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Author Topic: 2018 World Cup Thread  (Read 144284 times)

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Offline Sando prince

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #900 on: June 25, 2018, 09:46:32 PM »

Predicting Mexico and Colombia to go very deep in this year World Cup. No shorter than quarter finals

Offline Flex

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #901 on: June 26, 2018, 04:29:33 AM »
Things might be different this time: England’s end-to-end dismantling of Panama gives hope
By Chuck Culpepper and Kendra Andrews (washingtonpost)


SOCHI, Russia — For a hint that things might really, really be different with England in 2018, check out its 21st-century history in dealing with the minnows, guppies and small carp of Concacaf, all the way up to that 6-1 blistering of Panama on Sunday way up in Nizhny Novgorod, a result that somehow managed to make the U.S failure at World Cup qualification even more macabre.

In 2006, England bested wee Trinidad and Tobago 2-0 in group play in Nuremburg, Germany, and it cheated to do that. Back then Trinidad and Tobago, long before it made the United States its . . . its . . . its . . . victim, stood as the smallest-ever World Cup contestant at the time, having wriggled through Bahrain in a two-leg qualifying scrap that followed the final round of regional qualifying out of North and Central America and the Caribbean. Yet England did not score for the first 82 minutes, and had you watched this in, say, a pub in Soho in London, you would have detected a mixture of tedium, long-rehearsed frustration, mild resignation and drinking.

In the 83rd minute of this occasion of both inspiration (a little country stays level) and dreariness (a “golden generation” of a major soccer country stays level with a little country), the 6-foot-7 English striker Peter Crouch needed a little extra propulsion to rise above the 6-1 Trinidadian defender Brent Sancho. Thus did Crouch yank himself upward by Sancho’s dreadlocks. Besides calling into question whether dreadlocks constitute an unwise gadget to carry around the sport, the moment managed to achieve preposterousness in multiple ways.

[For more on England’s 6-1 victory over Panama, scroll down to the in-game updates section.]

By now, the 1.3 million citizens of Trinidad and Tobago, roughly the same population as San Antonio, also can chatter about how last fall, they made the United States their . . . their . . . their victim, ousting from Concacaf qualifying the populous behemoth (if not soccer behemoth). From 2006 to 2017, they apparently often spoke of Crouch and dreadlocks.

“It is folklore here in Trinidad,” Sancho told BBC Radio Kent in 2015. “It is one of those things that anywhere I go, people will always remind me.”

A lukewarm England reached the quarterfinals that time, but never appeared worthy.

In 2010, Concacaf-wise, England opened the World Cup in Rustenberg, South Africa, by drawing 1-1 with the United States, a match of which the memory bank blares with one thing: English goalkeeper Robert Green’s blunder in the 40th minute.

Steven Gerrard had scored on four minutes for England, perhaps wreaking English optimism among young viewers who refused to listen to their parents about reality. On 40 minutes, that Texan Clint Dempsey whipped his left leg to propel one from atop the box toward Green, to whom it skittered directly and without any signs of mischief.

It then caromed off his glove and slowly trickled into the net as he slipped slightly and then lunged back for it in the kind of way that turns up in many an REM nightmare of human beings. Manager Fabio Capello, such a careful orchestrator of preparations, took on the kind of expression that shows there are so many things in life for which nobody can prepare.

England did emerge from the largely toothless group after drawing with Algeria and taking the measure of Slovenia, then went out convincingly to Germany immediately thereafter.

In 2014, England lost to Italy and Uruguay before drawing 0-0 with Concacaf’s Costa Rica in an episode of a deadness that felt deader than dead. Here’s Daniel Taylor in the Guardian (with occasional dialectic spelling changes): “Imagine, for one moment, England’s bland ignominy and just reflect on the moments at the final whistle. Costa Rica — little, patronized Costa Rica — have won Group D and their manager, Jorge Luis Pinto, could be seen punching the air and bellowing to the skies. As one team traipsed away apologetically, the other reflected on the prize of a knockout tie in Recife on Sunday. They have done it from a country of 4.8 million people. Or the equivalent of 10 Bradfords.

“It’s a conundrum,” as England Manager Roy Hodgson said.

That mirthless failure to show even a hint of an EKG of reaching the knockout stage seemed to quash whatever expectations still lurked within England. The famous loss to Iceland at Euro 2016 lent further quashing. Yet maybe it’s true that, as in, oh, the NHL, destroyed expectations might help out somehow. In the days before this World Cup, England Manager Gareth Southgate welcomed the quashed expectations without a trace of bitterness, even as scribes and others spoke of a 2018 team less inchoate and more unified even if not as anticipated.

The England that decimated Panama did business in the manner one would expect of the nation with the world’s most-watched league. If things really are different in 2018, maybe you can measure it partly by using little old CONCACAF.

The real measure of a man's character is what he would do if he knew he would never be found out.

Offline Bitter

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #902 on: June 26, 2018, 12:00:06 PM »
Africa or Messi?   :thinking:

Nigeria wearing the boring uniforms, that is strike 1
« Last Edit: June 26, 2018, 12:01:50 PM by Bitter »
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Offline Bitter

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #903 on: June 26, 2018, 12:14:47 PM »
Boom!
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Offline asylumseeker

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #904 on: June 26, 2018, 12:36:11 PM »
Otamendi should be serving suspension! Flicking FIFA.

