World Cup

[dps]

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Rooting for Iceland since the US chocked in qualifying. Satisfied with the tie with Argehtina.

[Bartmanhomer]

I'm rooting for Brazil

[Scarlet Knight]

No USA...No Italy...*sigh*.

OK, I'm putting 100 quatloos on Belgium!

[The Fury]

My team of choice is Mexico. Though their first match is against Germany... Ugghh!

I can never get behind Germany because of the first ever World Cup match I watched. It was the USA versus Germany, Germany dominated because they're consistently good in World Cup and as the joke goes, the US doesn't even understand the sport. I've been salty about it ever since though, a big part of it is because the TV broadcast showed the US side of the stands and the wave of despair when Germany scored the final goal. There was even a man dressed as Captain America crying. Go to hell Germany, you made Captain America cry!

[Cristo Meyers]

Picking and choosing looking for decent matches since the US isn't in it this go-around, though I've taken a shine to Iceland after their game with Argentina. I caught their UEFA tourney run a few years ago too. Guess I just love an underdog.

I would love to have been a fly on the wall in Volkswagen's ad department, though. A series of commercials essentially rubbing it the US' face that they're not in the tournament? Brilliant! Who thought this was a good idea?

[Scarlet Knight]

I would love to have been a fly on the wall in Volkswagen's ad department, though. A series of commercials essentially rubbing it the US' face that they're not in the tournament? Brilliant! Who thought this was a good idea?

Probably the same people who gave us "Dieselgate"...

[Cristo Meyers]

Probably the same people who gave us "Dieselgate"...

If we'd been actually beaten, I wouldn't be so annoyed. But the reason we're not in the Cup this year is because, quite frankly, we screwed it up. That's why the new US men's team has been almost completely rebuilt from the ground up. These ads just feel like kicking us while we're down.

So... Mexico vs Germany. I don't actually like Mexico much as a team, but damn if I wasn't happy to see that result. Go El Tri.

[The Fury]

MÉXICO! YES! YES!

Maybe I'm only on board with them because we share a continent, but in any case I'm happy with how it ended.

[otakuryoga]

ok, WOW, that first goal from Brazil?
candidate for best goal of the tourny
that was nuts

[Jaxzan Proditor]

I’m rooting for Germany, so this morning was a little rough. Now I’ve got to hope Sweden and Korea do pretty poorly.

[Aedilred]

There's a thread over here. The two should probably be amalgamated.

Mods?

ok, WOW, that first goal from Brazil?
candidate for best goal of the tourny
that was nuts

Well it's a bit early for that - after all we have a lot of matches and hopefully a lot of goals to come!

Besides which and good as it was I didn't think it was markedly superior to Nacho's goal against Portugal on Friday.

I can never get behind Germany because of the first ever World Cup match I watched. It was the USA versus Germany, Germany dominated because they're consistently good in World Cup and as the joke goes, the US doesn't even understand the sport. I've been salty about it ever since though, a big part of it is because the TV broadcast showed the US side of the stands and the wave of despair when Germany scored the final goal. There was even a man dressed as Captain America crying. Go to hell Germany, you made Captain America cry!

If it's any consolation, it's not just American teams that get humiliated by Germany...

[otakuryoga]

Well it's a bit early for that - after all we have a lot of matches and hopefully a lot of goals to come!

Besides which and good as it was I didn't think it was markedly superior to Nacho's goal against Portugal on Friday.

and thus i said candidate

[Delta]

Well, so far, being a Germany fan hasn't exactly been smooth sailing either :( #lifeismeaninglessandfullofpain

[Scarlet Knight]

Well, so far, being a Germany fan hasn't exactly been smooth sailing either :( #lifeismeaninglessandfullofpain

Aaaaaand now you know how the rest of the world feels....

[farothel]

No USA...No Italy...*sigh*.

OK, I'm putting 100 quatloos on Belgium!

I'm for Belgium too, but that's probably because I am a Belgian. You have to root for the home team if they made it in.
Here in Belgium we make a lot of fun about the Dutch who din't qualify, while we did (in the past it was mostly the other way around and then they made fun of us, so revenge and all that).

[Delta]

Aaaaaand now you know how the rest of the world feels....

Hey, I was already shocked two years ago when we lost against France. It might sound completely silly, but ever since I can remember watching soccer (around '90 or so), I have never seen a German team play a tournament match where they where the better team, but lost. I'm not kidding, in almost 30 years, you could argue that was the first time that happened, it goes to show how ridiculously lucky this team has been through the years.

[truemane]

I love the World Cup. I get into it every time. I read articles and opinions, check the odds for and against any given thing happening, build spreadsheets to track results and predict brackets.

It's so much fun.

I mean, I hate soccer. I would rather bang my head against concrete for 90 minutes than watch a footie game.

But I love the event.

It's fun because it's basically a series of shots in the dark. Differences in team ability at this level are so small that single games (even the three games for Group Play) are really too small a sample to be able to tell anything meaningful.

It's like building an epic level party in D&D and then a perfectly matched epic level challenge and then deciding the entire fight with a couple of coin tosses.

So the results of this particular weighted number generator (as Randall Monroe would have it) don't MEAN anything, really, but they create compelling narratives. Either the titanic team has claimed its destiny or the plucky up start gas stolen their throne.

So much fun.

