Euro Cup 2012 Favourites:Spain

By rahulrawat, 7th Jun 2012 | Follow this author | RSS Feed | Short URL http://nut.bz/1hfki94m/
Posted in Wikinut>News>Sport

This article analysis the form of Spain and their chances of winning in the upcoming euro cup.

Euro Cup 2012 Favourites:Spain

Spain started the world cup 2010 as the favourites to win it and will once again start as the touranments favourites.For nearly four years now spain has dominated the world and europe's fifa ranking spending majority of time on top of the rankings with netherlands being the only other team in Europe to be ranked number one for a brief time in last four years.

Spain has qualified the tournament with a perfect record in the qulifier( second time in a row) so no doubt they are the favourites to win the cup.

A thing to note is that EURO 2004 winners Greece were eliminated in the first round in EURO 2008 and WORLD CUP 2006 winners Italy were eliminated in first round in WORLD CUP 2010 so those who believe in fate might expect the similar fate.

Before the start of euro cup 2008 spain was in good form( finishing first in their groups in qualifiers) but were not tipped as favourites to lift the trophy because of their poor form in major tournaments. Good performances in world cup 2006 made Italy,France and Germany the favourites. While Spain beat both Germany and Italy on their way to lifting the coveted trophy France were not even able to progress to the knockout phase.

They will deploy the same 4-3-3 formation.Spanish team has had considerable amounmt of success after adopting the 'tika-tika' style of play under the reign of Luis Aragonés.Their greatest stregth is their short and one touch passing. The brilliance of Spain lies in their defense and midfield. Due to their determination at the back they conceded only 2 goals in whole tournament and no goals in the knockout phase( a record for lowest number of goals conceded in entire world cup).
Five of the spain's eight goals in ther world cup were scored by David Villa proving he is a key figure in their attack and his injury can ruin the party for the world champions.

The squad:The squad selected by Vicente del Bosque is pretty similar to the World cup winning squad.Certain starters are Cassilas at goal, Ramos and Pique in defense and Alonso, Iniesta,Xavi and Busquests in midfield.
In attack Vicente del Bosque can go for either Fernanado Llorente or Fernando Torres.The other defenders that might start alongside Sergio Ramos and Gerard Pique are Raul Albiol and Androni Iraola.

With the team looking quite formidable in midfield and defense, attacking can be a problem with loss of touch for Fernando Torres and injury to David Villa. The determination and 'never give up' attitude of Puyol will surely be missed by the team.
The spanish bench will features the likes of Cesc Fabregas,David Silva, Jesus Navas and Juan Mata in midfield and attack while Alvaro Arbeola, Nacho and Jordi Alba in defense.

The style of play will surely be very much like they played in the World cup with possession football and not giving the opposition room to play with and winning with a margin of one or two goals maximum.

The Spanish team is placed in Group C alongside Italy ,Croatia and Republic of Ireland and will in all odds proceed to knockout stages topping the group.

Coming in the competition as the defending champions they are surely the favourites coming into the competition .Bookmakers and Pundits have tipped Spain to win consecutive Euro Cups and they have all capabilities to win the tournament if they take their chances and luck favours them.

Spain play their first match against Italy on the 8th of june.