Let Azerbaijan lead 1-0 from the start

Normally Janne Andersson would pull off the attack these days. Since getting the job, the captain of the Swedish national team has opted for a different media mode. He turns the page, underestimates the value of the page, reduces its importance, focuses on his image, wants to show respect, and at most expresses surprise in the face of criticism. It doesn’t matter whether it was Luis Enrique who tried to persuade him against Paulo Sousa, the Mexican captain who said he would rather lose than win in the same way as Sweden or something else.

So it looked here, except when it came to Euro 2020.

Anderson actually started in Romania when Sweden qualified for this summer’s tournament. This idea, he said, was completely incomprehensible. He listed the reasons. Climate, planning and perhaps worst of all: straight through injustice. He came back to the topic during the European Championships themselves, especially as Sweden prepared to play in the Round of 16 in Glasgow. It couldn’t have been done with a yellow wall at the back due to Britain’s quarantine rules, and the same goes for Ukraine, one of the biggest losers in one of the most unfair football leagues in history.

Sweden traveled from Gothenburg to Seville to Gothenburg to Saint Petersburg to Gothenburg to St Petersburg to Gothenburg to Glasgow and back home again after the miserable loss to Andriy Shevchenko’s team.

Swiss champion in travel time زمن

When the trip ended, it wasn’t only Blagult’s league captain who took the paper from his mouth. Two national teams have traveled more than Sweden. Wales right-back Chris Gunter, one of them, called the entire format a “joke” and thanked 350 people who had “violated quarantine rules and their bank accounts” for being able to see the national team in place when he wrote an angry and resigned farewell message on Instagram after the team was screened.

Wales bounced between Cardiff, Baku, Rome, Baku and Amsterdam and had 8,661km of flying when a completely finished national team featured in the Round of 16 with zero percent left in the tank and lost 4-0 to Denmark.

Switzerland became the European Champion in time travel when their European Championships developed into a logistical nightmare. Vladimir Petkovic’s team traveled over 11,659 kilometers from Zurich to Baku to Rome to Baku to Bucharest to Saint Petersburg and fought through extensions and penalties against first France and then Spain.

As the players prepared for the penalty shootout in Russia, “London Calling” with The Clash was taken out of the speaker system. One wonders if Fabian Scheer was reminded that another long-haul flight was the reward on the other side before he missed a penalty.

Four teams worked from home

He talks about Spain and Denmark.

If Sweden, Switzerland, Wales and a number of other countries are in a losing pile of these many childish ideas from UEFA, Kasper Hjolmand’s national team and the other three semi-final winners will be on the winning podium.

Four teams who have worked from home come to Wembley. Denmark – who lost two of their three group matches despite their home advantage – had to travel first in the round of 16 to face Wales in Amsterdam (635km away) and then had to continue in Baku in the quarter-final against the Czech Republic. . The Czech Republic finished fifth in the entire European Championship already when they defeated the Netherlands.

Spain set up their base camp in Madrid and moved to Seville throughout the group stage. Italy left Rome only when it was time for the other 16 to go to London and then continue on to Munich.

England played all of their group stage and quarter-final matches at Wembley before having to go to Rome in the quarter-final against Ukraine, who were sixth in the entire tournament when they arrived in Glasgow for their match against Sweden.

Fortunately, Gareth Southgate’s players are now back on their island.

Is she coming home? He barely left.

There is a completely skewed balance

Will the semi-finalists play the semi-finals because of their home advantages?

Of course, it is difficult to draw such a radical picture, but both statistics and logic show that it played a role. If some teams have to take night trips, deal with logistical management, switch between different temperatures and sometimes time zones, spend long hours on buses and planes, sleep in different beds and also play in front of far fewer supporters – while others don’t suffer Of all that, there is, of course, a completely skewed balance.

A host country belongs to the tournament. Over time, it became clear how the organizer benefits from the sport. Sweden reached the semi-finals in 1992, England to the semi-finals in 1996, France to win the World Cup in 1998, South Korea to the semi-finals in 2002, Portugal to the semi-finals in 2004, and Germany to the semi-finals In 2006, Brazil to the semi-finals in 2014 France to the semi-finals in 2016, Russia to the quarter-finals in 2018

However, this is different. The home advantage at Euro 2020 has benefited a host of teams and has been reinforced with quarantine rules – and is likely to get worse. Wembley will be full of Englishmen when it comes to it, and few foreigners will ever get into it. It’s hard to take the situation seriously.

Crazy idea, but a good one, Michel Platini said when it came up, and of course it’s good, it’s the best for… England.

Azerbaijan tops matches 1-0

Personally, I feel very sorry for Azerbaijan, which arranged a lot of matches. Their national team did not go a meter either, but for the wrong reasons. 110 in the world rankings. He has only won 16 international matches over the ages and has never participated in any tournament. Here came the golden opportunity when UEFA distributed Willy Wonka a golden ticket to the highest bidder.

It wasn’t enough, it’s a shame for those who give up.

So I have an idea. How about allowing Azerbaijan and seven or eight other national teams to play at home in Euro 2028 – but also starting the match with a 1-0 lead and accessing free substitutions?

It’s a crazy idea, but a good one.