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[Pu the Owl]

Originally Posted by Redpyramidhead

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Fucking french bastards

Ah Ah! Great! That definitely teaches a lesson to those who called the French players "too old" or "mummies"

[Redpyramidhead]

Originally Posted by Kaena

So this means Germany vs Italy, and Portugal vs France. I've been hopping so bad for Portugal to be sent back home, but they just keep going! grr...yes, it's very unpatriotic of me, but i'm still hoping for the same. And since i've been so wrong, i bet on a Germany vs Portugal for the final. Although i really wish for France to beat us next wednesday. *crosses fingers*

explain your hatred for Portugal


_RED_ stuff

[Frozen]

Originally Posted by Redpyramidhead

explain your hatred for Portugal


_RED_ stuff

Yeah, I don't get it either. Don't I wish my home team had made it into the World Cup.

Plus I've always wished the best for Portugal, they are an excellent team, and it is commendable that they beat England under the conditions they had.

[Faile]

Commendable? How is cheating commendable? Rushing to the referee to get a player carded is not only bad sportsmanship, but is also morally wrong. You never see that in the English leagues or from the England team. Also, you'll have noted that England didn't dive once, whereas Portugal were constantly playing for freekicks. No, Portugal didn't win because they played well, they won because they were lucky to make it to penalties. We outplayed them from the moment we went down to ten men.

[Redpyramidhead]

Originally Posted by Faile

Commendable? How is cheating commendable? Rushing to the referee to get a player carded is not only bad sportsmanship, but is also morally wrong. You never see that in the English leagues or from the England team. Also, you'll have noted that England didn't dive once, whereas Portugal were constantly playing for freekicks. No, Portugal didn't win because they played well, they won because they were lucky to make it to penalties. We outplayed them from the moment we went down to ten men.

Besides the technicalities that you mentioned, Portugal played an overall better game. England frustrated me becuase they couldn't get their shit together. England is lucky they made it to the shootout. It doesnt matter anymore, this game is old news.

_RED_ stuff

[Faile]

Originally Posted by Redpyramidhead

Besides the technicalities that you mentioned, Portugal played an overall better game. England frustrated me becuase they couldn't get their shit together. England is lucky they made it to the shootout. It doesnt matter anymore, this game is old news.

_RED_ stuff

That's not true. There was 1% in posession between the two teams and when you consider the fact that England were playing with ten men for the last hour and looked a lot more like they were going to win it through open play, then it was definitely England that played the better game. Cheating isn't a technicality, it's against the rules and the spirit of the game and a lot of teams that aren't able to play the physical side of the game opt for it. Diving needs to be banished from the game by making it a straight yellow card offence.

[Hylas]

I think Kaena was mentioning why she doesn't like her team earlier in this thread. Correct me if I'm worng.

I don't know what is going to happen now. At the beginning I thought Germany was strong, but they don't look like that now. I think the final will be Italy-France. And it would be cool for France to win, since they have many players that won the Cup in 1998 and are considered good for retirement

[tempted]

Originally Posted by Redpyramidhead

explain your hatred for Portugal


_RED_ stuff

Like Hylas said, i did mentioned why, but i'll say it again...it's not that i hate my team, i just hate our coach, there's a lot of "issues" behind this team, and that idiot Scolari, needs to be taught a lesson. I hope not, but if by any chance we win the cup or even make it to the final, i will be angry, very angry. And Faile is right when he says PT didn't deserve to win, in my opinion, Rooney shouldn't have been sent off. On a 11 vs 11 match, we wouldn't win. Plus i think England was very unfortunate in the penalty shoot, not that Ricardo was great defending, but to me it seemed like the english players weren't really focused on what they were doing. Or they would easily beat Ricardo.

[Redpyramidhead]

Originally Posted by Faile

That's not true. There was 1% in posession between the two teams and when you consider the fact that England were playing with ten men for the last hour and looked a lot more like they were going to win it through open play, then it was definitely England that played the better game. Cheating isn't a technicality, it's against the rules and the spirit of the game and a lot of teams that aren't able to play the physical side of the game opt for it. Diving needs to be banished from the game by making it a straight yellow card offence.

I am not the only one with the opinion that Portugal played a better game, but I guess that argument could go on forever.

