haaaa haaaa haaaa haaaaa

i heard someone say yesterday btw that they thought he had always been too protected by terry and… someone else i can't recall the name.

----

ANYWAY

i had the sucka on my lineup yesterday next to thiago silva. i didn't foresee brazil winning but i thought-- hey! at least they'll get to make a lot of saves!

dl scored 4 and thiago 6

not that the fantasy score is truly reflective of real game performance, but DAMN! that was bad in every way. so today i'm benching them and bringing howedes and boateng in.

AND I SOLD HUMMELS because i wasn't sure he'd play. i did it so i could afford two crap brazilians. shit, i should have kept all my defenders dutch or german. o well. at least i got devrij captain for 26 pts yesterday. not touching that today in the face of uncertainty i think.

my final lineup:
neuer
garay boateng devrij © 26(13) howedes vlaar 11
lahm kroos mascherano
messi mueller


here we go!!

LET'S GET IT ON!!! I'm pumped for it now. I really hope it isn't a dullard game *glares in Argentina's direction*

love love love argentina to win

i am divided in that as a south american i want argentina to win but as a bundesliga fan i know germany deserves it and they're the better team and our german friends are cool people (really).

if argentina wins they will be insufferably obnoxious for the next 4 years and brazilians will commit mass suicide.

oooh here we go really!!!

Yup, after that annihilation of Brazil it'd almost be criminal for germany not to win. Me? Ive never been into the "root for your state/continent/conference/league to win once your own team loses cuz frankly those teams are usually your team's rivals. Fuck that shit, im a good sport but I aint rooting for my rivals.


Yup.. for a nation that hasnt won the cup in an entire generation these people are cocky as fuck. They think history entitles them to future accolades.. got to earn it on the pitch, not just the praise of pundits..

Can you just imagine it?? Thatd be the penultimate humiliation

Hahahahahahahahahahaaaaaaaaa. Word! They've been so dull its shocking!

you should be satisfied with this first half so far though-- no??

First half has been fantastic.

i love it that it's tight tight tight but both teams manage to created chances-- besides that goalpost by howedes, argentina has had the best ones so far.

classic possession vs. counterattack game?

Best world cup ever

a sad day for me

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!

awesome. well well well well well well well deserved victory

the best team of the world cup won the world cup

Absolutely



messi was shit tonight

Great final. Neither team deserved to lose but I think Germany gradually started to edge it. They were probably the best team in the tournament so it's definitely deserved, even if I was hoping Argentina might do it and they actually played far better tonight than I expected. Schweinsteiger was immense though.

YES!!!

--

golden ball for messi? okay...

I agree with demo rail. I watched the first half and ten overtime at work. I was really indifferent on winner. Argentina wasn't expected and Germany was playing well...I'm happy. A good match and a fantastic goal to close it.

After everything that's happened with German football this past few years, it does feel right that they finally won it with this crop of players. During the game I always wanted Argentina to win but it would've felt slightly hollow if they'd won the tournament itself.

And more importantly, congratulations to Mike Obiku for thrashing all comers in the FF!

damn, you ended up beating bertrand after all.

do we have to pay obiku tribute now until the next tournament? $100/month or something?

I don't think all the scores are totaled yet so Bertrand could still get second. Mike Obiku's out of sight though.

shit! i think you beat him by a mere 3 points.

in the end i closed a little bit my distance to you one percenters (ha ha), but i couldn't overcome the triple fiasco of of a slow-starting argentina, a stingy belgium, and a failed italy that yielded very few points-- stuck with them for 3 rounds!!! i banked my hopes on the wrong teams.

ayway so obiku wins a car and we'll see him again for the euros or what??

isn't he gonna come here and gloat? he should.

thank you jogi for winning the word cup, i just pretended ppl were happy for my birthday

Agreed, after 2006 and 2010 this win felt inevitable, I pegged Germany to win it all back in May and I'm pleasantly surprised to see them pull it off. It just felt like they were building the momentum over the past few years to really pull off something big, and I'm glad they did it and with style. All things considering, the 4-0 beat down of Portugal, the 7-1 OBLITERATION of Brazil IN Brazil, and a 18-4 overall goal differential, I dare say this may have been the BEST World Cup team EVER. That is not hyperbole, it feels like a legitimate proclamation.