Offline Bitter

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #905 on: June 26, 2018, 12:37:14 PM »
Higuain and Mascherano should suspend themselves!
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Offline asylumseeker

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #906 on: June 26, 2018, 12:44:36 PM »
NGR squandered early opportunities

Offline soccerman

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #907 on: June 26, 2018, 12:47:43 PM »
Argentina got the start they wanted, 45 minutes to go.

Offline asylumseeker

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #908 on: June 26, 2018, 12:51:24 PM »
Musa and Iheanacho should have tested Armani
« Last Edit: June 26, 2018, 12:52:58 PM by asylumseeker »

Offline Bitter

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #909 on: June 26, 2018, 01:10:18 PM »
What is the point of VAR if we keep getting bogus penalties?
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Offline asylumseeker

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #910 on: June 26, 2018, 01:11:14 PM »
That was a penalty.

Offline Bitter

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #911 on: June 26, 2018, 01:37:56 PM »
If that was a penalty, then every corner and free kick is a penalty
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Offline lefty

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #912 on: June 26, 2018, 01:42:17 PM »
f**k Argentina

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Offline lefty

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #913 on: June 26, 2018, 01:43:03 PM »
Well dais it

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Offline asylumseeker

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #914 on: June 26, 2018, 01:47:52 PM »
If that was a penalty, then every corner and free kick is a penalty

That's why it's called the penalty area?

Offline asylumseeker

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #915 on: June 26, 2018, 01:50:39 PM »
Did I miss the ref address the blood on Mascherano?

Offline Controversial

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #916 on: June 26, 2018, 01:53:52 PM »
The World Cup as it is now, is designed for teams of colour to lose..

It’s a farce...

Offline Bitter

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #917 on: June 26, 2018, 01:55:43 PM »
Hide your cocaine!
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Offline Deeks

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #918 on: June 26, 2018, 02:26:47 PM »
Nigeria gave Argentina too much of the ball. Giveaways, fouls(which they know they would not get the benefit of doubt) and missed opportunities. Maybe they not mature enough. Good Luck in the future. All the African teams(except Senegal) going home.

Offline Bitter

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #919 on: June 26, 2018, 02:38:04 PM »
The World Cup as it is now, is designed for teams of colour to lose..

It’s a farce...

Oh? Please expound.
« Last Edit: June 26, 2018, 02:46:17 PM by Bitter »
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Offline Bitter

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #920 on: June 26, 2018, 02:45:58 PM »
Nigeria gave Argentina too much of the ball. Giveaways, fouls(which they know they would not get the benefit of doubt) and missed opportunities. Maybe they not mature enough. Good Luck in the future. All the African teams(except Senegal) going home.

I blame the away kit.

Nike template: 0 points
Naija kit: 3 points.

Them fellas cyah play they Afrobeat soccer in them maintenance man colours.



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Offline soccerman

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #921 on: June 26, 2018, 02:51:32 PM »
Happy for Messi. Thank goodness Rojo scored bc I don't think Higuain would've been welcomed in the country with that miss, AGAIN!
Let's see what France is really made of now.

Offline futbolfan

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #922 on: June 26, 2018, 02:53:46 PM »
Hide your cocaine!
Nigeria gave Argentina too much of the ball. Giveaways, fouls(which they know they would not get the benefit of doubt) and missed opportunities. Maybe they not mature enough. Good Luck in the future. All the African teams(except Senegal) going home.
Not disciplined enough to realise that 1 point would get them to the next round. This has been the narrative of (most) African teams. If Denmark needed one point to advance, best believe they playing with 10 defenders and ah goalie.
The darkest hour is just before the dawn.

Offline lefty

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #923 on: June 27, 2018, 03:42:50 AM »
Nigeria didn't do what they had to, but apart from d penalty, Argentina was afforded far more leniency when straddling d thin line between physicality  and fouls, Argentina committed several clear fouls that was ignored in their desperation to win...i was even surprised nigeria  got the penalty call, dat could easily be considered as soft by some and I is ah believer in applying physicality fairly to win d ball



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« Last Edit: June 27, 2018, 03:55:13 AM by lefty »
I pity the fool....

Offline asylumseeker

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #924 on: June 27, 2018, 09:28:56 AM »
Tentative play by MEX in the first half opened the door to the Swedes who were anything but tentative

Offline asylumseeker

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #925 on: June 27, 2018, 09:58:55 AM »
Cyah recall a WC with so many tears!

Offline Bitter

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #926 on: June 27, 2018, 10:02:06 AM »
Once again.
Play in Green, get licks!
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Offline Cocorite

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #927 on: June 27, 2018, 12:25:15 PM »
If it wasn't for VAR, Germany would have gone through to the next round.

The whistle would have been pressured to favor the "BIG" teams. . .Not that it's pure
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Offline soccerman

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #928 on: June 27, 2018, 01:00:03 PM »
Paulinho breaks the deadlock  :wavetowel:

Offline Bitter

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Re: 2018 World Cup Thread
« Reply #929 on: June 27, 2018, 01:02:29 PM »
If it wasn't for VAR, Germany would have gone through to the next round.

The whistle would have been pressured to favor the "BIG" teams. . .Not that it's pure

Yes, That goal they scored would have put them through.  ::)
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