Where's the thread to predict World Cup winner?

[the saint]

We are crap, but we are still there.

 

However, I am yet to see one decent ref in this world cup (quelle surprise) and I doubt I will. Having seen the Holland-Portugal match, I do find it hard to believe it can get any worse. I stand by my comments earlier that FIFA has to clamp down on professional conning, not physical contact.

[cherdano]

We are crap, but we are still there.

 

However, I am yet to see one decent ref in this world cup (quelle surprise) and I doubt I will. Having seen the Holland-Portugal match, I do find it hard to believe it can get any worse. I stand by my comments earlier that FIFA has to clamp down on professional conning, not physical contact.

Maybe I saw a different game, but in the game I saw, the trouble started when a dutch player only got a yellow card for a rude foul on Ronaldo. Later, he missed a red card for Figo. And a few more opportunities for cards...

Anyway, for most of the card the "physical contact" was someone hitting their opponents legs with their boots. Do you really want to allow that? Do you know how much football boots hurt, especially in full speed as most of the action in football of 2006?

[whereagles]

I'm pretty comfortable with the fact that Portugal won something like 9 of the last 10 games against Holand thankyouverymuch  <_<  B)  :P  :P

In that case you have nothing to fear, your record will still be decent after the Sunday-deception.

You're right. It even got better :P :P :) :o

 

Dirty game, though. 4 red cards! With our two best players out, England is going to be quite hard.

[Sigi_BC84]

Dirty game, though. 4 red cards! With our two best players out, England is going to be quite hard.

Four reds is World Cup historical record. I can't remember a game as crooked and chaotic as this one -- great show in any case ;-).

 

England is not going to be hard, because England sucks in this tournament. Portugal should be able to beat them even without Costinha and Deco.

 

I guess the real problem for Portugal will be there in the semi-finals -- five players (including Figo and Maniche) are bringing yellows with them out of the brawl against Netherlands and each of them will be sitting out if they draw another one against England.

 

Anyways, I'll cross my fingers for Portugal during their next match that they'll teach the English their overdue lesson. I'd cry myself to sleep if Mr. Hairdo, Bean Pole and Pancake Face make it into the semis.

 

--Sigi

[han]

I'm pretty comfortable with the fact that Portugal won something like 9 of the last 10 games against Holand thankyouverymuch  :rolleyes:  :P  :P  :P

In that case you have nothing to fear, your record will still be decent after the Sunday-deception.

You're right. It even got better :P :P :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

 

Dirty game, though. 4 red cards! With our two best players out, England is going to be quite hard.

Congrats Wereagles, it was an ugly game but Portugal deserved to win. I'm afraid that they will miss Deco a lot against England, but I will root for you.

 

I agree with Arend that it was not the referee but the players who made the game what it was. If you look at all the times that a card was given (16 yellow + 4 red!) then you won't find many mistakes of the referee. Arend is right that the horrible kick by Boularouz deserved a red card, not a yellow, I felt justice was done when he got his second yellow card for the much smaller offense later in the game.

[whereagles]

Well, 'sepp Blatter himself said the referee wasn't up to the task. The foul against Ronaldo triggered the nervousness. If the referee had acted there, it might not have gone out of hand.

 

Still, players of this level of skill and experience are expected to behave better. But we all know things get messy in the heat of the battle. After all, we're all sportsmen as well :rolleyes:

[cherdano]

Well, 'sepp Blatter himself said the referee wasn't up to the task. The foul against Ronaldo triggered the nervousness. If the referee had acted there, it might not have gone out of hand.

 

Still, players of this level of skill and experience are expected to behave better. But we all know things get messy in the heat of the battle. After all, we're all sportsmen as well :rolleyes:

Uh oh, what do you mean by "Sepp Blatter himself"? As far as I can tell, he isn't involved with FIFA referee training, he is never very protective of his referees, and rather prefers to be an armchair referee like the rest of us. It sounds like saying "Franz Beckenbauer himself admitted Bayern Munich didn't play well". Nothing Kaiser Franz likes more than criticizing his players...

 

Anyway, I agree the referee wasn't very good, sometimes he was a little too harsh, more often he missed a clear card (or gave yellow instead of red).

 

Arend

[cherdano]

I admit the red card for Italy would have been worth sending the whole team off, preferably for all the matches.

 

Arend

What a ridiculous comment, unless ....

