Spain 3-0 Turkey

Allianz Riviera, Nice

18th June 2016

As one-sided a match as I think I have witnessed for some time, with Turkey for all their endeavour and sweat having no answer to the devastating power of Tiki-Taka.  And yet, the Spaniards, for all their delightful passing movements had to rely upon a good old fashioned cross into the box onto MORATA’s head to finally turn their dominance into a lead after 34 minutes.  After a further three minutes of the Turks chasing shadows the lead was doubled; NOLITO capitalising on a horrible error by opposing defender Mehmet Topal.  

Following the break, Spain simply took up where they had left off and within three minutes of the restart were three up as MORATA tapped in a pass from Jordi Alba.  One which finished off a quite breath-taking 22-pass move, which had begun pretty much inside their own six-yard box.  The sequence was of such sublime brilliance, that it would have been churlish for the linesman to have flagged it for offside….which perhaps Morata marginally was.

My own seat in the Allianz Riviera was in an area which appeared mostly populated by neutrals – there was a Finn in the row in front of me who spent pretty much the whole match gurning into his own camera as selfie followed selfie – but there were sufficient Turks around for me to be in no doubt they were not a set of happy bunnies.  Their captain Arda Turam appeared to find himself on the receiving end of much of the crowd’s ire, but did himself no favours by giving the booing fans an ironic double thumbs-up sign.  This simply had the effect of jacking-up the boo-decibels whenever he received the ball which I suppose, if nothing else, perhaps took the heat off his equally under-performing colleagues.

As Spain took their collective foot off the gas a touch, Turkey did carve out a couple of half-chances, but neither Burak Yilmaz nor Olcay Şahan could make the most of their respective opportunities as their side’s Shots-on-Target column remained resolutely to the end of the match at 0.

Andrés Iniesta & Sergio Busquets

First-minute booking for Sergio Ramos

Spain v Turkey - Euro 2016

Turkey fans - Euro 2016

Vicente del Bosque (centre) at his last major tournament?

Spain v Turkey - Euro 2016

Spain v Turkey - Euro 2016

Arda Turan - Turkey

Nuri Şahin - Turkey

Panorama of Allianz Riviera, Nice

During the match I got chatting to the chap in the seat beside me.  He and his son were OGC Nice season ticket holders, and had decided to come along to this match primarily to experience a decent atmosphere inside the Allianz Riviera. 

For, as he told me, since the club had moved to the new stadium in September 2013, the atmosphere when watching his club had been somewhat less the overwhelming.  In fact, I recall “dead” was the word he used in his excellent English.  

For whilst the Allianz Riviera has a capacity of some 35,500 or so, an average gate for OGC Nice of just over 19,000 leaves an awful lot of empty seats most matches.  An inevitable consequence, I suppose of having to expand/build stadia to host major tournaments.  But one which leaves most supporters having to watch their local team in soulless one-third empty arenas, once the circus has left town.

Allianz Riviera, Nice

Allianz Riviera, Nice

Allianz Riviera, Nice

Allianz Riviera, Nice

Allianz Riviera, Nice