Sid Lowe was at the Arena AufSchalke and his report is in. Thanks for reading this MBM. Nighty night.
Updated
Spain put on a show tonight, even if they don’t have the thumping scoreline they deserved to show for it. Nico Williams was borderline unplayable, the 16-year-old Lamine Yamal exuberance personified. Pedri should have scored two, while Williams and Ayoze Perez missed one gilt-edged chance apiece. And those were just the sitters. There were plenty of other chances, and even the own goal that was strangely required to settle the game had been forced by some delightful play by Williams and Alvaro Morata. Spain qualify for the knockout phase as Group B winners, and on this evidence will take some stopping, albeit with one fairly major caveat: they’ll need to get clinical if they’re to convert all of their youthful promise into silver.
As for the reigning champions: they didn’t play well at all, though Spain were in the mood to dictate, and at least they got better in the last 15 minutes or so after Luciano Spalletti made some changes. But right now they don’t look capable of becoming only the second side in history to retain this title.
| Pos | Team | P | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Spain | 2 | 4 | 6 |
| 2 | Italy | 2 | 0 | 3 |
| 3 | Albania | 2 | -1 | 1 |
| 4 | Croatia | 2 | -3 | 1 |
Updated
