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Post by Art Vandelay on Nov 30, 2022 8:31:36 GMT
Would have preferred Ecuador, but still looks to be heading for a quarter final with France. And then inevitably a defeat on penalties......
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Post by corncobguy on Dec 2, 2022 20:30:00 GMT
Sportswashing works, it's been a great World Cup, everyone has forgotten about Qatar's social policies
The Japanese VAR decision last night was a joke, not that I'm necessarily complaining, but even if a small part of the ball was hovering over the white line then how do you overrule the linesman? It was hardly a clear and obvious error
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Post by Art Vandelay on Dec 2, 2022 22:09:37 GMT
The 'clear and obvious' doesn't apply to over the line incidents, they're like offsides where they'll spend twenty minutes measuring it out to the millimetre.
VAR has been pretty poor so far here. I remember when it first came in at the Russia World Cup it wasn't too bad, seems to be more Premier League style this time round.
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Post by Art Vandelay on Dec 4, 2022 1:39:00 GMT
That fluky Australia goal was brutal for my telegraph fantasy team - Started with Blind, Dunfries, and Depay then went full Argentina defence for the evening game plus Alvarez and Messi, so nearly perfect. Would have been ten points off the top and set up perfectly for the rest of the round  Anyway, I keep hearing worrying things about the next World Cup casually dropped in by the commentators. First it's groups of three, which sounds terrible, the four team group is classic. And worse than that, no draws! penalty shootouts for drawn games. What's going on, are they just mad proposals or is this decided? I'd not heard anything about this yet the commentator said it like it was already known  |
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Post by Art Vandelay on Dec 5, 2022 7:42:05 GMT
That Poland goal was even worse. I hate VAR so much.
It can't be more than 10% of interventions that have anything positive to contribute. 90%+ are just ruling out goals for supposed offsides that are so tight as to be basically level, penalties for accidental handballs, or overruling a perfectly acceptable decision with a different one.
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Post by corncobguy on Dec 5, 2022 20:28:41 GMT
Brazil v Korea... strange thing to say, but how is it only 4-0?
Brazil get forward so easily and with such purpose - helped by some really mediocre defending
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Post by ER on Dec 8, 2022 19:50:08 GMT
A bloke in work today went - I think France are shit they only have Mbappe. They are the fucking world champions
Honestly the teams we have beat have been terrible and Senegal had us on the ropes at one stage
We have a sniff Saturday but it will be the toughest game we have had in years
I am going for 1-1 and pens
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Post by hblock on Dec 11, 2022 19:18:59 GMT
Beat Iran and Wales and “football’s coming home!” but as soon as England play a quality team it all ends in tears. We’ve been here before, haven’t we?
Notwithstanding that England are blessed with some talented young players I wonder whether in real terms the national team has really progressed from the Sven Goran Eriksson years?
I know people will point to the semi final in 2018 and the final in 2021 but I get the impression England were made to look better by a soft draw in each of those.
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Post by mrsmith on Dec 11, 2022 20:16:34 GMT
The national team played much better football under Sven.
The media hype is always a load of bollocks, after Senegal there was all this bollocks about England only having good problems and being about to find their stride to the final. We were never going to win and the only time we played developed nations (US and France) England's weaknesses and mediocrity were evident.
Southgate is a very cautious, vanilla manager, which is fine if you like that sort of thing.
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Post by Art Vandelay on Jan 11, 2023 19:37:15 GMT
Well, that was all a bit weird wasn't it? A Wold Cup in the middle of the season, in December. Hope that never happens again.
I'm pleased Southgate is staying on. He is over-cautious and a bit boring but he's still so much better than any other England manager I've known. That was the first World Cup I've watched actually believing we had a chance and the first time I've actually felt disappointed when we went out.
All previous ones, despite having better teams on paper and the media hype I always felt like we had no chance of winning and felt almost nothing when we we went out*.
*possible exception of 1990, which was disappointing obviously, although we were still fairly rubbish.
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