The knockout round has been set at Euro 2016 in France, and thanks to a larger field, 16 teams start the round, with four of the best three seeds advancing in the 2016 edition. The expanded field yielded much controversy, but there have been some pleasant surprises such as Wales and Ireland. Both of whom have played atonishingly well considering their past histories.
Summing up the play so far, the most disappointing team would have to be Portugal, who needed the expanded format to even get to the group stages. Not to mentiona Cristiano Ronaldo brace that featured one of the most brillant goals of the tournament. They play Croatia next, who won their group and have looked as solid a side as any. Portugal will only go as far as Ronaldo can take them.
Speaking of Croatia, they were the only team to defeat Spain, who of course came in as one of the favorites to advance far in the tournament. In their slip up against Croatia, conceding the winning goal in the last fie minutes - a trend in this year's tournament - they drew Italy in the next round. Italy have been Italy, always capable of winning as they showed against a talented Belgian side. If there's any match that is a must see in this round, it is Italy-Spain.
Wales and Northern Ireland will be intriguing if only to watch Gareth Bale, who has proven that he is the next big thing in soccer. He leads the tournament in goals so far, and has been the best forward that it's not even close.
Tournament favorites Germany have been an enigma of sorts thus far, on paper it seems like they are without fault, but such is not the case. They have looked magnificent and perplexed at times, in the same match no less. They did match up with Slovakia, who defeated them 3-1 in a friendly just a week before the tournament. However it was simply a tune up, one that Germany likely didn't mind losing.
Should the Germans win, they will face the winner of Spain-Italy, bringing about another tantalizing match up.
England will play Iceland on Monday the 27th, this following a controversial draw against Slovakia in which six lineup changes were made. England manager Roy Hodgson is under heavy pressure, because if the English fail to advance, he will likely not stick around to make up for such a failure.
Photo: Flickr/Dan Farrimond
Maybe a poor comparison, but I look at this like golf's U.S. Open versus the Masters. In the forrmer, a no-name has the chance to be Cinderella--for the Euros, at least through the group stage.
Iceland against Englad? I don't know how you can get more compelling than that.
Iceland is surprising everyone, a country with only 40 professional players have the national team in the top 8 at euro after beating a young and promising team like England. France has another young and very promising team and they play at home, Belgium is a very good team too, but I think Germany right now is the best team. They won in Brazil in 2014, are a very young team and will be very good for a long time. Italy and Portugal are the opposite, old and not that talented but made of team-oriented players, very good defensively with Cristiano Ronaldo leading the way for Portugal and Buffon showing once again why he is considered one of the best goalkeeper in the history of the game and old but gold BBC defense (Barzagli-Bonucci-Chiellini) stopping everybody.In soccer more than in any other sport offense sell tickets but defense wins championships and Germany-Italy will be a fight between the top goalkeepers in the game , the best defenses, with Germany being favourite because of their offensive talent : they usually suffer Italy and have been crushed by the Azzurri a lot in the past but this time they look like the best team.