• Follow Germany v Italy from 7pm tonight
• Richard Williams on Ronaldo's (non) penalty
• Email sachin.nakrani@guardian.co.uk
Praise for Stan Collymore developing here. Have to be honest, I've not listened to any radio commentary on the Euros, although I've been informed that Sam Matterface, who commentates alongside Collymore on Talksport, is rather good.
Matterface is married to Sky Sports News presenter Natalie Sawyer and apparently they named their first child Sawyer Matterface. Quite something, that.
Exciting news has just come my way; the ever-excellent Dominic Fifield will be carrying out a webchat from Warsaw at 1pm this afternoon. He will be discussing all matters Euro, primarily this evening's clash between Germany and Italy in the Polish capital. But feel free to also discuss last night's game with him, as well as the fallout from England's exit from the competition.
A more fun debate developing on here seems to be the relative weaknesses and strengths of BBC and ITV's respective Euro 2012 punditry/commentary teams. Personally I think both have been rather poor, or truly dire in the case of Mark Lawrenson. Anyway, for what it's worth, here is my dream team, made up of those who have covered the tournament for the two channels.
Main presenter: Adrian Chiles
Studio pundits: Roy Keane, Gareth Southgate, Lee Dixon
Main commentator: Steve Wilson
Co-commentator: Jim Beglin
Main interviewer: Gabriel Clarke
And the real duds: Hansen, Lawrenson, Bright, Logan, Drury, Lawrenson, Lawrenson and Lawrenson.
And your picks are?
legaff; i'm kidding, couldn't care less who know which team I support. For the record, I also like the music of Kings of Leon, beans on toast and afternoon naps.
Right, this Ronaldo-pen debate is raging like a fire in an oil factory (don't think there is such a thing as an oil factory, but you get my drift) and, quite frankly, I'm getting a tad bored of it. We're all entitled to our views, personally I feel Ron should have made sure he took an earlier one, while others think that criticism is overly harsh. That's fair enough, football, as the cliche goes, is a game of opinions. I will give the final word to Prasad Chaporkar, who disagrees with me but does so with a cracking final line:
If people say that Ronaldo taking the 5th penalty was an error in judgement, then they might have a point. Even though, when should your best penalty takers take the penalty is a subjective matter. On the other hand, if anybody says he chose the 5th one because he is not a team player or that he does not have balls is, politely saying, talking out of turn in my opinion. He has taken high profile penalties before - he took the 3rd penalty in United's win over Chelsea in a UCL final, if I remember correctly he took the first penalty in this year's UCL semi final. In the past, in knock out phases, he has taken 5th, 2nd and 3rd penalties. Apparently the manager decides when he should take the penalty. So, saying Ronaldo lacks the balls to take a decisive penalty is bollocks.
Anyway, on to tonight's semi-final and this from Pankaj:
I have this weird feeling that if Germany progress they will be defeated by Spain and if Italy progresses they will beat Spain. But if you ask me to pick strongest of three teams I will pick Germany. Maybe i am too used to see Germany failing in later stages.
legaff is getting personal, and me not like that. In response to your critique of Liverpool's 2005 Champions League win I would point out that the four players who took penalties for the men in red in Istanbul were all very capable at that particular skill: Didi Hamann, Djibril Cisse, John Arne Riise and Vladimir Smicer. So Gerrard being down to take the fifth one was not such a major shock - remember he didn't even take Liverpool's pen in normal time; that instead fell to Xabi Alonso.
And are you telling me Bruno Alves is a more reliable penalty taker than Ronaldo? I would say no, no, no. Ron should have stepped up and taken one, simples.
More interesting Euro 2012-transfer news, this time on Twitter. @GuillemBalague:
My colleague @AlbertLlimos announces the agreement between Valencia and FCB for Jordi Alba a matter of hours. He's been excellent in Euros
Dipping under the line I see TheManFromNantucket has made this point:
What if he [Ronaldo] was told to take the last penalty? He's missed high profile spot kicks before. He's not the manager and the order of the takers is the manager's call. If he'd demanded to take the third penalty and had missed what then?
