Football Euro 2012 News: Israel 1 – 2 Croatia Analysis, Kranjcar saves the Blazers (Part 1)
The two goals struck by Niko Kranjcar in the first half of the game proved to be enough to take down Israel at the end of the match and place Croatia at the top position in Group F of the Euro 2012 qualification process.
Both teams were a major disappointment in the FIFA 2010 World Cup. Israel and Croatia are considered among the better side of football teams in the world, so failing to participate in the tournament was a big disappointment for both fans and experts.
Croatia has been on the footballing platform for sometime now and over time has produced amazing results. Currently they are at the 11th position in the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking having acquired 998 points. This means that their graph is heading
towards a positive trend, having gained 3 points.
Israel on the other hand though has been on the rise in recent times but they have let down with some poor performances and one reason for that is the fitness level of the team, as their players have either been under the knife or resting on the bed. At
the moment, they are placed at the 36th position in the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking. They have achieved 721 points, therefore increasing 2 more from the last time.
Now both teams headed for the clash in Israel at the Ramat Gan Stadium, refereed by German Wolfgang Stark in chronicle fashion. Both teams had a couple of injuries.
The most significant injury among them would be of the Israeli captain and Chelsea playmaker Yossi Benayoun. The 30 year old attacking midfielder has torn his Achilles tendon, ruling him out of action for around 3 months. This summer Benayoun has made a
controversial switch in the English Premier League from Liverpool to the defending Champions of the title, Chelsea for 5 million pounds.
That are not the end of woes Israel is facing, as they will also be missing the services of their star midfielder Biram Kayal. The 22 year old prodigy from Israel is suffering from a groin injury therefore, his admittance in the team was highly doubtful.
He has made a switch to the Scottish giants Celtics just this season therefore is expected to be considered among the upper echelons of football.
Apart from these two disappointments, there weren’t any other crucial absentees from the squad lists.
The starting line up for Israel was 1 Dudu Aouate (Goal Keeper), 3 Tal Ben-Haim (Defender), 13 Dekel Keinan (Defender), 14 Yoav Ziv (Defender), 21 Tamir Cohen (Midfielder), 7 Gil Vermot (Midfielder), 6 Bebars Natcho (Midfielder), 8 Almog Cohen (Midfielder),
10 Elyaniv Barda (Forward), 11 Itay Shechter (Forward) and 16 Alroey Cohen (Forward). From this it can be deduced that The Blue and Whites were going to play with a 3 – 4 – 3 formation.
The substitution list included 18 Ohad Levita (Goal Keeper), 2 Dani Bondar (Defender), 4 Gal Alberman (Midfielder), 20 Lior Rafaelov (Midfielder), 22 Eyal Golsa (Midfielder), 9 Roberto Damian Colautti (Forward) and 17 Amit Ben Shushan (Forward).
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