Dejan Stankovic: As I announced two days ago, here is a big surprise… Today’s guest commentator is Wesley Sneijder, my teammate from Inter, big and sincere friend and a great football player. Sneijder participated in Euro 2012, so it will be a pleasure to read his opinion and comment. In addition to that, two years ago Wes played in the World Cup finals in South Africa, where his team was defeated by Spain. Wes, thank you for being a guest on my blog, and greetings to all…
Exclusively written by Wesley Sneijder, an Inter football player and a member of the national team of the Netherlands:
First of all, I would like to give my regards to all visitors of the blog ran by my great friend Dejan Stankovic… It is an exceptional pleasure for me to have this opportunity to address you in this way and sum up everything we have seen so far at Euro 2012 in Poland and Ukraine.
I will start with my team, the national team of the Netherlands. We were in very tough group, along with strong national teams of Germany and Portugal.
We played bad at this Championship. We simply didn’t play as we usually do.
First we were defeated by Denmark. We had a lot of chances at that match, but didn’t score a goal. When you start a big competition with a defeat, it is hard to expect something good in the end.
Summarizing my impressions, I can only say – it’s a pity. It’s a pity for all of us, but especially for Dutch fans, who we deprived of the right to joy, happiness and pleasure.
There’s nothing else for us to do now but to focus on our future obligations and prepare ourselves for the 2014 World Cup qualifications and the World Cup itself.
As for Euro 2012, I can say that it is one of the highest quality competitions held recently. Personally, I’m very surprised with the play of the national team of Italy. Usually we expect them to play defense and wait for the counter attack chances.
This time they showed us an all new face. They played differently, more offensively, and they demonstrated a really good football. Therefore, they deserved their spot in the finals.
Spain today isn’t the Spain from two years ago. It’s going to be very interesting finals. Spaniards and Italians are currently equally prepared and have the same chances, so I can’t wait to see the final match.
Frankly, I will support Italy. That’s the country I currently play in and that’s why I have special feelings for it. They have a great team, and I hope that Italians will come back home with the Euro 2012 trophy.
I already talked about the quality of this Championship. Many teams came well prepared and with pretty same capabilities. It is exactly because of the strength of a number of participants that I regret us leaving the Championship so early.
We watched an attractive football. There were many nice matches. We saw some brilliant goals, with lots of action and moves…
We often talk about organization on these occasions. I want to point out that the organization at this Championship was really good. There is always someone who has doubts, but there was no room for such people this time – everything functioned the best it could. On my part, it was a pleasure and honor to participate in this year’s European Championship and I’m happy I was a part of it.
June 30, 2012