Fair points and my response would be to say that Ronaldo being Ronaldo, he could have chosen to take whichever penalty he wanted; if he wanted to go up first Paulo Bento would have allowed him to go up first. And if he missed, he missed; at least he would have showed the balls to take one. But to wait to take the fifth one, which was always unlikely to come about given who Portugal were facing, was, in my view, an act of unreal selfishness. People claim that is the 'pressure-penalty,' I would suggest the 3rd or 4th ones are the real pressure ones and that Ronaldo knew that. A top player but not a team player in my eyes.
Back to Ronaldo and Saurav Samaddar has this query/observation:
Do you think that Ronaldo would have felt worse than he does if Portugal had won the shootout on the fourth penalty and, thus, didn't need him to step up? Also, this must be the first time all four centre-backs have participated in the first five of the shootout while no strikers did
Interesting Euro 2012-transfer news as Bayern Munich confirm they have signed Croatia striker Mario Mandzukic from Wolfsburg for an undisclosed fee.
Mandzukic scored 20 goals in 56 appearances for Wolfsburg last season and three for Croatia in Poland and Ukraine. He is also, apparently, a little bit bonkers.
So then pop-pickers, tell me: which one of you would have stepped-up to take a penalty had the destiny of your country depended on it? I'm no braveheart but I reckon I may have, certainly so if I was my team's captain and standout player (a highly unlikely scenario as anyone who has ever shared a five-a-side pitch with me would testify to). Not so Cristiano Ronaldo, though. No, CR7, he of the strut 'n' pout, decided instead to lurk in his shadows after Portugal had taken Spain to a penalty shootout in yesterday's semi-final in Donetsk. He was down to strike the fifth kick apparently, but Paulo Bento's men only got to No4 following misses from João Moutinho and Bruno Alves. Proper men, them. Good on 'em.
So, anyway, Spain are through to Sunday's final and are only one win away from becoming the first nation to win three consecutive international tournaments. They will face the winner of tonight's other semi-final between Germany and Italy in Warsaw. Should be some game.
To start your day we have, as ever, some tip-top Euro 2012 content for you to get through, so why not check out:
• AC Jimbo and the pod crew deliver their verdict on Spain's victory over Portugal
• Sid Lowe reports from the match itself
• And what about these for cracking Spain v Portugal-based pictures
• Paul Wilson analyses Germany's prospects ahead of their meeting with Italy
• Amy Lawrence focuses her eye on the impressive talents of Mats Hummels
Enjoy!
Sachin will be here shortly. In the meantime, here's a report from last night's semi-final:
A penalty shootout began Spain's era and a penalty shootout could have ended it. Instead, the dream of a unique treble is still alive. A 0-0 draw and penalties with Italy in the quarter-final of this competition four years ago was the turning point, a game that changed Spain's history and changed their future. The man who scored the decisive penalty that night: Cesc Fábregas. On Wednesday night he again stood over the spot after 120 minutes had failed to yield a goal.
Fábregas had been down to take the second penalty but he had talked Vicente del Bosque into letting him take the fifth, admitting that he had a feeling hours before the game that this moment would come. "He told me that he wanted to take the fifth because he was going to give us the victory," the Spain coach said. Now the midfielder talked himself through the moment, convincing himself that he could do it again. And then he ran up and scored, the ball flying into the net off the right-hand post to send Spain into a third successive final.
"Being in another final is a miracle, it's very emotional," Fábregas said of the meeting on Sunday with Germany or Italy, who play on Thursday night. "I had a funny feeling about the penalties and I was thinking about them this afternoon. That life has given me another chance like this is really incredible. When I stepped up to take the penalty I said to the ball that we had to make history and it shouldn't let me down. They told me initially to take the second one but I said no, give me the fifth as I had this premonition."
For the full match report, click here. Read More [category Sport][tags Euro 2012, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Football, Sport]
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