World Cup 2010

[Chimpy]

At least we can say this: if the score stands like this, England cannot say that they lost solely to a bad call.

[Triforcer]

All goes back to Green's error.  If England had the easiest quadrant, they could have (likely) handled Ghana and Uruguay.  With that kind of momentum and confidence, this game might've gone differently.

[Amarr HM]

That was awesome hope Manchester United buy Ozil pronto he's seriously good. Gerrard was the main reason for all of Englands woes he was terrible in every game and he's supposed to be the captain. Lampard would have been a better choice.

[eldaec]

Holy Shit! A watchable England football match in my world cup!

I do think a competent linesman would have made more than a 1 goal difference, but in the end England weren't going anywhere in the tournament (let alone beating Germany, Argentina, Spain, Brazil in sequence), so better for it to end in a bang.

But if going out isn't depressing, this is...

James
Terry
Ferdinand
Upson
King
Carragher
Cole
Warnock
Barry
Gerrard
Lampard *
Beckham
Crouch
Heskey
and probably Wright-Phillips, Defoe, Carrick, Hargreaves

Every fucker on that list is probably too old for the trip to Brazil. Rooney is the only decent player England have under 29.


* OK, this is a plus.

[sigil]

not that it matters but this was funny, Photographic proof the disallowed goal was correct.

[Amarr HM]

It doesn't matter cause England were shit, but I think they really need to bring in a system similar to the Challenges they have introduced into Tennis.

[Chimpy]

Hey, I think all of us Americans and English are wrong for blaming the teams for the losses.

It is obvious that the real cause for the losses was Mick Jagger rooting for the teams from the luxury box!

[Abagadro]

They don't even need video replay, they just need a goal line official on each side. The problem is that linesmen are not in position to see those kinds of calls because of their responsibility for offsides. There is a reason American football has 7 officials on the field as so much of the game comes down to crossing various lines. Soccer at this level has no excuse for not parking 1 guy on each goal line.

[Amarr HM]

True and in fact they tried that out recently, not sure why it's not being implemented.

[Chimpy]

True and in fact they tried that out recently, not sure why it's not being implemented.

I think it is because FIFA is still convinced that everything that needs to be seen on the entire field can be seen by one man at ground level.

[Amarr HM]

I think it's mainly that fuckwit Sepp Blatter, Platini was trying to push for the video replay afaik.

[HaemishM]

That was awesome hope Manchester United buy Ozil pronto he's seriously good.

Fuck you, no. They got more than enough good players. But then I don't expect Ozil to stay at Bremen very long.

Gerrard was the main reason for all of Englands woes he was terrible in every game and he's supposed to be the captain. Lampard would have been a better choice.

No. HELL NO. While he certainly didn't have a great Cup, he was much better than Lampard who showed how useless he was in pretty much every game. I think part of the problem was that Gerrard was either in the midfield with Lampard (and they are too similar to be in a midfield together unless there's only 1 striker up top) or out on the wing where he's just not as good because he's constantly cutting into the middle instead of providing natural width. England's biggest problem was a shitty shit shit shit backline that also got no help from the midfield. Neither Barry, Gerrard or Lampard are worth much on the defense, and the backline was constantly exposed as being slow. Ferdinand and King wouldn't have helped because of their injuries, and Carragher is also way too slow to help that. Terry got caught out of position on at least two of the goals and Upson got beat on another. Neither Heskey or Defoe helped much and Rooney was constantly left without any service worth a shit. No one got wide and sent crosses into the box. The team was a mess tactically. The players were tense, and it showed, and I think part of it is that Cappello doesn't let the players play in the positions that maximize their potential. He's like Rafa Benitez in that - good when a team doesn't take advantage of their flaws, but horribly easy for good teams to expose.

[Chimpy]

My god the video quality on Univision's stream is so much better than I was getting on ESPN360 this morning.

[Amarr HM]

Gerrard was the main reason for all of Englands woes he was terrible in every game and he's supposed to be the captain. Lampard would have been a better choice.

No. HELL NO. While he certainly didn't have a great Cup, he was much better than Lampard who showed how useless he was in pretty much every game. I think part of the problem was that Gerrard was either in the midfield with Lampard (and they are too similar to be in a midfield together unless there's only 1 striker up top) or out on the wing where he's just not as good because he's constantly cutting into the middle instead of providing natural width. England's biggest problem was a shitty shit shit shit backline that also got no help from the midfield. Neither Barry, Gerrard or Lampard are worth much on the defense, and the backline was constantly exposed as being slow. Ferdinand and King wouldn't have helped because of their injuries, and Carragher is also way too slow to help that. Terry got caught out of position on at least two of the goals and Upson got beat on another. Neither Heskey or Defoe helped much and Rooney was constantly left without any service worth a shit. No one got wide and sent crosses into the box. The team was a mess tactically. The players were tense, and it showed, and I think part of it is that Cappello doesn't let the players play in the positions that maximize their potential. He's like Rafa Benitez in that - good when a team doesn't take advantage of their flaws, but horribly easy for good teams to expose.