 

1. You change the rules (it hasn't happened yet as far as I know).

2. That you, even if you could, send the whole German team off next time any German player is sent off.

 

It's no big deal as far as Germany is concerned anyway. They will be knocked out after the group stage. That will save the rest of us from the boring football Germany has delivered since the 70's.

 

Roland

Actually at this point, even Roland take-every-tongue-in-cheek-comment-serious Walddk might understand how wise my comment was. Had rules been changed in time, the referee could have sent off all 22 players on the pitch sunday night, and FIFA send home both teams afterwards...

[Walddk]

Yes, send all the teams home, except the angels from Germany of course. That would be the only chance Germany has if they are to become world champions.

 

Roland

[the saint]

Dirty game, though. 4 red cards! With our two best players out, England is going to be quite hard.

Four reds is World Cup historical record. I can't remember a game as crooked and chaotic as this one -- great show in any case ;-).

 

England is not going to be hard, because England sucks in this tournament. Portugal should be able to beat them even without Costinha and Deco.

 

I guess the real problem for Portugal will be there in the semi-finals -- five players (including Figo and Maniche) are bringing yellows with them out of the brawl against Netherlands and each of them will be sitting out if they draw another one against England.

 

Anyways, I'll cross my fingers for Portugal during their next match that they'll teach the English their overdue lesson. I'd cry myself to sleep if Mr. Hairdo, Bean Pole and Pancake Face make it into the semis.

 

--Sigi

England will beat Portugal.... So long as Lampard is dropped for Crouch and Beckham for Lennon. Who am I kidding, England are due a performance and we will cane Figo and co. :blink:

 

You lot actually awake when it comes to all this red card stuff? I've told you all before that its FIFAs fault clamping down on all the wrong things. Instead of allowing a certain amount of physicality and cutting out all the cheating (some teams are much worse than others, but as this is a multi-national board, I won't shame which ones cheat their way to victory as their first course of action because it will only rile people). As a result, you only have to breath on someone to get booked and it has turned into a diving competition to see who can get the most opponents sent off. To encourage free flowing football, you have to allow challenges to be made. All this stop-start nonsense has stifled games. Players must also be banned immediately from harassing the referees. It is ugly and unsportsmanlike - witness Podolski's patting the ref on the back for sending off Lucic. There is no place for that.

 

Where to begin? KICK OUT SEPP BLATTER NOW. THE MAN IS A COMPLETE %*&*£!

 

This World Cup is being spoilt by his edicts.

[Aberlour10]

Another match with more controversial Ref' decisions took place. What do you

think about the red card for Materazzi and the penalty situation in the last minute?

I think both decisions were wrong.

 

Robert

[whereagles]

Will Collina make a comeback??? :blink: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

[whereagles]

So long as Lampard is dropped for Crouch

Don't discard Crouch. He's our 12th man! :blink: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :P :P :P

[Sigi_BC84]

Yes, send all the teams home, except the angels from Germany of course. That would be the only chance Germany has if they are to become world champions.

Hey Roland,

 

nice trolling attempt. I will follow-up again after the Germans have sent Argentina home on Friday.

 

Please already start thinking about your next prediction "when the party will be over (for real, this time)", because I'll be expecting one from you by then :-).

 

Cheers,

Sigi

[Sigi_BC84]

Another match with more controversial Ref' decisions took place. What do you

think about the red card for Materazzi and the penalty situation in the last minute?

I think both decisions were wrong.

I think the Red Card decision was wrong (bad foulplay but Yellow would have been enough).

 

I also think the Penalty Kick decision was okay. My first emotional reaction was different but in the end I have to admit that it had to be penalized. Obviously the Italian didn't make an effort not to fall at this point, but nobody would have. It was quite careless by the Australian to jump into his way the way he did.

 

I'm very disappointed that the Aussies got eliminated that way, literally in the last second. They have played a good tournament and I hope they'll find a good coach to continue the excellent work of Guus Hiddink.

 

--Sigi

[Sigi_BC84]

You lot actually awake when it comes to all this red card stuff? I've told you all before that its FIFAs fault clamping down on all the wrong things. Instead of allowing a certain amount of physicality and cutting out all the cheating (some teams are much worse than others, but as this is a multi-national board, I won't shame which ones cheat their way to victory as their first course of action because it will only rile people).