You are right about how diving should be an offense punishable by atleast yellow card, especially if it is in the opponents penatly area. If I am not mistaken, somebody earlier in the cup was sent off for this reason, but I forget which game it was and who did it. The problem is it is very hard to tell when a player is faking or not in a lot of cases. I have seen guys go down countless times when I immediately thought they were faking it only to realize they were probably in actual pain and when seeing a replay of the action it was like "oh wow no wonder the guys down." The referee does not get to see these replays from several angles like we do. Players often do go down because of the physical nature of the sport. Sometimes they are not hurt and are sportsmanlike enough to get right back up and keep playing. Others will stay down there for a while clutching pretend injuries until they are sure a foul was called. But it still happens that players go down and do not get back up because they are actually hurt and it would be very difficult for the referee to spend half his time deciding whether or not this is true. A good referee solves that by making a decision on the foul based on what he saw happened. As far as carding a player for feigning injury, he can really only do it when it is so incredibly obvious because he saw the player take a dive when nobody touched him.

I imagine it wouldnt be easy being a referee.

Another argument that could be brought up was the penalty kick that was given to Italy in the last seconds of the game against Australia. Based on what I saw of the replays of a few angles, it was still hard for me to make up my mind. We really have no idea what it looked like to the ref. My dad is of the opinion that you should NEVER give a team a penalty kick in the closing minutes of a game no matter what. All I will say is we don't know how that foul looked to the ref. I wish he hadn't called it because I was for Australia, but there's not much anybody can do now.

_RED_ stuff

[Berserker]

Originally Posted by Redpyramidhead

I My dad is of the opinion that you should NEVER give a team a penalty kick in the closing minutes of a game no matter what.

_RED_ stuff

Come on Eli, that was definitely a red card for Rooney no doubt about it the ref was standing right next to him when he stamped him in the groin. People think the ref gave the card because of the shove against Ronaldo but the ref explained right after the match without seeing the replays that it was for him stamping him in the groin.

Faile the only one to blame is Sven Goran, his choice of strikers and bringing of Ronney to early(and therby frustrating him for lack of form) crippled the England offence. Walcott's place should have been filled by someone like Defoe or Harwood, England never looked like winning the game. After Owen got injured it was all over for England, how can you play with one striker upfront? That's just asking for Rooney too lose his cool...
England never got into the tournament, just look at the way the penalties were taken(even by Garragher who used to be an expert) and I think Eriksson is too blame..

[Frozen]

Originally Posted by Hylas

I think Kaena was mentioning why she doesn't like her team earlier in this thread. Correct me if I'm worng.

I don't know what is going to happen now. At the beginning I thought Germany was strong, but they don't look like that now. I think the final will be Italy-France. And it would be cool for France to win, since they have many players that won the Cup in 1998 and are considered good for retirement

They don't look so strong because they went on penalty kicks with Argentina? C'mon.

Originally Posted by Kaena

Like Hylas said, i did mentioned why, but i'll say it again...it's not that i hate my team, i just hate our coach, there's a lot of "issues" behind this team, and that idiot Scolari, needs to be taught a lesson. I hope not, but if by any chance we win the cup or even make it to the final, i will be angry, very angry.

So you would trade the joy of victory for a whole country and an excellent team just to punish a single man? Whoa.

[Aubrey McFatum]

Here's my thing:

I think Italy and France are the most dangerous.

Italy has been unbeaten for 26-in-a-row or something like that games. They paly horrible to watch football, but they have a solid defence and no team is scoring against them (only an own goal in the whole tournament!).

France has very good potential, just seems players don't use it all the time. In the last game they played as we were expecting Brazil to play, with creative touches and a lot of invention and I think they can surprise us again.

The both of them are teams that maybe don't seem as strong as others because they are like hiding their good qualities. Some of the games they play are boring, and this confuses the audience, because in football impression is everything, so we notice more Argentina or Brazil because they score a lot or play entertaining games instead of noticing teams that are steadily going on and doing nothing superfluous.

Germany has never won against Italy. Stats clearly say it. Last time, months ago, it was 4-1 for Italy. I can be wrong, but I bet Italy will win in a final against France. Unless they screw up everything.

[Frozen]

Originally Posted by Aubrey McFatum

Here's my thing:

I think Italy and France are the most dangerous.

Italy has been unbeaten for 26-in-a-row or something like that games. They paly horrible to watch football, but they have a solid defence and no team is scoring against them (only an own goal in the whole tournament!).

France has very good potential, just seems players don't use it all the time. In the last game they played as we were expecting Brazil to play, with creative touches and a lot of invention and I think they can surprise us again.

