been.

Roy Keane moaned about the Irish attitude, but as Gordon Strachan said, if you asked any Scottish fan they'd have swapped places with them in a heartbeat. Minnows are there as tasty snacks for the bigger fish, and most of them would rather be eaten by a shark than a tuna.

Italy 1 Croatia 1

This one was a slow burner, with Italy starting the stronger. Balotelli had a shot in the third minute after a defensive lapse, which went just wide. Soon after he had another effort blocked, and Marchisio fizzed the rebound just over.

Balotelli's next effort was punched away by the Croatian keeper, Pletikosa, who followed up with the best save of the game, stopping Marchisio not once but twice.

It didn't help. Pirlo had a free kick a minute later, which he curled over the wall and into the right corner. Pletikosa got a hand to it, but it wasn't enough. This happens to keepers a lot. They make a great save, then a minute later it's in anyway. As a fan, do you celebrate the skill, or mourn the lack of consequence?

Something similar was happening to Balotelli. His next shot, just over, was a quality effort. Nothing changed because of it. Just after, he was taken off for di Natale again. He'd done much better in this game than he had against Spain, but it didn't matter

At least it meant he wasn't responsible for the Croatian equaliser. Chiellini in the Italian goal got hopelessly underneath the cross, and Mandzukic found himself unmarked on the six yard line. He controlled it neatly, and scored off the post. The Croatian fans considered which element to celebrate with, and chose fire, expressed through the medium of flares.

Fortunately they threw them onto the pitch rather than at anyone, but it brought the game to a halt anyway. Mark Bright was horrified that the fans had been able to get them in, when the BBC staff had been rigorously searched. My sympathies lay with the minimum wage stewards asked to process a crowd numbering tens of thousands in time for kickoff. If I had to choose between looking in a few camera bags and patting down the chanting posses of vigorously tattooed Croatians I'd probably have made the same choice they apparently had.

I also thought he was rather underestimating the ability of experienced fans to smuggle objects into football grounds. People are ingenious in the matter of subterfuge, or they'd never have been able to build a glider in Colditz. Flares fit invisibly down a trouser leg or inside a bulky jacket. Are you going to strip search everyone?

Towards the end Croatia pushed forward, and it seemed like they'd snatch a winner if either side did, but it finished 1-1. It was a tight game, that set us up nicely for a loose one.

Spain 4 Ireland 0

Ireland went into this with high hopes, which lasted all of four minutes. Silva picked up a great pass, but Dunne tackled him on the edge of the box. He didn't regain his balance quickly enough, though, and Ward left it to him. Torres pounced, ran round Ward like a galactico running round a Wolves player, blasted it through Given and that was the end of realistic Irish hope.

Jim Beglie described it as the ultimate test of Irish character. You felt there might be some more tests of Irish character on the way in the next 86 minutes.

In the end Ireland managed to hold things together until halftime. There were a few scary moments, and one moment of high comedy when the ref ran straight into Keith Andrews at full tilt and flattened him, but they might have been encouraged going out for the second half only one down.

Then Silva scored. Given punched a shot straight to him, but he still had to get it through three Irish defenders. It went past two right knees, and between the third pair of legs. People say that kind of thing is luck, but players like Silva seem to be lucky a lot.

The only issue now was goal difference. Assuming Italy beat Ireland, a draw between Spain and Croatia would leave the three continental teams on 5 points each, and goals against Ireland would be the decider.

Knowing this, Spain turned it on. Given made amends for any responsibility he might have felt for the first two goals with a top class save from Xavi.

Ireland had some pressure themselves. No real proper chances, but some briefly hopeful dead ball situations as they took the game into the Spanish half. It was a terrible idea, leading to the inevitable result. A hopeful Celtic scrimmage on the halfway line, the Spanish come away with it, Ireland are all out of position, Torres gets the ball through, goal. You never want to have a good spell against Spain, it just makes them angry.

Del Bosquet took Torres off for Fabregas, to safeguard him for the Croatia game. They had the goals they needed. The substitution in itself told you everything you needed to know. Ireland were playing a team who can bring on Cesc Fabregas to give another player a rest. They brought Maclean on for Duff, as if to highlight the gulf between the teams. He's a promising player, is Maclean, but he'll never be Catalan.

Keane had a decent effort soon after, well saved by Casillas. Nobody cared. Neither did it affect anything except goal difference when Fabregas scored a few minutes afterwards. It was a corner, the tiring Irish defence didn't pick him up, he dinked round a defender and slotted it in between Given and another defender. I normally check the BBC clips if I've missed players' names, but it hardly seems worth it with this one.

