The FIFA Football World Cup 2018

[bilby]

Heh...footies...Brits "successfully got beaten".

Tally-ho!

As the two teams went into the match level on points, goal difference, and goals scored, a draw would have seen the team with the fewest yellow cards 'awarded' the top spot in the group that both wanted to avoid. There was some discussion amongst the Australian commentators after the lack-lustre first half in which Belgium picked up a couple of yellow cards, that that might have been a deliberate ploy to give England the top spot.

Clearly someone had a quiet word with the team at half time, and Belgium came out in the second half suddenly looking like they wanted to win; Once they scored, England woke up too, but too late to avoid the loss (which I bet they are not too upset about).

 

[ruby sparks]

Heh...footies...Brits "successfully got beaten".

Tally-ho!

As the two teams went into the match level on points, goal difference, and goals scored, a draw would have seen the team with the fewest yellow cards 'awarded' the top spot in the group that both wanted to avoid. There was some discussion amongst the Australian commentators after the lack-lustre first half in which Belgium picked up a couple of yellow cards, that that might have been a deliberate ploy to give England the top spot.

Clearly someone had a quiet word with the team at half time, and Belgium came out in the second half suddenly looking like they wanted to win; Once they scored, England woke up too, but too late to avoid the loss (which I bet they are not too upset about).

Yeah.

It's an interesting situation. Getting into the supposedly much weaker side of the draw could be a poisoned chalice, because if they fail to get past Colombia (lower ranked but no pushovers), their record will have been two wins against poor opposition and two defeats against not-so-poor opposition, and I think the tournament would go into the pigeon hole labelled 'failure' along with most of the others since 1966. If they get past Colombia but slip up in the quarter final agains Switzerland or Denmark, there will be similar criticisms, albeit getting to the quarters would probably be enough to fend them off, not least because if it's the Swiss, they're FIFA-ranked above England.

That's the potential downside. The upside is that they do have a genuine and rare opportunity to get to the semis at least, which would be considered a great success by any reasonable standards, and I hope they can take it and I will be watching with interest and hoping, if nothing else, to see them 'going for it' by playing attractive football.

On a side note, the better England do, the louder the political Brexiteers are going to get. If they (the England team) win the effing World Cup, some will take it as a sign of Britain (read: England) being restored to its 'rightful' place in the world hierarchy.

 

[bilby]

And as Germany are out, at least England are in the correct half of the draw to meet France in the final.

It could be another 52 years before the chavs stop banging on about it.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Heh...footies...Brits "successfully got beaten".

Tally-ho!

As the two teams went into the match level on points, goal difference, and goals scored, a draw would have seen the team with the fewest yellow cards 'awarded' the top spot in the group that both wanted to avoid. There was some discussion amongst the Australian commentators after the lack-lustre first half in which Belgium picked up a couple of yellow cards, that that might have been a deliberate ploy to give England the top spot.

Clearly someone had a quiet word with the team at half time, and Belgium came out in the second half suddenly looking like they wanted to win; Once they scored, England woke up too, but too late to avoid the loss (which I bet they are not too upset about).

And so everything they did looks like exactly what they would have done if they wanted to win. I suspect the Belgium side have merely pretended they were looking for a loss.

Ah, so now Belgium is getting better at being perfidious than perfidious Albion itself?!

Good job! I'd say "Sambre et Meuse"!

Seeking the path of glory
That led them to immortality

EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

And as Germany are out, at least England are in the correct half of the draw to meet France in the final.

It could be another 52 years before the chavs stop banging on about it.

The downside is that neither of us will have the excuse of being beaten by the Germans this time.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

There's no rule - and if there was, how would it be enforced? Giving the other team a penalty kick would be rather counterproductive as a punishment for a team that actively wants to lose

Hmm... Exactly fucking annoyingly so.

So, here we have this apparent problem that teams may choose to play to loose a match. That's unfair to the public and all living things in general.

So, why do they not just give the right to choose their next opponent to the winner? Sounds fair enough... Why isn't that the rule?
EB

Well the goal is the World Cup, not a semi-final win, so one way or another you're going to meet with the other side. Granted the odds of randomness allowing you to slip in a world cup win at the end are better if you actually make it to the final, but if you're that worried about the opposition of one half, your odds for the final aren't too good.

There's that and the fact that it becomes a precedence issue. If side A is noticeably better, why can't the winners of side A jump over to side B too. And who gets to choose to do that when everyone is competing within different groups?

No, the goal is to make a lot of money and therefore to please the paying public and so you really need the rules to make sure the spectacle is maximised as best as possible without actually killing any footballer.

The rule could well be that at the group stage, it's the winner of the stage that gets to choose which part of the bracket to advance to. That would be a motivation for both teams to always play to win at this stage. That would also favour the big teams since they would be able to try to avoid each other, which seems fair but more to the point would get more public to want to watch.