[Cristo Meyers]

Aaaaaand now you know how the rest of the world feels....

At least the Germans aren't as bad off as the Argentinians. If Iceland pulls out a win today Argentina is looking at not getting out of the group stage.

[Rogar Demonblud]

I'll take "Things I Never Expected To Hear" for $200, Alex.

How many major clubs are going to want to go back to Russia after this year? Moscow may never win another hosting bid again.

[Aedilred]

Hey, I was already shocked two years ago when we lost against France. It might sound completely silly, but ever since I can remember watching soccer (around '90 or so), I have never seen a German team play a tournament match where they where the better team, but lost. I'm not kidding, in almost 30 years, you could argue that was the first time that happened, it goes to show how ridiculously lucky this team has been through the years.

The really impressive (and/or annoying) thing about Germany has always been that even when they've apparently been rubbish (notably 1998-2004 when they arguably only had two world-class players in Ballack and Kahn*) they've generally still been good at major finals. Only in Euros 2000 and 2004, where they were in the groups of death, and played off the park by great Portuguese and Czech teams, have they looked poor and performed poorly.

But for most of their history they have succeeded by playing safe, percentage-based games, grinding oppositions down through discipline, patience and ruthless efficiency**. Even when they lacked star quality they still executed their key skills properly and rarely got starstruck, which allowed them to overcome more naturally talented teams. I don't think it was luck - although they got the odd slice as everyone does - rather it was exhaustive preparation and hard work.

Then in 2010 they exploded out of nowhere with a young team and shocked the world not just by how good they were but by playing expansive, entertaining, attractive, attacking football. The problem with this, as Brazil, Spain, France, et al have known for decades, is that it's much easier for this to go wrong. For a while, the German team was so talented that it rarely did, but there are holes starting to appear in this team which render it more vulnerable than it has been for a while.

From the team that played against Argentina in the 2014 final, they're missing five of their starting XI and all three of their subs. Their replacements don't look quite up to the same mark, while Ozil, Khedira and Mueller look increasingly tired.

FWIW, I still think Germany were the best team at Euro 2012 and were unlucky to go out to Italy in the semis. But they didn't play at their best in that game, it must be said.

Having said all that, they've only played one game so far, and that against Mexico. Mexico have been good for years, with a solid defence and a midfield which can pass it around like Barcelona when they're in the mood - but have lacked a cutting edge. They have been a habitual banana skin for top teams in the World Cup group stages and it's remarkable that they've never won a knockout game. So it's probably a bit early to be pushing the panic button.

I'll take "Things I Never Expected To Hear" for $200, Alex.

How many major clubs are going to want to go back to Russia after this year? Moscow may never win another hosting bid again.

Has something happened that I've missed?


*Matthaus was past it, as was Klinsmann. Bierhoff gets an honourable mention.
**and nice red uniforms?

[Vinyadan]

Hey, I was already shocked two years ago when we lost against France. It might sound completely silly, but ever since I can remember watching soccer (around '90 or so), I have never seen a German team play a tournament match where they where the better team, but lost. I'm not kidding, in almost 30 years, you could argue that was the first time that happened, it goes to show how ridiculously lucky this team has been through the years.

What about the defeat against Italy, six years ago? Germany was the better team, but somehow let itself be fooled. And I think that the defeat against France in 2016 at least partially depended on the game Germany had previously played and won against Italy; Italy was even worse than in 2012, but somehow put so much stress on Germany, that Germany didn't have the time to recover on the psychological (and maybe physical) level, before the game against France. I mean, the game against Italy gave us Joachim Löw making the Italian hands to ask his team what the hell they were doing. https://www.zeit.de/sport/2016-07/eu...lien-reportage

[Delta]

Against Italy, I felt they were more or less evenly matched. You could make a point about the game, but I never felt like "They should have won this." while against France, it was really more or less one dumb mistake that led to the game happening as it did, I feel like if you let those teams play against each other 10 times, Germany would win 7 or so.

[Delta]

Of course I never doubted for one second that Germany would win this

[GolemsVoice]

What a game! That final penalty, man. Germany was back to their old class most of the game, which gives me hope for further games.

[Delta]

Now if they just managed to get that ball over the line with any consistency they could blow Korea out of the stadium 5-0 or something...

[GloatingSwine]

Speaking of 5-0, I think everyone would have agreed that England would beat Panama, but 5-0 up at half time? That's not supposed to be the English way at world cups....

[Ebon_Drake]

It's coming home!!!!

Spoiler

Show

The English press are going to go nuts about today's result and act like we've already won the tournament. Then we'll either get shocked by Senegal next round or lose to Germany in the quarters. It's the English way.

While I'm realistic about England's actual chances in the tournament, I have to admit it'd be hilarious if we finally managed to win the trophy again under the management of 1996 national pariah Gareth "oh it's saved" Southgate. What a redemption story that would be.

[otakuryoga]

Argentina squeaks by and escapes group play

[Cristo Meyers]

And draws a round of 16 match versus France.

That should be a good match. Hopefully better than France's last match against Denmark. Only caught the second half and, near as I can tell, fell asleep somewhere around the 80th minute.

[Yora]

Wow, looks like Germany is on their way out. They need 2 goals in 20 minutes to get even with Sweden.

Sweden again! They already kicked out Italy.