Three huge cheers for the Irish fans, though, and the Spanish ones too. They were supposed to be segregated, but somehow or other the Irish and the Spanish ended up half mixed together. I don't know if they'd swapped tickets with each other or what, but the green, orange and white looked very nice mixed in with the red and black. Some of the morons who blight the game from Dartford to the Dnieper must have been watching, so let's hope somewhere in the back of their minds they felt a little bit shamed.

Day Three

It was a big day, an exciting day, and I really wish the BBC had got it. I admit it makes sense to give Adrian Chiles the Croatia game as he's half Croatian himself, but there's one huge reason to prefer the BBC to ITV. Salford.

Yes, Salford, which is where the BBC coverage is coming from. Because it's so ugly (evidence), they film inside. ITV, on the other hand, have flown their whole team out to Poland and rented space in every beautiful city square in the country. Having spent all that money they seem to feel obliged to do everything on a balcony, so they can film Gordon Strachan in front of that basilica which looks old but was actually rebuilt in 1946. Strachan himself, of course, is a genuine Baroque original.

I'm generally all in favour of an outside broadcast, but they haven't been able to solve the technical problems. Sometimes it's the wind fucking up the mikes, the rest of the time it's brass bands, which seem to be everywhere they go. Either amateur salsa nights are a big thing in Poland, or Chiles baiting is their latest national sport.

There are other problems with the ITV coverage beyond sound quality. I think for instance of the tweets and texts they insist on running under their talking heads. If you must do that it's important to make the font big enough to read, and therefore big enough to ignore. ITV's was only legible if you squinted, which of course meant you found yourself squinting.

And while I'm at it, Roy Keane. They wheeled him out specially for the Ireland game, which makes him quite literally a professional Irishman. I realise they've paid for him now, but couldn't they just stick him in a bar somewhere and tell him he's doing the local colour? It's not like he's teetotal or anything, is it?

Fourthly and most obviously, the adverts. It doesn't really matter what your pundits think if their analysis has to be squeezed between two commercial breaks in a halftime slot. Also, football attracts the shoutiest ads. Did you know that billionaire financier Joe Lewis owns a large slice of Ladbrokes? If you're in the Bahamas right now, why not hunt him down and belabour him repeatedly about the face and body with a baseball bat, all the while screaming LADBROKES! GAME ON! into his baffled face in a cod Italian accent.

Spain 1 Italy 1

The Spanish national anthem is my favourite. It has no words at all. It's an awful grating racket, obviously, but at least it isn't an awful grating racket with a bloodthirsty lyric like most of the others.

The Italian one is more typical of the genre. Apparently Victory has bound Scipio's helmet upon her head, so let us join in a cohort, we are ready to die. This, I feel, may account for their lack of military success in more recent times. I'm sure cohorts were a great help at the battle of Zama, but military technology has moved on since then. If the Austrians are gassing you in the Dolomites, you may not want to be moving any closer together.

They'd got their formations right for the game though. You felt they'd learnt from the way other teams played in Spain in the World Cup. Back then team after team clammed up against them, hoping to contain their midfield and stop the through ball, but got tired and gave up the crucial goal after an hour or so. Today, Italy came to play.

And it worked for them. They had to survive some scares, like everyone else who plays Spain, but they had their own moments as well. Their best chance of the first half came right at the end, as Motta had a header which Casillas saved athletically. It was just after Balotelli got booked. It wasn't an awful tackle, just a bit high, and he might have got away with it if he hadn't been mouthing off earlier. One to watch, we all felt.

Spain, meanwhile, looked just a little bit fallible at times. The odd loose pass, some slightly idiosyncratic goalkeeping, nothing that would shock you from Poland or Greece, but this was Spain.

They had their moments though. Of course they did. They started with none of the four players identified on the squad list as a striker, but if you can play midfielders like Fabregas, Silva and Iniesta you'll probably get some chances, and they did.

Five of their eleven starters play for Barcelona, four for Real Madrid. Just stop and think about that for a moment. Nine out of eleven from two clubs. At this level, that's a hell of a thing. It gives you a cohesion no other national team could dream of. In this country it would mean nine from the Manchester clubs, and can you imagine them using that many English players? Or finishing first and second if they did?

The second half started dramatically. Fabregas and Iniesta shots were pushed wide. Balotelli got the ball off Ramos on the touchline, but then dithered long enough for him to get back and tackle. Almost immediately, del Bosque took him off for di Natale. Everyone makes mistakes, but Balotelli's always seem to be expressions of his personality. He'd got booked for petulance and recklessness, he'd fluffed his big chance - at this level that's enough.