I had Germany-Netherlands for my Final and Brazil-Argentina as my Third Place match so I'm actually pretty happy to be .500 in my predictions for the Semis.. I really thought the Dutch could make the Final, but I still thought Germany would beat them inevitably. Great World Cup, I had SOOOOOO MUUUUUCH FUUUUUUUN this past month, possibly the most I've had in any international summer tournament in my life!

That was one of the the best goals in the entire Cup, well worth that 113 minute wait.. While it wasn't a scoring match, I liked this better than 2010..

This match was way better than 2010. A really honest and hard thought game.

Great goal to win it

I think Sabella made some mistakes with his substitutions though which affected Argentina pretty adversely.

Lavezzi went off too early and offer more width than Aguero.

Palacio was terrible and is no target man. Despite playing pretty poorly at least Higuain holds the ball up and brings players like messi and perez into the game.

And surely a half fit Di Maria would have been better than Gago.

Anyway great tournament. So many highlights. Props especially to Algeria donating their prize money to the poor of gaza.

I mean, I get it, but I don't. Messi, at least wait until AFTER the game to look so ungrateful and upset. Seriously. Like a BILLION people just watched you make that, "Did I just smell a fart face."

Also, why the fuck did Messi NOT give any high-fives to all those fans when Argentina was walking up to the podium? That was totally classless. Fuck Argentina and their cocky asses, always act like their shit don't stink meanwhile ain't won the Cup in a generation and probably won't win the next one either ;)

messi is not cocky at all. he's pretty reserved though. if anything, i saw a grown man trying not to break into tears in front of a billion people. right before he went up i saw his face twich a little but he got a hold of himself.

I agree that he is usually quite reserved but for him, indeed the whole ream to diss a line of high fives and spend twenty standing around arms crossed and sulking like teenagers? I didnt like it. Honestly.would have been better off crying, most of the argentina fans in the crowd did. I know its in part because they.won, but notice how the entire german team went out of their way to high five every nearby outstretched hand in the crowd

yesss! after agüero came in for lavezzi, i was wondering-- what the fuck for?!?! he made it worse. useless sub.

not sure about dimaria as i thought he was pretty crippled. i heard something about him getting treated with… stem cells. true or bullshit? anyway, same could have been said of khedira btw-- poor kramer was atrocious… maybe because of the head bang or maybe just because he was raw and under too much pressure. that was a bad start.

gotze's goal was so beautiful though. fooled romero into going towards the opposite side. simply gorgeous-- worthy of a final


ha ha ha-- when is your barfday?

Agreed. Goetze goal was definitely one of the most beautiful of the cup and not just because of what was on the line.

shit man, germany just had won. didn't you see neuer skip the hand and give angela merkel an enormous hug?

crying like david luiz just doesn't go with argentinian machismo. the fans were drunk and can let loose i suppose, but the players were sober. they thought they had a chance and looked devastated.

The picture of german team drinking beers with blatter.and merkel in the locker room is pricelesss! Look, with argentina I get it, totally, but I just dont like it. They new the risk of losing, seems they shouldve made the best.of the situation and be good sports about the loss in the immediate moment. There was.still business to takke care of, and there were fans to support, leave sulking mourning for thr locker room

Considering Argentina's default setting when they lose is to beat up any official or opposing player in range, I thought Messi et al were on their best behaviour last night. I imagine the ref was just relieved it never went to penalties. (Click to 6 mins).

In Messi's case I think part of what looked like sulkiness may just have been embarrassment - not just at losing the final but because he won the golden ball for best player in the tournament, when he obviously knew as well as anyone that he hadn't played that well.

This. I was as shocked as everyone else wen he got that. Sure he pretty much got Argentina to the, but there have been more players who have been consistently great.

I'd have given it to Neuer but no way would Fifa ever let a goalie win it.

YES. Neuer totally.

If someone in Argentina deserved an award it was Mascherano.

Messi's choice was bizarre. Robben had a better world cup-- why didn't he get it? So did James in spite of his limited stay. But Neuer really was consistently fantastic throughout.

--

ps zonal marking piece on the final is up. nothing that will surprise anyone i think but probably just the best summary you can read anywhere.

I can't believe Goatse scored a goal

The award was sponsored by Adidas







I haven't been agreeing with all his analyses this WC; he's written off too many games as boring that I really enjoyed. He seems spot on there though.

They did with Khan.

well that's my argument in shreds than