And Now for Something Completely Different

After years of concentrating on club management with Cremonese, it’s finally time to focus on something different with the 2036 European Championship in Germany. I have managed at international tournaments on this save before with Italy at the 2024 Euros and 2026 World Cup but I failed to give those tournaments the attention and detail they really deserved. So this time around I’m determined to document the journey of my Spanish side at Euro 2036 as best I can, while also paying a good level of attention to the wider events where possible.

Squad Selection

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With a squad of 23 players, my natural proclivity is to go with two players in every position plus the mandatory three goalkeepers required by the rules. However, with this tournament, I went against my better judgement by going with just three centre-backs in a bid to fit more attacking players in the squad. On the whole, the squad features a number of ageing players with the majority of quality Spanish players now being very much the wrong side of thirty. This is partly down to a bit of sentimentality on my own part with the likes of thirty-four-year-old Ricardo Ruiz and thirty-two-year-old Ricardo Zubizarreta featuring mostly because they’re players I have admired throughout their club careers and whom I believed may have one last tournament in them. A number of Cremonese players also feature in the squad with Rachid Saidi, Diego Linares, and Damian Puente all long-serving members of the national team, while Carles and Juan Pedro also received call-ups due to my desire to advance their international careers. The national team would also be playing the standard Cremonese Gwynbleidd 4-1-2-2-1 system throughout.

Group Stage

Spain 3 – 1 Poland Scotland 0 – 0 Spain Spain 5 – 0 Bulgaria 57′ Vicente Goal vs Bulgaria Performance of the Round: Germany 4 – 0 Belgium

The group stage draw may have thrown up a couple of tricky opponents in the form of 13th ranked Scotland and 16th ranked Poland but on the whole, it was a rather straightforward looking group, especially when the Bulgarian side ranked 46th in the World are taken into account. The priority then was to get a win on the board as soon as possible to put us in the best possible position for the remaining two games. However, things started off rather terribly with Pepe Herrera conceding a stupid penalty just two minutes into our opening group game against Poland. Thankfully Poland showed little if any, ambition after taking the lead and Herrera was quick to rectify his error by providing an assist for a Spanish player this time with a lovely timed pass to start Jordi Garcia off on the path towards a hat-trick. Up next was Craig Gordon’s Scotland side, who had just drawn their opening game 1-1 with Bulgaria. Something that forced me to reconsider my initial plan to rest players against the Scots before going full strength in the final game against Bulgaria. Instead with a chance to qualify outright here I sent out the same side who had defeated Poland in the previous match but Scotland proved a far more difficult side to break down and in the end, we had to make do with a bore draw. Thankfully a rotated team made up for that in the final game by hammering the Bulgarian’s to properly ensure our passage into the Second Round along with a potentially more favourable draw once there.

Elsewhere the Group Stages provided some interesting developments with three of the four home nations making it through to the knockout stages of the tournament. The French managed to score a terrifying amount of goals in their own group taking thirteen goals from the three games, as the Cremonese duo of Elias Huet (4 goals) and Cyril Bertin (7 goals) proved a deadly partnership up front for their national side. Israel and Northern Ireland must surely go down as two of the worst performers at the tournament, however, with Israel scoring just one goal and conceding twelve in their group while Northern Ireland proved a sterner opposition with just five conceded but their attacking threat was non-existent as they failed to score a single goal before heading home. There were a number of strong team displays during the Group Stages; with France battering Sweden 6-0, and the Welsh securing a famous 2-0 victory to send Italy home, but the performance of the round has to go to hosts Germany who put four past a highly rated Belgian side on their way to topping the group.

Second Round

Spain 3 – 0 Romania 60′ Saidi Goal vs Romania Performance of the Round: France 6 – 1 Wales

Topping our group certainly paid off, this time, around with a draw against a poorly ranked Romanian side who had managed to finish just third in a group featuring an Italian side which failed to win a single match. I may have been more concerned about this clash had Alexandru Pop not retired from international football a few years back meaning he would not be taking to the field to almost certainly terrorise my side. In truth, it wasn’t a particularly great game and we were on top for pretty much the entire match. However, Rachid Saidi did put in a rather fine display to wrap up the win in emphatic fashion with a 17-minute hat-trick that kick-started his tournament.

Despite Croatia having done well to beat Sweden by four goals to one, there’s still only one game that could possibly be considered the performance of the round. Unfortunately, for Wales, they happened to be on the receiving end of it too as Huet and co once again ran rampant for the French in a 6-1 demolition of The Dragons. Particularly impressive was Huet who brought his tally to eight goals for the tournament so far with his four-goal haul. Elsewhere holders Holland required penalties to get past Scotland after 120 minutes of goalless action, and Belgium were somewhat lucky to scrape past Russia with a late goal in extra time.

Quarter Final

Belgium 1 – 3 Spain Performance of the Round: England 4 – 5 France Huet sets a new record

The Quarter Final stage saw us matched up with a talented Belgian side featuring a number of current and ex-Cremonese players in the form of Adam Jacquet, Albert Michiels, Kris Wauters, and Jordan Vanhee. They played well enough and were able to create a few chances but the old men of the Spanish side were too much for the Belgians in the end as Zubizarreta, Ruiz, and Saidi who have a combined age of 96 put them to the sword.

