With the first of the semi-finals out of the way, it is time to see who will join Spain in the final of the Euro Championships 2024. Last nights game between Spain and France was arguably the game of the tournament with it having fast attacking football in abundance throughout the game and young talent taking centre stage, most notably Lamine Yamal scoring from distance with a dazzling curled strike.
From what we have seen so far from both England and the Dutch, this game doesn’t have all the hallmarks of an ‘all timer’ however, both teams are more than capable of producing spectacular moments on a football pitch and it would be wrong to assume another slow-paced, boring game.
A win for England tonight would send them to their second consecutive Euros final and would arguably see Southgate cementing his place as Englands greatest manager of the modern era. It’s been a long time since England have enjoyed silverware on the international stage and a win tonight should give them the boost they seem to need. Beating the Netherlands won’t be an easy feat by any means though as they have a team capable of going the full way in this tournament. England will need to bring their A-Game tonight if they are serious about progressing to the final and an in-form England is something this tournament has lacked up until now so time will tell if Southgate has managed to rally the troops.
The Netherlands will look to gain a place in what would be their second ever European Championship Final. The Dutch have been largely disappointing in recent tournaments and didn’t even manage to qualify in 2016 so tonight is a chance to send a clear message to the world of football that the Netherlands are still a world class footballing nation. They have played good football at the tournament so far with a well drilled attacking set up being seen in most of their games however, them having the joint top goalscorer in Cody Gakpo, they do seem to lack a clinical threat in front of goal at times with there being a lot of wasted opportunities in previous games. Despite England having a team full of superstars, The Dutch would be foolish not to see this as a huge opportunity to advance as England have been extremely poor in previous games at the tournament and have advanced in a somewhat ‘lucky’ fashion in both of their knockout games so far. Contrastingly, The Netherlands made short work of Romania in the RO16 beating them 3-0 and missing many opportunities to make it more. And despite a rocky start against Türkiye, they turned it around to win the game in normal time.
Tonight’s game between two behemoths of the game, both of which have a lack of recent silverware, will display hunger and drive for success as players from both teams fight to bring glory back to their nations. The atmosphere will be something to behold too as it is expected that over 40,000 England fans and 80,000 Dutch fans will pile into Dortmund to support their countries.
Robbie Talks Football 