Premiership misfits roll on

Edwin van der Sar, Holland's penalty shoot out hero

14 April 2012

England may be gone but the Premiership marches on. From Spurs misfit Helder Postiga to Liverpool let-down Milan Baros, from Fulham goalie Edwin van der Sar to Arjen Robben, a kid who is surely going to wow them down the road at Chelsea, those who ply their trade in our league are having a decisive influence in the outcome of Euro 2004.

On Wednesday, we have one glamorous semi-final between Holland and hosts Portugal in Lisbon and, 24 hours later, a more surprising one in Porto between a Czech Republic side with a 100 per cent record here and long-odds outsiders Greece. If what happened on this dramatic weekend is anything to go by, the Premiership brigade will be right at the heart of more rare old drama - and not just its grandees.

We don't make much of a fuss about the likes of Van der Sar when players like Ruud van Nistelrooy are doing their stuff but here in Faro after Holland's penalty shoot-out win over Sweden following their 0-0 draw, it was refreshing to see the Manchester United icon handing his man-ofthematch award to a less garlanded team-mate from a less heralded club.

"Edwin deserves it, not me," he shrugged after one save laid to rest one of sport's weirdest mysteries. Namely, why can't the Dutch take penalties? Naturally, the Swede he foiled, Olof Mellberg, was a Premiership worker too. After Gareth Southgate and Darius Vassell, UEFA ought to consider a new rule outlawing all Aston Villa players from taking spot kicks for their countries.

Good for Van der Sar. In Holland's last three shoot-out defeats, which knocked them out of two European Championships and a World Cup, he had been fairly hopeless. "I used to take a relaxed attitude to it," he said. "It didn't work so this time I decided to take a more aggressive attitude."

This approach entailed the 33-yearold, in the style of England's Portuguese tormentor Ricardo, being a pain the neck with his bickering and stalling. It worked eventually.

"If we'd lost this one, I would have ended my international career," he admitted. "Yet now we are close and I've a really good feeling about it."

So does a lad in white boots who is too young to have been infected by Dutch penalty paranoia. They were down to the sixth choice when Robben agreed to crash home the winner. "I wasn't really afraid. Indeed, I was confident," he said. "I just picked up the ball, blocked out my common sense and scored."

Easy as that, eh? There is a real strut about Chelsea's new £12million man. He seems older than 20, quite self-assured for a small-town boy. From the moment Dick Advocaat selected him for the second game against the Czechs, his bold menace on the flanks has done perhaps more than anything to bolster Dutch courage.

Jose Mourinho will have watched not just the talent but the big-match temperament of Claudio Ranieri's acquisition with some satisfaction. "This has been a good chance for me to make a name for myself before I go to Chelsea," said Robben. He is taking the chance so well that you fear for Damien Duff 's future at the Bridge.

After returning from an injury layoff, Robben has looked sharp here which is more than can be said for poor old Freddie Ljungberg who admitted to be "almost falling apart" as he hobbled away from the stadium with his left ankle twisted, his right leg bleeding from stud marks and nothing to console him except phone texts from Sol Campbell and Ashley Cole saying they knew how he felt.

Fresh legs are the ones doing damage here. Postiga was under-employed at Spurs but popped up for Portugal to haunt England but even his fateful contribution doesn't seem as completely unlikely as Baros's explosion.

Before last night, the player of the tournament had been Wayne Rooney. After Baros's two dazzling strikes in three minutes sealed the Czechs' emphatic 3-0 win over Denmark, we can at least say the new holder of that title plays on Merseyside.

Last season at Liverpool, Baros broke his ankle, managed just a single goal in 13 league games and got dropped by Gerard Houllier. Here, he has scored five in four games which makes him the leading scorer with a single tournament haul that only Michel Platini has ever bettered with his nine in 1984.

"If you'd told me that before I came here, I wouldn't have believed it," he said in Porto. "When the boss put me on the bench, it was a very difficult period for me but I'm sure I can play for Liverpool like I'm playing here."

Anfield's new man Rafael Benitez will pray he does because the Baros who is terrorising defences here seems like the kid who was always rated as a sort of young 'Ostravan Maradona' in the Republic but has shown only occasional glimpses of his true quality under Houllier. Mind you, he doesn't play behind Pavel Nedved, Tomas Rosicky and Karel Poborsky there, one reason why his national tally is 21 goals in just 29 matches, including 11 in the last 10.

Baros reckons Greece, still buoyant after their improbable defeat of France, will take some beating. Bolton's Stelios Giannakopoulos said yesterday he would be back after injury. Perhaps he will end up taking a penalty in a shoot-out against the Czechs' new Chelsea keeper Petr Cech? Tune in for the next installment of Euro 2004's Premiership saga.

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