To be honest I'd like to hear the names from you. You have made quite a few well-informed comments so far, why should anybody blame you for dropping a few names. When in doubt, people will assume anyway that it's just out of frustration about the English performance ;-).

 

I agree with what you have said about a good ref policy so far. Too many yellows are shown for acceptable tackles. On the other hand, some really annoying stuff (like dress tucking) has almost vanished due to the hard line the refs are going about this. So the situation is not completely hopeless.

 

No, what I find the most annoying are the fussy offside decisions. 1 out of 3 offsides are actual equal height situations decided in favor of the defending team (actually they should be made in favor of the advancing team, according to official policy). This is so damn frustrating. Beautiful advances are stopped because the linesman imagines an offside. One of my friends has suggested to bring in two additional linesmen and only give a freekick if both of them see an offside. Maybe this would work, anyways something has to be done.

 

I also agree with what you have said quite in the beginning of this thread about the general quality of the refs: having only Champions League refs would be a lot better. Just for the sake of internationalism the FIFA is bringing in too many inexperienced referees from countries without high class tournaments/leagues.

 

As a result, you only have to breath on someone to get booked and it has turned into a diving competition to see who can get the most opponents sent off. To encourage free flowing football, you have to allow challenges to be made. All this stop-start nonsense has stifled games. Players must also be banned immediately from harassing the referees. It is ugly and unsportsmanlike - witness Podolski's patting the ref on the back for sending off Lucic. There is no place for that.

Podolski is young and inexperienced, and I also think he's not the brightest. Probably refs don't take it even seriously if such players do that. In principle you are right, of course, but I think there are worse offenses.

 

A good referee will get so much respect that the players won't even dare patronizing or harassment (cf. Collina).

 

--Sigi

[Gerardo]

I will follow-up again after the Germans have sent Argentina home on Friday.

Open one, I think. Hope you're wrong. And you're at home already.

 

 

(continuing for older post): I AM from Argentina. BUT

Host team always got the upper hand, more before the TV brought BIG $$$ (see Sweden 2nd in 1958, Chile 3rd in 1962, Eng-Arg german ref and Ger-Uru english ref in 1966 for examples, Arg-Per after Bra-Pol in 1978 for examples), but still going on (Korea in 2002).

[Sigi_BC84]

Host team always got the upper hand, more before the TV brought BIG $$$ (see Sweden 2nd in 1958, Chile 3rd in 1962, Eng-Arg german ref and Ger-Uru english ref in 1966 for examples, Arg-Per after Bra-Pol in 1978 for examples), but still going on (Korea in 2002).

OK, I thought you were referring to the group lottery. In Italy there were the usual ridiculous speculations about fraud (quite funnily, one of their theories was that the ballots containing the easy opponents for Germany have been kept in a fridge until right before the broadcast :-). I think the easy groups are a result of the fact that too many weak teams are allowed into the World Cup. Group A hasn't been the only easy one (Group D had Iran and Angola, Group H Saudi-Arabia and Tunisia and an overrated Ukraine).

 

Undoubtedly the host nation has certain advantage to their side, but at the moment I don't see were Germany has been given unfair advantages because they're the host nation.

 

--Sigi

[mgoetze]

Just for the sake of internationalism the FIFA is bringing in too many inexperienced referees from countries without high class tournaments/leagues.

Countries like, oh, I dunno, England?

 

(Think Croatia vs. Australia.)

[Gerardo]

OK, I thought you were referring to the group lottery.

That too, BOTH Korea and Japan group heads in 2002.

 

Well, you got an easy group, and guaranteed to not meet Brazil before the finals, provided both win the group.

 

Our group was much harder (on paper, turned out not to be), including Pele taking the balls in the lottery(!).

 

If you think I'm paranoid, maybe, but it doesn't mean they are not after you :-)

[Codo]

You lot actually awake when it comes to all this red card stuff? I've told you all before that its FIFAs fault clamping down on all the wrong things. Instead of allowing a certain amount of physicality and cutting out all the cheating (some teams are much worse than others, but as this is a multi-national board, I won't shame which ones cheat their way to victory as their first course of action because it will only rile people). As a result, you only have to breath on someone to get booked and it has turned into a diving competition to see who can get the most opponents sent off. To encourage free flowing football, you have to allow challenges to be made. All this stop-start nonsense has stifled games. Players must also be banned immediately from harassing the referees. It is ugly and unsportsmanlike - witness Podolski's patting the ref on the back for sending off Lucic. There is no place for that.

