At first glance, from the quartet of Belgium – Hungary – Serbia – Scotland – you should choose anyone, but not Domenico Tedesco’s team, because the “Red Devils” are unconditionally among the elite of world football.
However, at the moment, the stars have aligned so that the head coach of the national team of Ukraine has no reason to complain about the draw.
There are no reasons at all.
And all because, at the moment, the Belgian national team has lost all its power and aesthetics. There is only one name left of the team that not so long ago reached the semi-finals of the World Cup.
Substitution is the main scourge of the current Belgian national team. With the departure of Eden Hazard, an entire era has passed. And you have to put up with it.
However, this passing era could have passed less imperceptibly, less resonantly, if the national federation had made the right choice for the post of head coach of the national team.
But the choice fell on Domenico Tedesco, a young coach with a very tarnished reputation. The former coach of Moscow “Spartak” failed to reach his new level.
Getty Images/Global Images Ukraine. Domenico Tedesco Moreover, under his leadership, the Belgian national team dropped below second place in the League of Nations for the first time in its history. In 2021, Belgium fought for victory in this tournament, in 2025 they will fight to stay in Division A.
Somehow, very quickly, although not very noticeably, the Belgian national team slipped into the inconspicuous niche of good, but faceless teams. Tedesco tried to find a way out of the situation, but the more he tried to find this way out, the more he moved away from it.
A textbook example of the disapproval of the current coach of the Red Devils is the story of Thibaut Courtois, currently the former goalkeeper of the Belgian national team. The goalkeeper of “Real” was allegedly offended by the fact that Tedesco, after the departure of Hazard Sr., gave the captain’s armband not to him, but to Lukaku.
In my opinion, this whole story is not worth a single egg. It seems to me that a compromise could be found. But Courtois did not ask to find him. And why seek ego, this compromise, with a no-name coach?
Tybo understood very well that now with his national team he can lose rather than gain. The fact that the “Devils” are going downhill was already visible at Euro-2020. There was to be only the bottom.
And it was, this bottom. With Courtois, it would certainly be the same. But the cunning Tybo decided to retreat. Watch from the side.
From the outside, watching the withering of one of the best national teams in the world turned out to be a very ungrateful thing. And uninteresting.
It turned out that Tedesco failed to replace Courtois and Hazard. Moreover, having given up on veterans – Witsel, Carrasco and Vertonghen, the new coach of the Belgians could not find an equivalent replacement for those who left the reserve.
As he was not able to replace the injured De Bruyne and Tom.
Without these seven players, the Belgian national team became such an ordinary team.
We could judge its ordinariness based on Euro-2024, where the Red Devils were drawn into the same group as the Ukrainian national team.
Belgium was the “mother” team in our quartet at the Euros, but did not confirm its status at all.
In the last round of the group tournament, the Belgian team played to a scoreless draw with the Ukrainian team. Then it seemed that our opponent was playing strictly according to the score. But in reality it turned out that he plays as well as he can.
The first round of the CHE-2024 playoffs was the last for the Belgians: they lost 0:1 to the French national team.
And the defeat by the Musketeers cannot be considered a mistake or a coincidence, because later the trend was confirmed. Belgium and France met in the same group of the League of Nations, and Tedesco’s wards lost both matches – 0:2 and 1:2.
The relationship between the “Red Devils” and another tough team in the group – with Italy – was not the best: a 2:2 draw and a 0:1 defeat.
So it turned out that the Belgians in their group fought exclusively for the preservation of the elite registration, and not for the exit to the playoffs.
The team managed to defend the third place in the group in the fight against Israel. But only thanks to the better difference between scored and conceded goals in personal meetings – 3:1 and 0:1.
That’s how, from the hegemon of continental football, the national team of Belgium passed to the status of ordinary teams.
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And this wind of change caught not only the inconvenient and short-sighted Courtois, against whom Tedesco began to fence the garden, but also Lukaku, for whose sake the new coach of the Belgians started to fence this garden.
The newly-minted captain of the Belgian national team played only one match in the recently concluded League of Nations tournament – a lost home match against Italy. Romelu asked Tedesco not to call him to the national team – under the guise of better preparation for meetings at the club level.
Getty Images/Global Images Ukraine. Romelu Lukaku And that’s how, not by washing, but by skating, the Belgian national team ended up where it ended up. That is, it turned out to be balancing on the edge of the elite and everyone else.
Undoubtedly, the “Red Devils” even in this – disassembled and raw form – remain a serious opponent for any rival. However, in my opinion, now, that is, at the end of March next year, is the best time to clash with Tedesco’s team.
It is unlikely that this team will become stronger in these few months.
It won’t. Even if De Bruyne recovers from his injuries, the best days of this team are behind him. And the KGB has already announced his retirement from the national team. There is no equivalent replacement for the outgoing leaders. And it won’t be. Belgian football is not so prolific as to produce a golden generation every hour.
The current generation of the Belgian national team is not even aiming for the silver medal. Well, unless it’s tin.
But that’s not even the point. After all, again, everything is known in comparison. Compared to the Belgian team, the national team of Ukraine still remains an outsider, because, despite the obvious problems of the “Devils”, our problems are even more obvious. Even more indicative.
And this is exactly where our team has a chance. We have absolutely nothing to lose. In the matches against Hungary or Serbia, we would definitely have something to lose. In case of defeat. And now – no one, not even me, will dare to throw stones in our garden, if in the end we do not defeat this opponent. Because this opponent, despite all his pains, remains a level higher than Rebrova’s team.
And if so, in future matches against the Belgians we can only buy.
Minimum experience.
But I would very much like our main team of the country to acquire positive emotions along with experience.
Sergey Rebrov is a playoff master. Well, let him prove that he is a master.
Source: sport.ua