Quote:
|
Originally Posted by demonrail666
I'm an enormous fan of Xavi and he's probably been my favourite player in the world these past few seasons, but, whether it's fatigue after a long season or simply not being in form, he's definitely not firing on all cylinders and I think that's a major reason behind the teams overall lack of bite up front.
|
Wasn't that a quote by Del Bosque? "It's important that Xavi plays well, because if Xavi plays well then the team plays well" or something like that.
Pedro looked alright in my book. At the very least you could say that he was more dangerous than Negredo (as was the corner flag).
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by demonrail666
Saying all that, the very fact that Spain have reached the final, however unspectacularly, without a functioning striker is pretty impressive.
|
There's a lot to say about Spain's "attacking weaknesses", but just looking at the amount of goals they're not doing any worse than in 2010. They only scored 8 goals in 7 games during the world cup! (I still can't get my head round that)
So in that regard Spain already outdid themselves by scoring 8 goals in their first 4 games. Shots on goals however is probably a different matter entirely. If I remember correctly (don't have time to check now), after 90 minutes it was only one save for Patricio and zero for Casillas... and that's where it gets really impressive: during the knock-out phases of the tournaments, Spain haven't conceded a single goal in 2008, 2010 and 2012.