Two entertaining games that went down to the wire. Dramatic finishes on the final day of an international soccer celebration. One team wins scores the eventual game winner in minute #86. The other has to go extra time to break a scoreless tie in minute #112.
SPAIN WINS EUROS
*Spain (-0.2 goals) beat England 2-1, winning possession 65-35%, shots on goal 6-4 (on 16-9 total shots), and corner kicks 10-2! That’s a rout of 16-6 in the sum of SOG+CK. Saw one expected goal assessment of about 2.5 to 0.5 for Spain. So, very one-sided even if the score was tied relatively late. Spain went ahead 1-0 in minute #47. England equalized in minute #73. Spain put it away in minute #86.
Ultimately, a continuation of themes from the full event. Spain started out well and looked superior to all opponents. England had been priced as the pre-tourney favorite to lift the trophy…but never looked THAT good. We’ve documented a few times how the Three Lions were clearly better than the Slovakia/Slovenia class of teams, but only about even with the Switzerland, Netherlands, Denmark, Serbia class of teams (Serbs power-rated at the tail end of that “pretty good” class). In a test against a true elite, this particular English side was exposed as NOT being a true elite.