Well, I guess.
EB

 

[bilby]

And as Germany are out, at least England are in the correct half of the draw to meet France in the final.

It could be another 52 years before the chavs stop banging on about it.

The downside is that neither of us will have the excuse of being beaten by the Germans this time.
EB

The English hooligans will need to swap their hilarious 1918 - 1945 - 1966 shirts for ones that say 1805 - 1815 - 2018.

 

[angelo]

The best outcome of this tournament is Optus having to hand over all games to the SBS network and free viewing for all Aussies.

 

[Speakpigeon]

And as Germany are out, at least England are in the correct half of the draw to meet France in the final.

It could be another 52 years before the chavs stop banging on about it.

The downside is that neither of us will have the excuse of being beaten by the Germans this time.
EB

The English hooligans will need to swap their hilarious 1918 - 1945 - 1966 shirts for ones that say 1805 - 1815 - 2018.

Sorry, I don't understand your English here.

Can't be bothered, I guess.

I thought hooligans were a thing of the past? Like this Wellington dude in his ridiculous accoutrement.

But as things stand, we're not going to play England.

Or England would need to beat either Switzerland or Sweden, and then either Russia, Spain, Croatia or Denmark! You know! Nah.
EB

 

[laughing dog]

France vs Argentina was a great way to start the knockout round. Very entertaining. France outplayed Argentina when and where it counted.

As an aside, this bracket is the Romance Language bracket with 7 out of the 8 teams (Japan is the exception) speaking one of the Romance Languages.

 

[Speakpigeon]

I missed the game. Couldn't stand the heat... So, I went for a long walk, in the afternoon here, to see if I could stand the heat. 30°C. Still reasonable but it is still going up tomorrow. I'll try again. I walked in a large park just outside Paris.

I counted three French goals judging from the rhythmic honking on a section of motorway just outside the park and the vocal erupting coming from the nearby suburbs. I somehow missed one goal.

Four goals in this one match against only three goals overall in the three Group C matches. That says it all.

Everybody happy here now. Except obviously the small population of Argentinians living here. Hey, three goals! You did well! It was close enough! Yeah, I know, a loss is a loss and this one's final.
EB

 

[ruby sparks]

I missed the game. Couldn't stand the heat... So, I went for a long walk, in the afternoon here, to see if I could stand the heat. 30°C. Still reasonable but it is still going up tomorrow. I'll try again. I walked in a large park just outside Paris.

I counted three French goals judging from the rhythmic honking on a section of motorway just outside the park and the vocal erupting coming from the nearby suburbs. I somehow missed one goal.

Four goals in this one match against only three goals overall in the three Group C matches. That says it all.

Everybody happy here now. Except obviously the small population of Argentinians living here. Hey, three goals! You did well! It was close enough! Yeah, I know, a loss is a loss and this one's final.
EB

I missed the game too. Was Thierry Henry playing? If so, did he score the winner with his hand again?

 

[Speakpigeon]

I missed the game too. Was Thierry Henry playing? If so, did he score the winner with his hand again?

I guess he must have learned a few tricks while playing for the very British Arsenal.

I know he's one "old hand" but still. And he's assistant manager for the Belgium national squad nowadays. Remember than when your day comes!



The specificity of the French squad is that they make a young team. And they've now demonstrated they can play as a team. Yesterday, it was a French team beating this one guy Messi. The lone superhero didn't stand much of a chance. Eleven against one. Not too difficult. Uruguay will be more problematic to beat. You don't have to believe me, I'm just repeating what the pundits say here. It seems you can't stop them.

Still, I hope England is at least prepared to put up a fight.

It's true you don't have anyone even remotely like Mbappé, I don't think, but you have at least to try.
EB

 

[angelo]

Uruguay is so far looking the goods. They're going to be hard to stop many pundits are saying.

 

[bilby]

Don't cry 4-3, Argentina...

 

[ruby sparks]

Uruguay is so far looking the goods. They're going to be hard to stop many pundits are saying.

Yes.

Croatia worth watching too, imo. So far, they've also looked very good. Today's game against Denmark will be interesting.

As to the other game today (Spain v Russia) I reckon most England fans will be hoping for an upset (Russia to win) because that would eliminate another high-ranked team from their side of the draw.

That said, as things stand, there is no team head and shoulders above the rest, so it's actually quite an open tournament and in most games it'll be more to do with which team plays well on the day.

 

[angelo]

Croatia has been the surprise package so far. I hope they beat the Danes. Australia would have beaten them had they had a better striker.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

I'm torn between Russia winning and Ramos losing.

 

[bilby]

 

[angelo]

Brazil V Mexico game should be worth staying up for.