All’s well That ends well. Spain will play the quarterfinals of this Eurocopa 2020 after having had to win the game up to three times against a visibly inferior Croatia , but that was able to put Luis Enrique’s squad on the ropes. But no, let no one think that this is a negative view of the facts, resultism prevents the undersigned from putting a but to a match in which the Turkish Cakir scored in the final act a 3-5 favorable to the Spanish team . From there, everything can be discussed, but nothing will change the fact that it will be Luis Enrique and his team who travel to St. Petersburg to play the quarterfinals while the Croats can start their vacation.
Point one so that everything is clear from the beginning in this account of the events. Spain accumulated more than enough merit to win these round of 16 against Croatia, it was infinitely superior to the chessboards in terms of football that no one can dispute their victory. However, doubts remain due to his special determination to lose when it seemed that he had put the victory on track, particularly when he got one to three with barely a quarter of an hour to go.
Only Spain itself could let the opportunity slip away, and this was evidenced when an almost identical circumstance occurred in that extension that should never have come. There, with the lesson learned, man was not the animal that stumbles twice on the same stone. The selection if he knew how to move the ball from one side to another, then, until the Croats simply threw in the towel due to impotence from running so much behind the ball.
A couple of tweaks in the eleven was the choice of Luis Enrique for the start and Spain ate Croatia, but Koke and Morata missed two very clear goals and the gift came
With defenses in the style of Laporte or Pau Torres, paradoxically much better when it comes to becoming organizers from behind than when it comes to protecting Unai Simon , everything that is giving the ball to the opponent is a real recklessness and that is how Luis Enrique and his coaching staff understood it. Of course it is understood that the Croats also play and burned the ships in that final rush of the initial 97 minutes, but it was enough to treat the ball with affection, something that the Spanish did not do in a few minutes that could be lethal.
Because Croatia grew so much that it even had bad luck at the start of extra time. All the fortune that had appeared to them previously turned its back on them and there Unai Simon did save his own with an excellent save on Kramaric, although it was more of an attacker’s mistake than anything else. You can’t miss a goal like that in a game of such a throne no matter how much merit the goalkeeper has.
Spain knew how to suffer in that stretch and in a flash plas the men of refreshment, those who had not worked at all, got them out of the jam, particularly that Dani Olmo with a Croatian soccer education. The extreme blonde destroyed his friends. First, with a pass to Morata in which the man from Madrid, finally, seemed like Van Basten himself in his resolution. Oriented control and splicing with violence to the roof of the network.
After one-nil, even Busquets made mistakes in deliveries, but Spain knew how to be true to itself and turned the score around in the second period.
A great goal for Spain to see things differently. Because Dani Olmo did not stop destroying the Gvardiol area and just a couple of minutes later he served Oyarzabal a sweet ball . This resolved in a wonderful way and Spain was placed again with a cushion of two goals in their favor.
You couldn’t escape that again and you didn’t, although after having started from the end it would be convenient to leave at the beginning of everything, twenty minutes from a promising game by Spain at the start, although with the tare always present of not taking advantage of what it generates to annihilate the adversary. Koke and Morata must have done it with everything in their favour, but it was incredible that they didn’t get it right.
And even worse would be the way in which Spain began to lose the game for the first time. A pass behind Pedri towards Unai Simon, the Basque goalkeeper tries to control it and unprotects himself so that the ball enters in a very cruel way. All the good starting football was suddenly diluted with that blow.
With one to three and the Croats burning the ships, Spain lacked the humility to understand that it was not over and that it had to continue touching the ball
. Fortunately, there was a long time ahead and the team, after a while of serious doubts, knew being true to herself after a quarter of an hour almost knocked out in which even Busquets became unrecognizable with his mistakes. But the soccer that Luis Enrique’s men have returned andSarabia signed him for the tie before intermission.
The thing remained the same in the second period and Spain was already moving at an almost stellar distance from Croatia when Azpilicueta scored an excellent goal and not only because of the shot, but because of Unai Simon’s pass-oriented control to break all the Croatian pressure . Everything was born there and the Navarrese confirmed it with his excellent head after a magnificent intervention by Pedri and Ferran Torres .
The extension began with a great save by Unai Simon, but the team was effective with Morata’s great goal and did what they should have done before, touch and touch
Spain had already channeled the thing and then had to finish it with the mischief of Pau Torres in the pass to Ferranfor it to define almost perfectly. With one to three that should have ended, but this selection lives in a somewhat strange situation. On the one hand, blessed, that it be a family like that; on the other, almost schizophrenic, that she is capable of self-injuring herself in that way.
Well, it goes back to the start and it only remains to celebrate the way in which everything was finished. Spain defeated Croatia three times and will deservedly play the quarterfinals of this European Championship. If to this is added that Morata came to remember Van Basten, who may doubt that the horizon has cleared and allows us to be most optimistic. Hopefully everything stays the same.
Technical sheet
3 – Croatia:Livakovic; Juranovic (Brekalo, m.74), Vida, Caleta-Car, Gvardiol; Modric (Ivanusec, m.113), Brozovic, Kovacic (Budimir, m.79); Vlasic (Pasalic, m.79), Petkovic (Kramaric, m.46) and Rebic (Orsic, m.67).
5 – Spain: Unai Simon; Azpilicueta, Eric Garcia (Pau Torres, m.71), Laporte, Gaya (Jordi Alba, m.77); Busquets (Rodri, m.102); Koke (Fabian, m.77), Pedri; Ferran Torres (Oyarzabal, m.88), Sarabia (Dani Olmo, m.71) and Morata.
Goals: 1-0, m.20: Pedri own goal. 1-1, m.38: Sarabia. 1-2, m.57: Azpilicueta. 1-3, m.77: Ferran Torres. 2-3, m.85: Budimir. 3-3, m.93: Pasalic. 3-4, m.100: Morata. 3-5, m.103: Oyarzabal.
Referee: Cuneyt Cakir (Turkey). I admonish Brozovic (73) and Caleta-Car (83), for Croatia.
Incidents:Round of 16 match of Euro 2020, played at Parken in Copenhagen before 25,900 spectators, around 2,000 Spaniards.
