There Is Only One Sinnacle

The Swiss come into Euro 2008 by qualifying automatically due to co-hosting the event. Switzerland will look to improve upon its second round World Cup showing where they lost against Ukraine in Penalty Kicks. If it wasn’t for Penalty kicks that game could still of been going. Not a prime example if you wish to prove that football is indeed the beautiful game.

Switzerland 2-0 World Cup victory over South Korea that saw them through to the knockout round.

While my belief is that hosting a tournament improves a teams chances. I also feel when a coach is already confirmed as leaving his post which is the case with Swiss coach Jakob Kuhn that takes away from the build up to a tournament. I may be wrong but I don’t recall a coach who lead his team to victory announcement his departure before the tournament.

Switzerland will need players such as Patrick Müller, Philipp Degen and Sampdoria midfielder Reto Ziegler fit if they are to proceed any further in the tournament. While a starting eleven that features the likes of Valon Behrami, Philippe Senderos (Hopefully he won’t crack under the pressure) Tranquillo Barnetta, Gelson Fernandes all of whom are quite young can give anyone a game depth will clearly be an issue for Switzerland. If plan A isn’t effective they are very few players on the bench that can change the game as plan B.

There is a good mix of young talent as been mentioned above and veteran established players who have been through this before. The likes of 37 year old keeper Pascal Zuberbühler and 31 year old Hakan Yakın leading the way.

Key Player – Alexander Frei

With a top scorer in French lique 1 on his resume the now Borussia Dortmund player will need to be at the top of the Euro 2008 league board if Switzerland are to advance far in this tournament. The Swiss are fine at back with Valon Behrami and Philippe Senderos paired with veterans Christoph Spycher and Ludovic Magnin. As is the case with most teams, its faith depends on who gets hot and Alexander Frei will be the man counted on to score goals for Switzerland.

Group A Outlook

I like where this Swiss team is headed but I feel even with hosting the tournament their young players need more seasoning on the big stage before being able to take the next step up. With Bayern Munich coach Ottmar Hitzfeld taking over this squad leading up to World Cup 2010, that would be a better tournament to predict Switzerland making some noise. They should have a chance to move on heading into the third game of the group stage but I feel they will come up just short.

Prediction – 3rd in Group A

This entry was posted on Friday, May 23rd, 2008 at 5:29 am and is filed under Euro 2008. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.