Euro 2004

[Elewyn]

yes, we have many german names over here (bah, in our bordering areas germans live since 13th century and their number increased significantly after 1620). Examples? Koller, Heinz, Hübschman... but also Polish (Jankulowski) and hungarian or south slavic: Vavrovic, Horváth, Kovác... but f.e. Austrians are just iverted. They are "germans" but in fact they are german speaking Slavs, half of them have slavic names, mostly czech.
I think that most of nations have names of neighbouring nations.

btw, there are only 3 teams in EURO with all players born in their country: Czech republic, Spain and Denmark.

oh and Italy yesterday? Great. I changed my mind, it was not defense and defense and defense, as I knew it. They played very ofensive football.
But.. I don't know who would be better to go on. Italians? Danes? Swedes?
I hope Czechs will be frst qualifired team. But it will be very very hard. i hope Baros will play from the beggining. Or Heinz, I think he could be very unpleasant surprise for the Dutch :)

[Ledhead]

Originally posted by Finellach


Btw. there are no iranian names in Croats since there are no Iranians in Croatia. The names are mostly slavic. There are many hungarian, italian and german surnames atypical for slavic nations. As far as I know a similar situation is in Bohemia as well where you can see many Bohemians with german last names.



That came out a little wrong. I meant what the most common names are in that group that you identified as descendant of the non-slavic Croatians.

[Finellach]

Ledhead about 75% Croats have non-slavic ancestry, but the language is still and was for centuries slavic. These people got assimilated and got slavic names. Take Hungary for example. You will notice that they have strange finno-ugric names, but their ethnicity is slavic.

Hope you understand it a bit better. ;)

Btw. this getting off topic. If you have some other question please refer to the thread "Balkan history".

[Ledhead]

OK I think I get it. The Croats are in all a homogenous people except in looks. And the later immigrated Germans, Hungarians, Bohemians and others...
Their footballplayers in the Euro 2004 too (to keep it somewhat in topic...:angel: )

[Henrik]

I just wanna say: poor Latvia ! - they're facing the German team today :eek: - it just isn't fair IMO :rolleyes: , but i'm gonna watch the "carnage" anyway :)

My heart is with Latvia - but one must also face reality - there can ony be one outcome of this match - i think.........or are we in for a surprise :scratch:

[Kuno of Gersenau]

My heart is with every team who plays against Germany...:D

So, GO LATVIA! :cheers:

[Elewyn]

I hope for surprise. Better and sweet for Latvians, Czechs and Dutch and very very bitter for Germans. More bitter than it was on tuesday when we, Czechs were about to face reality-bitter surprise of latvian unbreakable defense (and our poor play as well)

[Angryminer]

Damn, that game was boring...
That wasn't soccer, that was "Keep germany from scoring" :( .
Latvia should try to win, not try to not-loose.

Angryminer

[Finellach]

Germany played extremly poor. Not to mention Latvia should have got two penalties...

btw. I noticed one strange thing. Not one attacker in German national team is german.
Bobic is Slovenian, Brdaric Croat, Kuranyi Brazlian with Hungarian ancestry and Klose is Polak. :p

[Henrik]

Eeerrrrmmm, i think a few comments are in order here....

First: i'll admit i have eat my words and doubts regarding Latvia - i honestly thought that the german team would have taught the Latvian team a lesson in "German thoroughness", but THAT didn't happen - I think that one really has to respect and admire the struggle from the Latvian team i.e as understands it all the players comes from the Latvian league ! I also think that the result of the match has made the bookmakers rich - i'm glad that i didn't spent a few bucks on the match.

WTF ! happend Germany :confused:

Second: The match between Holland and Czechnia, boy was that a match or WHAT ! first half 3 goals in the first 23 min. awesome ( my hero: Ruud van Nistelrooij scored ! - God must have misplaced him at birth - he should have born in Denmark :D ) - i thought that Holland would have nailed the Czechnia cuffin, but luckily the second half really turned the table ! I really think the Czechnia had their finest hour - there only seem to be one way for them and that's FORWARD :go: - both the danish commentators agreed that this match between Holland and Czechnia is the best in the tournament so far and i'll agree with them 100% - this is what football is all about - i wonder if the this tournament can get much better than this ?

[Finellach]

It's not just Danish commentators Croatian agreed so to.
We also have a retired pro coach Tomislav Ivic...you maybe heard of him, he trained Marseille, was in Belgium, Portugal...who knows where else...in any case the man is football encyclopedia. You should hear him. The man knows every tactic, he explains what each coach did in game and such thing...hes nuts old man. :D

IMO one of the best coaches we had if not the best. He was the guy who led Croatia when they got their first big win against Italy in Palermo in 1995.

He also agreed that this is the best game so far and if he agrees than you know it really is the best game. ;) :)

[Nike]

There is no doubt - The Nederlands : Czechia was the best game so far! Portugal vs. Spain was very good too! Too bad Spain didn't qualify for the Q-finals. :(

Has anybody noticed that on every World or Euro Championship there is a surprise team? 1994 - Bulgaria - fourth in the world; 1998 - Croatia - third on the world; 2002 - Turkey - third in the world, Senegal defeated France; etc.

