woohoo, super eagles!

Considering how suspect Argentina's defence looks, he's been great, although maybe more as a winger than a defender.

Don't know if you know this picture. From what I remember Vinnie Jones said to Gazza straight after it "Stay there, I'll be back to soon" Dirty playing at its best.

That was a hell of a game between Argentina and Nigeria.

Fantastic goals by both teams.

to mirror demonrail's post about yesterday's italy-uruguay, i don't me to be a contrarian just for the fuck of it but i couldn't get into the argentina-nigeria, ha ha ha.

too… i don't know… sloppy? i didn't see a real tactical battle. just lots of disorganized attacking. the same thing happened with the colombia game-- started "fun", disintegrated after 20 minutes, and didn't reconstitute until the coach put in a midfielder, which stabilized things.

and argentina without messi is still a non-entity.

---

ecuador just fucked themselves. played mostly like they were defending the tie where they needed a win to go through.

the game itself was shit until ecuador got a player thrown out. it was still shit though, but slightly more entertaining at times because the ecuadoreans threw themselves forward, but only briefly.

what a shit day for games. i finally was able to get some office work done.

tomorrow, however….

oh! ive seen that before but didn't know who they were, ha ha ha

thanks!

Obviously a completely different game to the Italy-Uruguay one, but I did really enjoy it. Not a tactical battle, as you say, but some really good attacking play from both sides. And I'm not sure I agree about the Messi point. He's obviously their main man but I thought Di Maria was excellent and on another day could've easily scored a couple himself. And as weak as they seem in defence, I love Zabaleta and been really impressed with Rojo, who I didn't know anything about prior to the WC - although I'm not sure he's actually a defender. in any conventional sense.

I ultimately came away thinking Argentina had finally become everything the pundits had predicted, both good and bad: they're great going forward but clearly very suspect at the back.

Uruguay's coach is such a tool. Why won't he just apologize? Why blame the Italians or the British media, WE ALL FUCKING SAW IT LIVE ON TELEVISION. Its no conspiracy. Its no witch hunt. Y'ALL FUCKED UP, PERIOD.



They are clearly the Villains of this World Cup, AGAIN.. The entire world knows Suarez fucked up. It wasn't the typical "dirty play" it crossed a line even among dirty plays. A "My Bad" from the entire team, let alone Suarez and the coach is crucial to move on. The whole world feels like they cheated, TWICE to advance. In other words, they need to do some damage control and fast.

Why would you want to be the hated team in the world? Why not just accept fault when there clearly was a wrong? Why throw gas instead of cooling water on the flames?

Honestly, I hope they not only ban Suarez, but suspend the coach like they did Jurgen Klinsmann in the Gold Cup.... Fuck Uruguay, they've lost the world's respect.

right, my problem was that it wasn't so much good attacking as poor defending in my eyes. so you get flashes but they are kind of easy. no real glory.

re: messi/di maria. yes di maria's shot to the goalpost is what enabled messi's first goal, and the man does run, but after sabella took out messi, di maria was tired and couldn't run much.

btw, sabella himself has publicly recognized some of this. check it out:
http://www.goal.com/en-gb/news/3841/...-messi-sabella

rojo as you said earlier is more winger than defender. while he scored, how do you judge him on defense? i wasn't paying 100% attention so i didn't observe him closely.

my dissatisfaction i suppose has more to do with the fact that i expected argentina to be much better. they qualified #1 in conmebol, and they ought to "represent" a little better, and if you take out messi's goals there is very little production. same as brazil without neymar.

in that regard i think chile and colombia have done much better. sure, they have their indispensables, but they are also more of a "team" proper and they have made a good impression-- no?

Yeah Suarez, you dick

That's one for demonrail (if my memory is right)

France qualified in a poor way.
The coach's choice to field a team with many changes, if fine for the players, allowing them to commit themselves and think they're relied on, did not pay.
After that draw, they may believe they're second choice and lose a bit of hope. Those who played the first games, on the other hand, might feel safe and pay less attention.
Deschamps' looks told he was anxious. He wanted a result.

Ecuador left on a good note - apart from AValencia.
Sakho and Giroud could have been carded for their elbowing too.