I agree Gerrard should have been played in the hole from the start of the WC if they really needed him on the pitch, it's his best position. But Gerrard for me was the most out of form player in the squad his short passing was terrible and he linked up with absolutely noone, FIFA stats puts his short pass completion at something like 62% which is terrible for a midfielder at this level of play. Johnson was fairly dirt aswell. Defoe is great if you need to punish weak teams or as an impact player or when you need goals but not against a solid defense, even an out of form Rooney will give you more benefits over the course of the match. I agree with the lack of defense from Midfield which leads to the Scott Parker decision, he looked like the most in form defensive midfield option England had and they brought Carrick instead? That was probably the one thing that fucked everything up he might have been shit but he couldn't have been worse defensively than Barry and at least it would have given Cappello an option to switch things around.

[Abagadro]

Another bad call, but I actually think that ball was going in anyways.

[Chimpy]

And another example of where a video review of the goal would have not necessarily been a bad thing.

Tevez was way offside there.

[Abagadro]

Doh!

[Chimpy]

Ok.

That goal was sweet.

[Engels]

The expression on the two British nationalist fans with the bomber caps was priceless QQ. God Bless Univision.

[Amarr HM]

That was really strange the linesman saw his mistake on the big screen and couldn't take it back. I wonder is Sepp Blatter watching this one aswell?

[Abagadro]

WOW!

[Engels]

That 3rd goal was serious business.

[Chimpy]

That was a damn amazing shot.

And latin american announcers on scores rock.

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!

[Sjofn]

Augh my univision thing keeps screwing up, I can hear the announcers but the pictures don't move augh.

wtb the ability to understand spanish pst

I noticed this too. Then I realised I was running flash 10.0 rather than 10.1. I upgraded and the glitching/hangs went away. YMMV

Does this mean Univision puts a stream online of even the afternoon games on weekends when espn3 doesn't carry them? Or are you not using espn3 for a reason and nobody puts those online but the pirates?

Univision streams every single game. Which is pretty nice. Otherwise I watch whatever ESPN360 shows. Because I gots no TV.  

They don't even need video replay, they just need a goal line official on each side. The problem is that linesmen are not in position to see those kinds of calls because of their responsibility for offsides. There is a reason American football has 7 officials on the field as so much of the game comes down to crossing various lines. Soccer at this level has no excuse for not parking 1 guy on each goal line.

Yeah, more officials would help, there's no good reason to still stick with just the three (plus the loser time keeper ref). Replay would still suck shit though.

[Sjofn]

Hooray, Mexico isn't going to be shut out!

\o,---<| BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

[Chimpy]

And Mexico puts a beut on the board.

Some good strikes in this game.

[Abagadro]

Oh, almost some Messi magic.

[Chimpy]

Oh, almost some Messi magic.

It would have been a nice bit of icing on the cake.

Was probably the most engaging game than I have seen so far.

[Paelos]

That match was great. So far the knockout rounds are putting the rest of defensive-ugly-boring shit in the group rounds to bed early.

[Xerapis]

Headliine of The Korea Times English edition "Korea should have won"

Under that: "Korea exits World Cup gracefully"

Oh, Korea.

[ghost]

At least we can say this: if the score stands like this, England cannot say that they lost solely to a bad call.

England stood a much, much better chance playing from a tie.  They don't have the speed to match the counterattacks of Germany so in order to go on the offensive they left themselves vulnerable.  It was a terrible call and was a tipping point for the match.

[Teleku]

Ok, I knew I said I was done with the thread, but I felt I had to post this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8JGhoVybkM&feature=player_embedded#!

[ghost]

Netherlands is looking strong, but I still think it's going to come down to Germany, Spain, Argentina or Brazil.

[eldaec]

Gerrard was the main reason for all of Englands woes he was terrible in every game and he's supposed to be the captain. Lampard would have been a better choice.

Your opinion is bad and you should feel bad.

[Stabs]

Bitterly disappointed with England. Not that we lost, but the way we lost.

I doubt we'll ever get the true story but we looked like a squad divided by dissension. We need less people looking to "take the game by the scruff of the neck", more people who can keep the discipline of playing the shape the manager wants.

I believe a lot of the turmoil came from Terry's belief that Cole was essential. You can argue the merits of Cole v Lennon v Wright-Phillips v Millner, they all have different qualities. But what's important is not fucking up the squad because you're too obstinate to accept you're not in charge.

I thought Capello did well trying to turn the "player revolt" around but you can see that against Germany the Chelsea players in particular had let it get to them. Terry had put them in an impossible position - they had to pick between club captain and national manager and it got to them. They decided not to back Terry but felt terrible about it and it showed in the game. Ashley Cole was shit, Joe Cole was shit, Lampard played at walking pace.

What I would like to see is the FA to continue with Capello, for the England squad to be gutted, for all the undroppable millionaire celebs who would rather second guess the manager than do what they are fucking told to do to be sent to the BBC studios to watch the next World Cup with Lineker. Just drop everyone over 25 years old and start over, building the team around Wayne Rooney.