'Exceptional' show wins technical praise
Tuesday 4 August 2009
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The 8th UEFA European Under-19 Championship provided high-class entertainment, with UEFA technical observers Zdeněk Sivek and Jarmo Matikainen particularly pleased with the standards set by the teams, and individual players, in Ukraine.
Player development
"The individual technique of the players has been exceptional," Sivek told uefa.com. "That technique in connection with speed and fluid movement helps to provide the supporters with what they want to see. Football isn't just sport, it's also an art, and many of the fans visit the stadiums in order to see football artists." Matikainen, meanwhile, was especially impressed by the continued progress in player development, explaining: "There have been no compromises on that front. You can see with the countries that have been here that player development is in good shape. Playing at the tournament is a fantastic opportunity for the players. They play against the best and have the challenge of playing at a very high level; in the end that optimises their general performance levels."
Physical preparation
The high levels of fitness allowed the players to produce consistently top-class performances during the two weeks of competition, despite the high temperatures. As Sivek pointed out, each team's preparation had played a crucial contributory role in their finals campaign. "I had the opportunity to talk with the coaches regarding their physical preparation before starting this tournament," he said. "Everybody agreed it was very important to have time for preparation. For example, Ukraine had 19 days divided into two phases, which was valuable in terms of working on physical fitness. Spain had 12 days while Serbia had three phases of three days plus three friendly matches. If you want the opportunity to get to the final of a European Championship, you have to prepare the team in terms of condition and reduce the amount of recovery time. Mental preparation during this time is very important too."
High entertainment
Hosts Ukraine managed to keep two clean sheets en route to winning Sunday's final – compared with none for the eventual runners-up England – and while all eight teams often defended with distinction, Matikainen believes the attacking elements were particularly noteworthy. "The defending has at times been great, but I don't think there has been an overemphasis on that side of things," he said. "The coaches admitted that the first round of games was very important and that teams were taking care in those matches was evident. Yet even then, and I've seen every match, all of the teams had plans to try and break through their opponents' defence. They had different variations and different game plans. It's probably a good thing to compare this tournament to last year's tournament, where the emphasis was on not losing the first and second matches and then going for the game in the third one. Everybody knows you have to attack if you want to win games."
'Football is about goals'
Sivek agreed, adding: "If you want to be successful in terms of results you have to have a compact defence, but football is about goals. You have to take into account the attacking phase of the game and to find solutions, with emphasis on the transition from defence into attack. Without goals football is a very poor sport. In the semi-final between Ukraine and Serbia we had four goals; the fans were very satisfied and gave a standing ovation at the end. The same at the game between England and France. Eight goals in two semi-finals was fantastic."
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