First they were joking about Scotland and Hove Albion.

Then it became Spain and Hove Albion.

Seagulls fans have been spotting the similarity between their own team in the Premier League and those two Euro 2020 outfits who suffered disappointment yesterday.

Albion had a habit of dominating games piling possession at times last season without getting the rewards they deserved.

There were a few bad misses along the way too.

Although they never conceded from the halfway line.

So it gave scope to a bit of a laugh as Monday’s action played out.

Scotland had 19 goal attempts to ten by the Czech Republic – but it was 5-7 in terms of those on target.

The Scots shaded possession 56%-44% as they lost the game 2-0.

Spain v Sweden felt rather like Albion v Aston Villa last term as it ended 0-0.

The hosts passed the ball very nicely and had 17 goal attempts to four by Sweden, with a count in terms of those on target of 5-0.

Luis Enrique’s men dominated possession to the tune of 75%-25%, according to uefa.com, and played a total of 954 passes with an 89% success rate.

But Martin Olsen in goal for Sweden did something very similar to what we saw from Emilaino Martinez for Villa at the Amex.

Even Albion’s own Twitter feed made a joke about Expected Goals along with a picture of their goalkeeper Robert Sanchez taken at a Spain training session.

The xG count in the Spain game was 2.47-1.34 in favour of the hosts as Sweden also created a couple of gilt-edged chances.

Scotland won the xG contest by a more lop-sided 2.31-0.91.

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Poland, with Jakub Moder going on as a late sub, were not unAlbionlike either in terms of xG.

In theory they should have won their game by something like 2-0 or maybe 2-1 given an xG of 1.64 to Slovakia’s 0.49.

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Instead the three points and trans-Tatras bragging rights went to Slovakia by a 2-1 scoreline.