I wished they'd face Argentina, which improved but still relies a bit too much on Messi.
Having him subbed when leading 3-2 meant it gave his partners a test to see how well they could do 30 minutes against some fine opposition.

I still can't get over the fact that Italy lost. Such a disappointment. Now I'm all for Mexico (and maybe Argentina, but they haven't impressed me that much, liked them 4 years ago better with Tevez)

USA vs. Germany may be a no go......decision pending:

NINE Games and 4 months = DONE!

The defending wasn't great from either team but I'd say at least two of the goals were among the best I'd seen so far. And I don't remember Nigeria's defending being that bad overall. Argentina's does seem a genuine weakness though that, if it's not sorted out could easily end up being the difference between them winning the thing and not. Rojo kind of embodies their situation better than anyone: a defender who seems more comfortable in front of the opposition's goal than his own. I love watching him but I'm sure coaches of defending must watch him in despair.

Your point about Chile and Colombia is obviously true; I just wonder if this doesn't end up being a WC that doesn't really have a truly outstanding or even fully-rounded team and where the title is largely being fought out between a handful of outstanding individuals.

Just heard a FIFA spokesperson say the game WILL go ahead. Bloody hope so.

^^^ thanks for the update.

Here in the States, ESPN reporting that FIFA Official and game ref will make a decision one hour prior to kick. Multiple reports that the corners are extra sloppy.

Just heard some "soccer guy" say that if the match is tied at the half, that USA & Germany May choose to not let the ball leave the circle in the second half. Said there was some precedent of this happening in the past??? Said the last time involved, Holland.

squirrelman got a 4 month immediate suspension!

next time don't be so weird and just use your elbow. it won't be a scandal.

As in just letting the game run cos they are both through?

The only example I can think of is Austria and Germany in the *thinks* '82 world cup. Supposedly just an awful game where even the commentator was saying the ref should stop the game and make them actually play.

edit:aye it was '82

Believe it was more about being forced to play in bad conditions and not wanting to have any players injured. Said the teams could just kick the ball back and forth across the center circle. I was surprised to learn this tactic had been used in the past.

i believe the weather is due to a fissure between alternate universes because klinsmann is still germany's coach in the other universe and the waves of contradiction are too potent

I enjoyed the SHIT out of the Argentine Nigeria match! It was fucking awesome!

The good folks at my work have assigned our Rockwell Pavillion to be used to screen the USA/Deutschland match!

Deutschland unter alles!

On German TV, commentators immediately made reference to that specific Gijón 82 game, as soon as Sunday's USA-Portugal game ended and it was established that both Germany and USA could qualify with a draw on the last game... I have the feeling there is a good chance that the guy Bytor Peltor mentioned was indeed also making reference to that game...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Ge...80%930_Austria


I hope we won't have this today!

This is total #Kharma for that snow game against Costa Rica...

ALL
WE
NEED
IS
TO
DRAW

There is no ball that Bradley does not lose.

right...perhaps it may have been sloppy like _*(&%(*$&^%@ said....but it kept things very interesting! I mean the fact that Nigeria didn't let Argentina take that one easily was enough for the group play to be exciting!

That is true, but I think he gets dissed too much.. He is solid. Could he be better?? Of course. He does enough though..

Really, I think that we are overly relying on Beasley and Jones, and its become VERY CLEAR that Germany scouted against them well.. Jones is pushing his luck, we need some more variety. What we did in the 1st half to keep control of possession by bringing it back to Howard was good, it mixed up Germany's defense, we need to go back to that balance.

Our attacks have been rushed. We can't out speed Germany, but we can play OUR game and sneak in an equalizer..



Praise the LORD that thus far Ghana and Portugal are tied..

It looks like Jones is annoyed....but he's annoying me with those dives.

Jones is annoyed because the Germans are pressing him very hard, bordering on dirty, and the ref is enjoying the show..

However my two cents: The US is overly relying on Jones, he played very well in the first games against Ghana and Portugal, but he's not THAT good and Germany is.

Bedoya and Jones just crashing into each other is a great example of those guys trying too hard to do too much..