[Henrik]

@Nike

You're right that there is always one team at the European or the World championship which seem to surprise and i like to add Japan to your list of "surprises" - i.e. i don't that nobody could forsee that they went so far in the World championship last time in Southkorea and Japan - this is also IMO what make these tournaments so great - i love it :)

[Finellach]

Well in 1998 Croatia was not surprise for me. I knew we had great players and that we will at least get to the quarter-finals. With a bit of luck we could have been the world champions today.
Also in 1996 if we recieved fair referee we would get by Gerrmany and who knows what would happen.

The current Croatian team is not even 1/3 good as that one.

[Ben Nevis]

I'm sorry for Croatia Finnelach. I loved their game against France. Hopefully better luck next time.

[Elewyn]

hmm, paper favorits are through. Henry ultimatelly shot 2 goals.

Unlucky game for Croatia, my sympathies, Finellach.
I think you need one more striker alongside to Prso. Sokota was not as good as I would expect from Croatian striker.

I think Croatia have strong football potential, just to find new generation after Prosinecki, Suker, Jarni, and co.

[Finellach]

Well I don't think we were unlucky, England was just way better. The thing is that England is the strongest in the middle where Croatia is the weakest...at least with the players Baric enforced.

IMO Croatia has few really good young players like Klasnic who plays for german champion Werder alongside Ailton as attacker and IMO it's stupid not to put him instead of Sokota. In fact there was a question all the time why Baric doesn't puts him instead of Sokota, but he didn't get one minute!!

Also there is Babic who also plays in Germany and was one of the best players in Germany and in Leverkusen for the last two years yet Baric chooses Rapajic who is old and a spent player and can't run anymore. :rolleyes:

There are also Srna and Leko who also sat on the bench. Look at England...their best player is the youngest player unlike Baric who enforces older players. All other teams force their oyunger players yet we do the opposite. :bash:

Also I must say that I am not pleased with Baric's descion of putting the defensive player in the middle...you can't experiment in such important match.

Well life goes on...at least we showed something. :blob:

[Henrik]

@Finellach that was too bad for Croatia - i'll agree that the team need a new generation of players - we had the excact same ploblem with the danish team from 1988 - 1990, because before that we had a team which on a good day could beat just about any team, but our coach at that time forgot to take new and younger players in which meant that when we played in the european championship in Germany in 1988 our team were almost an old boys team compared to the other teams !

well, i'll miss the croatian fans, because they really seem to know how to party during a match :)

[Finellach]

Originally posted by Henrik
well, i'll miss the croatian fans, because they really seem to know how to party during a match :)

Yeah. I would probably a bit exaggarate if I say that we have the best fans in the world, but see the numbers. England had 40 000 fans and we had 10 000 fans. Imagine how big this number is when you see that Croatia is small country with population more than 10 times lesser than England or even more compare our standard with other European countries. It's incredible.

You should have seen the euforia here in 1998 when we won 3rd place, I still remeber the game when we beat germany 3:0 in quarter-finals...I don't think there wasn't a man or women that wasn't on the streets. :)

Or the welcome party for Ivanisevic...that was incredible....everyone one was by him. You would walk on the streets and no one was out....everyone watched Ivanisevic playing. :p

Btw. I will cheer for Denmark. I hope Sweden and Denmark go through and Italy falls out. ;)

Edit: I am sorry we disappointed the Scots. They wanted us to beat England more than anything...more than we wanted. :silly:

[Henrik]

Originally posted by Finellach
Btw. I will cheer for Denmark. I hope Sweden and Denmark go through and Italy falls out. ;)


I hope so too :) - eventhough the danish players denies it and the swedes too that they don't wanna play for a draw 2-2 which mean that both Denmark and Sweden qualify for the 1/8 final then i think that a "safe bet" at the local bookmakers would be to bet on a draw 2-2 ;)

besides, i don't really think that neither Sweden or Denmark would run the risk of facing Italy again later in the tournament, so i wouldn't be surprised if we'll see some "scandinavia brotherhood" in tomorrows match. A 2-2 draw tomorrow will be a tactical consideration - eventhough danes simply hate when we loose to the swedes - it hurts our "pride" :rolleyes: because we see the swedes as the ones who "stole" half of Denmark - eventhough this isn't the truth, but it helps us in denying the facts of history :D :D :D

Originally posted by Finellach
Edit: I am sorry we disappointed the Scots. They wanted us to beat England more than anything...more than we wanted. :silly:

Yeahh, i saw some scots dressed up in croatian colors - this give a good impression on how much the scots hates the english, due to their troubled past - it's the same with the danes and the swedes though we don't hate'em - we simply just can't stand to loose to them !!!!! - and they probably knows it :D