The both of them are teams that maybe don't seem as strong as others because they are like hiding their good qualities. Some of the games they play are boring, and this confuses the audience, because in football impression is everything, so we notice more Argentina or Brazil because they score a lot or play entertaining games instead of noticing teams that are steadily going on and doing nothing superfluous.

Germany has never won against Italy. Stats clearly say it. Last time, months ago, it was 4-1 for Italy. I can be wrong, but I bet Italy will win in a final against France. Unless they screw up everything.

You bring up a very interesting point of view. My say to that is, never underestimate the power of the home team.

I see a Germany - France final.

[Faile]

Originally Posted by Berserker

even by Garragher who used to be an expert)

Carragher had only taken two penalties before in his career, but both were in cup finals and he scored. We, the English, have a mental block when it comes to penalties. Oh well. Erikson's team selection was surreal. Being a Spurs fan, I found it strange that there was no Defoe and instead some guy he'd never seen play went. But oh well, it's over now.

[Berserker]

Originally Posted by Faile

Carragher had only taken two penalties before in his career, but both were in cup finals and he scored. We, the English, have a mental block when it comes to penalties. Oh well. Erikson's team selection was surreal. Being a Spurs fan, I found it strange that there was no Defoe and instead some guy he'd never seen play went. But oh well, it's over now.

So he can handle the pressure
Crouch declared on the bbc, that the squad was too tired for pens because of the hard work after Rooney's sending off. But like you said, it's over now we'll see how McLaren does the job.

[Faile]

Evidently he can't! Boo, but yes. Soon be time for endless months of shouting abuse at the referee as I watch Exeter city try to gain league status again. Oh, and Spurs for the Uefa cup, I hope.

[Frozen]

Originally Posted by Frozen

You bring up a very interesting point of view. My say to that is, never underestimate the power of the home team.

I see an ITALY - France final.

Corrected.

Sheiße!!!!!!!!!

Italy better win this cup. They made it this far playing like shit, and now they kicked out my favorite team.


THEY - BETTER - WIN

[Harry]

Like Aubrey said so well, Italy plays a kind of soccer that is not as spectacular as the one of other national teams; as a matter of fact, regardless of the fact the Seria A teams show all kinds of schemes and tactics, whenever Italian players play in the national team they go back to the way of playing soccer we have been used to for dozens of years. The way Italy plays soccer today is very similar to way most European teams played in the past. Yes, it may not look nice, but Italy is one of the few true teams in the whole championships.

They played great soccer in the latest two games; today Germany managed to find just one real chance to score a goal to Italy - they really played a bad match. Italy was unlucky not to score 4 instead than just 2 goals today.

Germany really played a shit game today. We did play a shit game with United States and Australia as well, but when a team reaches the final in a World Cup, you can't really talk about luck or bad soccer. Luck can last a few matches, not a whole championship - especially when a team wins a game like the one we won today, against the home team, one of the favorites of the whole championship, in a stadium filled with 60,000 Germany supporters.

[Pu the Owl]

Germany deserved to lose. It's the adequate punishment for not letting Kahn play. He's doing advertising campaigns now, with lots of benches, sighing words as "on the bench, life is best"... the poor man

[Bogart]

Yes, you said it well. Mighty Germany played worse than Australia, in my opinion. Italy proved to be a great team, but I really hadn't any doubt about it.

a) They never lost a match
b) Nobody (but themselves) ever scored a goal against them
c) The only time they didn't win (1-1 with the United States) it was obviously because they weren't really playing at their best, as a lot of World Cup winners have done in the past

Playing the first round without employing the full strength of a team is a well-known strategy in football, often imposed by reasons like lack of time to prepare a team because players come from very physically demanding football league games. In 1982, Italy played all uninspiring matches in the first round (all draws, I think); in 1994, Brazil-Sweden ended in a 1-1 draw; in 1990, Brazil-Colombia ended in a draw; and I think we could find many more by looking at the history of the World Cup. As you people said, luck is part of the game, but not when a team arrives to the final game of the World Championship. As a football fan, regardless of my personal team preferences, I was just excited by Italy's brave attitude until the very last minutes of today's game, in a stadium filled with supporters of the home team, or by Zidane's way of playing like a wizard with the ball like no other Brazilian player was able to do in this championship. I really think this is what soccer is all about!

So, go Italy, go Portugal, go France!