An hour in, and against the normal run of things, Italy scored. Di Natale held his run just right, pushed through to get on the through ball and played it perfectly past a splayed Casillas. The contrast between di Natale's finishing and Balotelli's was obvious.

I'm not sure why the equaliser was such a surprise. Spain always score at about this point. Iniesta to Silva to Fabregas, it went. Barca to Barca, via Manchester. A small stepover from the Spaniard, a huge leap forward for Spain. Kind of what we expect.

Torres came on for Fabregas, and the rest of the game seemed to be about the chances he missed. First he got through on Casillas, who tackled him without going down and played it out for a throw in. Then he had a lob from outside the box which drifted agonisingly over. Shortly before, di Natale had stretched for a cross and just flicked it wide. But then he'd already scored.

It ended one all, a gripping match from two titans of the game. We'd had our main event, so the stage was set for the supporting feature. Who schedules these things?

Ireland 1 Croatia 3

They sang the Irish national anthem in Gaelic, but I looked up the translation. Out yonder lies the Saxon foe, it goes. Could they possibly mean us? Would they include Jackie Charlton? Soldiers are we ... mid cannon's roar and rifles' peal ... For love of the Gael, towards death or life ... oh for Christ's sake. How far we've come, and yet sometimes I don't think we've got anywhere at all. If people don't think war is glorious any more, why do they sing songs like that?

I do feel a certain warmth towards the Gaelic language, the only Gaelic speaker I've ever met having helped us push the car out of the Irish mud, but it must have been a challenge for the players. Nine of the eleven starters were actually born in Ireland, by the way, before anyone starts, but they're mainly east coasters, who speak English.

The weather was vile. Bad news for the players, but good for the cameras, which got to do lots of those slo-mo close ups with players grimacing and spray flying around.

The Irish played in shirts 1 to 11. It wasn't any kind of objection to the squad numbering system, they just selected numbers 1 to 11 in the squad. I guess Trappatoni knew who he wanted to play early on. That's nice. I like a manager who knows his mind.

Although he may have had his doubts when Croatia scored in the third minute. As soft goals go, it was Andrex quality. A cross was deflected, and Mandzukic slipped on the edge of the box and looped in a gentle header towards Given's right corner post. It should have been stopped, but Given was moving the wrong way and couldn't quite get across to keep it out.

There was an element of bad fortune to it. Mandzukic's body language in the split second before he slipped suggested he would strike at the opposite corner. His header was actually an excellent moment of improvisation, but a keeper of Given's standard will feel he should have done better.

It was a shame. We all want the Irish to do well. Some of their fans went with a banner that said Angela Merkel thinks we're at work. You want fans like that to have something to cheer.

After 18 minutes, they did. They got a slightly questionable free kick forty yards out, Corluka let St Ledger get on the wrong side of him on it and St Ledger headed home. The Irish fans celebrated with a Poznan in Poznan.

There seemed to be a whistle in the crowd as the kick came over. It wasn't the first time, it had happened a few times to apparent Croatian advantage, but you had to wonder if it was a factor in the goal.

The game as a whole reminded me why I like Championship football so much. It's lovely to watch the Xabis and Iniestas of this world doing their thing, but sometimes you want to see a bunch of also rans slipping and sliding in the mud as the ball flies anywhere but where they meant it to go.

Like many Championship games, a few talents stood out above the white noise of the rest. Jelavic has injected an element of flair into Goodison Park, and it looks like he's done the same for Croatia. Ireland don't really do flair, but what they lack in that department they make up for with a certain kind of monosyllabic punchiness. Dunne to Doyle, Doyle knocks it down to Duff, Duff to Keane. It may not be pretty, but it does cut down on the typing.

It was flair that told though. Just as Ireland were looking to the halftime whistle there was a scramble on the edge of the box,Ward hit his clearance about 150 degrees the wrong way, Jelavic was way ahead of the rest and it was 2-1 at the break.

Shortly after the restart it was 3-1. Mandzukic had another header, and Given wasn't quite quick enough. It his the post, bounced back off Given's head and went in.

As time went by, what tension there was in the game dribbled away. Keane went off for Shane Long of West Brom. He used to play for Reading, and he's caused us a few problems at Ashton Gate, but it was hard to see him doing a lot against Croatia, and so it proved.

Andrews headed just wide in injury time, but it didn't really matter by then. Ireland were well beaten, by a Croatian team you wouldn't expect to challenge either. Now they have to play Italy and Spain. It's a very long way to Tipperary, but on this showing they'll be back there soon enough.