After winning our game I knew we could potentially end up facing the French side that had so far decimated every team put in front of them. However, it was more the potential embarrassment of being absolutely smashed by three of my own protegee’s – Bertin, Huet, Ogbonna – in the next round that really terrified me so I was rooting for the usually overpowered English to come through that particular encounter. They gave it their very best shot too in a nine-goal thriller but perhaps going toe to toe with this particular French side wasn’t the smartest idea as Elias Huet went on to set a new record for goals scored in the competition. I do feel odd about calling that the performance of the round, however, given that the French did concede four goals during the course of the match but in comparison, every other result seemed so routine and mundane.

Semi Final

Spain 3 – 2 France 92′ Saidi Goal vs France Ukraine 0 – 5 Germany

So judgement day had arrived, my worst fears had materialised, and my chickens had come home to roost. Almost literally in fact considering the emblem of the France national team and that their best players are all products of the Cremonese system. I was certain of one thing heading into this encounter; there was absolutely no way we were going to try and trade blows with the reigning World Champions as England had tried in the previous round. Our attackers wouldn’t have the legs for it and opening ourselves up to Bertin and Huet would have been suicide. The order of the day, therefore, would be claustrophobic containing possession in a bid to best neutralise the French threat while still being able to pose one ourselves. This worked well early on as Garcia gave us the lead while our opponents managed just the one shot on target during the first half, unfortunately, that shot also happened to find it’s way past Carles in goal to see us head into the break level. The second half proved more fruitful for France as things inevitably opened up but while Carles was equal to five of their six shots on target he was unable to do much to stop the tournament’s leading goalscorer from adding another to his collection. For the most part, our gameplan had worked well, we had limited the French to a handful of decent chances and had twice put ourselves ahead in the match but even that was not enough to avoid being dragged into extra time.

It was there that a surging run from Rachid Saidi, who somehow had the energy left to drive up the field and slot home, put us ahead to leave me with just one thing in mind; survive. Immediately we switched to a more reactive deeper lying system in an effort to contain the French and hold onto our narrow lead. For a while it seemed the French were destined to score and as Elias Huet slipped past two defenders before curling an effort from the edge of the box past Carles I figured we were done for, only to see his shot cannon back off the post. That was to be the last effort the French would manage on our goal and after 120 energy sapping minutes, we had somehow survived to move on to the Final.

Final

Spain 1 – 2 Germany 61′ Saidi Goal Hosts become Holders

We had earned our place in the Final and with it the chance to face off against the host nation Germany at the Olympiastadion in Berlin for the right to lift the European Championship Trophy. Something I had personally been denied some eight years previous as my Italian side lost to Jose Mourinho’s Spain in extra time. Having been forced into extra time in the Semi Final against France cost us though with the majority of our best players really struggling for fitness, in particular, Linares and Saidi who had done so much to carry us this far both began this match with horrendous conditioning. I’m honestly shocked Saidi made it through the whole game, Linares couldn’t after picking up an injury late on.

The absolute last thing we needed was another game to go to extra time just three days after our encounter with France but having conceded early on to the excellent Daniel Saurer it was all we could do just to get back into the match. Saidi once again came up with the goods as he notched his sixth goal in six games at the tournament to ensure that we would at least go down fighting. The legend would end the final on just 45% condition and in dire need of a rest but unfortunately despite his best effort he and the team would not end the final as champions. At no point did we play for penalties but in hindsight, it may have been our only real chance once the match went past the regulation 90 minutes, and when your best option is a penalty shootout against the Germans then you know you’re in trouble. It wasn’t to be anyway as Daniel Saurer shrugged off a lazy challenge from substitute Uxio Arenas in the 100th minute to slot home the winner and to guide his team to a European Championship title in their own backyard.

Awards and Retrospection

Team Statistics Player Statistics Golden Boot Best Player

If I could do it all over again there are a few things I would certainly change. Taking Ricardo Ruiz was a massive error in judgement on my part, he was not cut out for this kind of tournament at thirty-four years of age despite his rather excellent season for PSG. I likely would have left Zubizarreta at home with him too. It was also one tournament too soon for Juan Pedro who had a few decent moments but on the whole, he just was not ready and I wonder what could have been had I gone with a pair of strikers in their prime rather than two at opposite ends of their respective careers. I enjoyed the tournament, however, despite all of that and I’m certainly proud of having overcome a rather potent French side in the Semi Finals.

As is to be expected considering the sheer amount of goals they scored, the star’s of the tournament were the Cremonese duo of Elias Huet and Cyril Bertin who once again formed a deadly partnership up front for their national side. I may even look to feature them more centrally for Cremonese in the future as a result. Ultimately it was a strikers tournament with three players netting ten times or more each and with Spain we had no one capable of matching them which is my fault really. Whether I stay on as Spain manager remains to be seen but from here on out I am determined to have an international job whenever a major tournament comes around.