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PREVIEW: Euro 2008 Group A, Czech Republic vs Portugal
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Czech Republic |
 |
vs |  |
Portugal |
Tuesday, June 11th, 1800 CET
Geneva (Switzerland) – Travel to Geneva
THE BIG PICTURE
Both teams won their opening games, though Portugal’s 2-0 win over Turkey was a lot more convincing that the Czech 1-0 win over Switzerland. So Portugal are top on goal difference going in, but whichever team wins this will qualify for the quarterfinals.
Three Key Players:
Tomas Ujfalusi – possible handballs aside, the captain was a defensive mountain against Switzerland
Jan Koller – disappointing against Switzerland, and his replacement Vaclav Sverkos scored the only goal, but should get another chance to perform today
Martin Fenin – the team looked one dimensional against Switzerland, but this young striker could provide the missing x-factor
Czech Republic squad
Czech Republic Team Profile
Visit Méd’a at the Czech Republic Euro 2008 Team Blog for more.
Buy Czech Republic national team gear here.
Three Key Players:
Pepe – will the big central defender pull off another Brazilliant wondergoal? Probably not, but he’ll likely have another rock-like game in defence.
Cristiano Ronaldo – obviously his performance is key, but more importantly I’m hoping television commentators/announcers will stop drooling over him long enough to remember there are other players involved in the game.
Ricardo – great at stopping penalties, not so great at gathering crosses. And the Czech Republic seem to like putting crosses.
Portugal squad
Portugal Team Profile
Visit Greg at the Portugal Euro 2008 Team Blog, and definitely read his quality Portugal vs Czech Republic preview here.
Buy Portugal national team gear here.
BIG BATTLES
Petr Cech vs Cristiano Ronaldo It’s Chelsea vs Man Utd, only on a bigger stage. And who wouldn’t love to see C-Ron face P-Cech from 18 12 yards again?
Jose Boswinga vs Marek Jankulovski There’ll be a contest between Portuguese right back and Czech left back to see who can make the most overlapping runs.
Tomas Ujfalusi vs his own arms The captain got lucky and had two possibly very good shouts for handball in the box against him ignored against Switzerland. Third time he might not be so lucky.
LIVEBLOG
Follow the Czech Republic vs Portugal LiveBlog here.
A little note for our bracket competition involving this match. If either team wins this one, we’ll have our first confirmed quarterfinalist, and thus our first points in the competition. A scoreboard will be going up later today, and each time points are updated, we’ll include it in the day’s Euro Wrap, along with a link to the bracket table.
Thanks Mike, yes I did mean 12. It’s been corrected.
Although Ronaldo has had better luck with free kicks than penalties lately, so maybe he’d prefer 18.
Wait, isn’t it still possible for the winner here to face a three way tie for first place… and lose on goal differential? Or is the head to head result the tiebreaker here?
Posted from 
United States
It comes down to Head-to-Heads in this one.
Posted from 
United Kingdom
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Dont you mean 12 yards when talking about the c ron vs. cech face off from the penalty spot? my vote is an easy portugese win because of a lack of offensive attack from the Czech side