USA needs to play ITS style and not get too crazy.

I will say this, between ALL the teams playing, including Germany's, I don't recall seeing this many bandages and black eyes in the Group stages.

This may be a high scoring Cup, but its also VERY VERY physical. Thankfully coming from CONCACAF USA is in great shape to compete against physicality, shit, we almost invite it.

we dodged a motherfucking bullet

but

usa defense = sucks

usa attack = sí se puede

ps lucky as second we get an extra rest day. we play… belgium?

congratulations guys!
It will probably be Belgium, unless they loose their match. Which would be a disgrace ;)

Our defense is actually what saved us. It could have been better, but we won by having the best goal differential in goals allowed, not goals scored.. remember this was a group of death and we just shut down the best offense in FIFA to ONE SCORE?????

USA earned this yo. Its a fucking Group of Death and we competed well.

Beating Ghana sent them home, period.
Drawing against Portugal sent them home, period.
Keeping Germany to just one score sent us through, period.

This is BIG for USA futbol, and I dare say we can play well against Belgium if we just tighten up our mistakes. Against Portugal we just fell apart in the final minute of injury time. Against Ghana we were solid defensively but our offense got stagnant against a better defense. Against Germany the 1st half was about as good as USA is going to get defensively and we managed to have some great offense and control of possession, all credit due to Germany who rushed all our attacks thoroughly neutralizing them.

I don't think Belgium has the same level of defense as Ghana or Germany, so naive as it is, I like our chances to advance to the Quarters..

A lot of Americans will not understand the intricacies as to why this was a great World Cup showing, indeed, they may just think we sucked. They need to take it in the context of American sports..

This was the equivalent of an American sports team beating the 3 top teams in their league in the playoffs. THAT is huge. Its like the Phoenix Suns beating the Rockets and the Thunder and then only losing close to the Spurs.

Its like the Indianapolis Colts beating the New Orleans Saints, the 49ers, and losing close to the Denver Broncos... This was HUGE. I only hope Americans will understand that!!!!

Not a great game, especially for USA but it must've been hard for Klinsmann to know quite how to approach it. In the end congratulations to them for doing enough. Assuming they play Belgium, and if they keep playing the way they are and not feel tempted to open up and really go for it, I think they have a decent chance.

I think only the 2nd half was bad. The 1st half was great, but its clear that the weather and the pressure defense focusing on Jones and Beasley was taking its toll. Why no magical Klinsmann substitutions? Where was Wondo so spark the offense in the 2nd half???

All in all, I think we should give more credit to Germany in the 2nd half, but look at it tempered with the perspective that USA did what it had to do. Germany scores 2 goals we go home. Germany is the 2nd highest scoring team in the Group stages with the 2nd best in goals allowed. We did very well.

Shit, remember all those futbol aficionados who said USA didn't stand a fucking chance in this group? Remember smart people saying USA wouldn't even draw in a single game?

Yeah. USA did its job.. The great thing about futbol is there are realistic expectations, and we just realistically exceeded ours ;)

i'm going to leave your analogies out: of course it's a big result, but you underestimate the public i think-- i just saw pictures of people celebrating in big cities. they understand.

about the defense, we were lucky they scored only 1. could have been 3 easily. we did suck today. just not in teh aggregate.

today the pivot was bradley and he kept losing and losing balls. which is why we couldn't move up the center. brad davis was a zero but at least gave bedoya a break. once yeltsin got in things got exciting for us for a little bit on his flank.

the thing is though we're much better when we go forward. this kind of masochistic passivity cannot work in the long run.

ghana could have easily fucked us. they scored an own goal. say they don't do that and score another, and germany scores another, and we're out. this was a very close shave. for me it was a very tense match.

i'm glad we go through, but i got a bad taste in my mouth from today's performance. one thing is to defend a tie, another is to defend a one-goal loss. i understand scoring back and sitting on it but this was too much.

of course germany is really the better team, one-for-one their players are amazing. but i see us with more chances when we go forward instead of playing it all inside our own half.

Suchfriends^Yeah full credit to USA. They're where they are now on merit and have become one of the most likable teams left in the tournament. They know their limitations but work to their strengths.