In a pretty much uninspiring match, mostly due to Romania refusing to do anything about their future, Holland defeated Romania with 2-0. I find it strange that when the goal of Romania should be to actually win the match to survive in the tournament, they resorted to playing defense.
This strategy turned out to be very unfortunate for Romania and my enjoyment. Romania’s offence didn’t create any problems for the Dutch defense and as a result lost with 2-0.
Given the uninspired performance of the Romanians I’d love the Italians and the French to continue in the tournament. But only one of them could go through. The winner of their match would be the one to progress in the tournament, so there was a significant incentive to win for both teams. Their match showed a crippled France trying to defeat the Italian forces. The Italians did their job well and defeated the french rightfully with 2-0.
Based on the performance against the Dutch, I found the french to be stronger, but apparently they were still tired from the last match and couldn’t put up much of a fight against the Italians. In any case, they had a bad day already with their bus driver unable to make a corner without crashing two cars and a fence. Their defeat will not be too good for their mood.
That said, I think Holland has done great: three wins out of three, and 9(!) goals. I can’t wait for the quarter finals to take place. Basel here we come!