 

Where to begin? KICK OUT SEPP BLATTER NOW. THE MAN IS A COMPLETE %*&*£!

 

This World Cup is being spoilt by his edicts.

Okay Sepp Blatter should be eleminated and Podolskis clap for the ref was wrong, but I disagree with the rest of your post.

 

What do you want to see in a football game?

 

I like to see high speed football, many shots on goal, nice tricks and fair sports. So any rule, which allows this is welcommed.

 

A lot of cards for "tactical" fouls, for tacklings, which may hurt the opponent, for time play and other ugly nonsports are wonderful.

 

So the second Yellow for Lucic was a good example. Klose simply won the fight and tried to run down the line. I had liked to see the attack, but no, Mr. Lukic played foul. I hate this and I believe, that a free kick is not sufficent for this kind of foul.

 

 

And I absolute disagree with all your protests against the refs.

I saw about 90 % right offsides descissions. And this is marvellous.

Of course, there had been some very stupid descissions too. There had been very big mistakes from some refs too. Esp. Mr. Iwanov had a bad day- not because of his single descissions, most had been right, but becuase he was not able to calm to the players.

But so what? Do the refs claim to be free of faults?

 

Players like Ballack tried five times to shoot on goal against Sweden. No success, some tries had been really bad. So he made mistakes. Joe Cole had some very bad tries too - and one of the nicest goals ever. Do you blame them for their bad tries? No.

So, why on earth do you believe, that refs must be without any mistake?

 

In my opinion, Football developes in the right direction. Away from wrestling, tactical fouls, bad habits to a game full of speed, tricks and shoots on goal.

[Codo]

OK, I thought you were referring to the group lottery.

That too, BOTH Korea and Japan group heads in 2002.

 

Well, you got an easy group, and guaranteed to not meet Brazil before the finals, provided both win the group.

 

Our group was much harder (on paper, turned out not to be), including Pele taking the balls in the lottery(!).

 

If you think I'm paranoid, maybe, but it doesn't mean they are not after you :-)

It is always thew same. We are so lucky lucky lucky.

We had been so lucky, that we met the USA and south Korea in our way in the final 2002.

Okay, Italy had the same luck, they met south corea too, but failed.

We were looking for Argentina or France, but luckily, they did not reach the 2. round. Just pure luck. Or had other teams simply been better and deserved the right to play in the quarter- and semifinals?

 

And this time, we will meet Sweden and Argentina, Italy and Brazil. Well, just pure luck....

 

Germany competed in 13 World cups. They reached the finals 7 times. We must be the luckiest nation on this planet.

 

P.S: Host nations are always group heads and funnily enough, they (nearly) always make it into the second round.....

 

P.P.S. Argentina is guaranteed too not to meet Brazil before the finals.

But both of our teams are unlucky enough to play against the strongest possible opponent besides Brazil. I really had prefered anybody from Europe.

[whereagles]

I also think the Penalty Kick decision was okay.

Well, all the news I've read so far (except for italian, of course!) are unanimous in saying that was a phantom penalty :( :) :)

 

But the red card was quite overboard, I agree.

[hotShot]

For the referee this "penatly" situation was a no win scenario.

 

The australian player slides into the way of the italian (not playing the ball) and the italian player could not avoid (and did not even try to avoid) falling over him.

It does not matter which decision he made, it would have been disputed any way.

[Walddk]

Germany had a great team in the 70's with the likes of Maier, Vogts, Breitner, Beckenbauer, Overath, Grabowski and Müller, but I think it's fair to say that they haven't even come close to a team with that many profiles since then.

 

They always did well at major championships, right enough, but rarely because of spectacular football. Fight and a little luck with the draw (all teams need that) have been main factors. The team of today has very few profiles. Ballack and Klose are excellent players, and Lehmann is a fine goalkeeper. Not much more to write home about.

 

That might be enough to advance further, but I don't think and I don't hope it will. Argentina plays the kind of football I like to see, and I hope it will prevail.

 

I understand perfectly well that Sigi, Arend and Roland support their country. That's how it should be. Just like I supported my country in the 1992 European Championship final ... against Germany. They had all the stars, we had the better team on the day, and then of course Peter Schmeichel in goal.

 

Roland