WORLD CUP

[Mind Flayer Monk]

Germany wins again! Germany vs France should be a good one.

[Yorkshire pud]

Here you are...USA V Belgium I believe

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/28100892


http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/live/football/27463666

[coaster]

Watching the game on ESPN. The US isnt playing that great.

[coaster]

Tim Howard. Fear the beard.

[Yorkshire pud]

I watched it. It was a fantastic match and USA played their hearts out. In many ways better than Belgium. Not just Howard, but the rest too. I don't think they should feel as if they let anyone down either; they should be proud that they made it a very entertaining game for a neutral. I'm sorry they lost, because I think they'd have given Argentina a game and possibly come good. The problem with south American teams though is they play the off ball incidents and dive on cue, and I think that would have frustrated USA as they just want to get on with it. Klinsman's appointment was inspired, although he wasn't above theatrics when he played.
How anyone in the USA can say American football is more exciting after watching that match last night I have no idea.   

[pate]

I can say that I find American football more interesting than futbol, right?

[Yorkshire pud]

I can say that I find American football more interesting than futbol, right?

What is futbol? Spanish?

[pate]

Well, there's Football, then there's futbol or soccer...

[Yorkshire pud]

Well, there's Football, then there's futbol or soccer...

You call it soccer, we call it football. We invented it before your version of rugby with body armour was invented.

[coaster]

I can say that I find American football more interesting than futbol, right?

As do I. Its still my favorite sport. I'm a big fan of the NFL and especially college football, but as an ignorant American, I never gave soccer the respect it deserved. I was surprised by how exciting yesterday's game was.

[maureen]

Well, there's Football, then there's futbol or soccer...

Pelé pronounces it "footsieball".  Love the lilt of Brazilian Portuguese!!

[PB the Deplorable]

You call it soccer, we call it football. We invented it before your version of rugby with body armour was invented.

In other words we took something and improved it?

[Yorkshire pud]

In other words we took something and improved it?

Not really.. 

[VtaGeezer]

The only televised soccer I ever enjoyed was the German League stuff that was broadcast in Seattle back in the 70's.  It was entertaining because the the Brit announcers ladled out non-PC ethnic cracks at the officials and players freely. 

[albrecht]

The only televised soccer I ever enjoyed was the German League stuff that was broadcast in Seattle back in the 70's.  It was entertaining because the the Brit announcers ladled out non-PC ethnic cracks at the officials and players freely.

They've cracked down on presenters making funny statement quite a lot over the years. Though apparently the Hispanic announcers still make good sexist and ethnic/racial jokes and comments. But sometimes the Brits still get away with a few. I love hearing Chicharito called "the diminutive Mexican" in EPL broadcasts, a truthful description, but funny hearing it.

[b_dubb]

The only televised soccer I ever enjoyed was the German League stuff that was broadcast in Seattle back in the 70's.  It was entertaining because the the Brit announcers ladled out non-PC ethnic cracks at the officials and players freely.

German league? Is that where the winning team eat the losing team?

[Mind Flayer Monk]

Though apparently the Hispanic announcers still make good sexist and ethnic/racial jokes and comments.

A friend told me there is pretty rampant homophobia at these events as well. Loud, thousands of people chanting someone "derogatory term".

[Yorkshire pud]

England manager Roy Hodgson has set up a friendly match against Iceland* to try and cheer fans up. They are hoping the under achievers will manage a goal bonanza. If they win that match they will then play Tesco* next Saturday and Asda* the following Wednesday.


*All three are supermarkets. ASDA is owned by Walmart 

Made me chuckle when I saw this.

[Yorkshire pud]

I thought this an interesting article about Tim Howard.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-28128439

[albrecht]

A friend told me there is pretty rampant homophobia at these events as well. Loud, thousands of people chanting someone "derogatory term".

Yeah, NPR had a show bit on it. Much of Mexico and Central/South America is pretty sexist, racist (more based on skin tone/ethnic makeup and not race per se) and aren't friendly to homosexuals (though they don't mind them if they keep in their place and have a suspicious number of brothels and street-walkers that are cross-dressers/trannys (I don't the difference between all the terms)) so there clearly is a demand. I think they shout the equivalent of "faggot" or "fairy" or something but more as an insult of the "manhood" of the other team; not that the players are really homosexual. Just as here, until politically correct times, guy might call another guy something like that. Apparently Univision was trying to address it when their announcers got into using similar terms during broadcast.

[albrecht]

I thought this an interesting article about Tim Howard.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-28128439

Wow, I hadn't heard that before. Interesting theory and pretty neat when/if someone takes a "disability" and turns it into a benefit/ability.

He had an impressive performance but our news, here in the States, and the casual US soccer fan doesn't understand that it is a poorly played game team-wise if your keeper needs to make that many saves!!

[Kelt]

I think there's still a great deal of naivete about soccer in the United States, which is understandable.

I've read countless threads where people are saying, "We should have played this formation" and "We were set up to defend."

The thing is that the Belgians had much, much better players... that's the bottom line.  It doesn't matter what formation you play, if the other team is better than you then you're going to see them dominate the match. Sticking an extra man in between the defence and the attack isn't going to magically imbue a team with the ability to keep the ball away from the other team.

I've also heard complaints that we should have been playing with another striker, because, you know, we needed less defenders and more players isolated up front. What a fucking genius idea that would have been.

The bottom line is that the United States was always going to be on the back foot against Belgium unless someone has some kind of magical formation they knew of that would see the United States dominate a far superior Belgian team. And if someone did have that magical formation then they should have passed that info along to Klinsmann rather than keeping it to themselves.

Klinsmann set us up to defend because we needed to defend... if we'd 'gone out swinging' and pushed forward we'd have been blown away in the first 45 minutes.

As it was we kept it tight for 90 minutes, and came within one ludicrous miss of going through against a potential finalist.

I'm not saying Gung Ho isn't sometimes an option... I'm saying Gung Ho is sometimes an idiotic option. 

Against Belgium Gung Ho would have been an idiotic option.

[albrecht]

WTF? Die Mannschaft looking invincible! 5-0 over Brasil and still in the first half?!? 5 goals in 18 minutes (!!) and over the host country. Holy Mackerel.

[zeebo]

The other day I watched an entire game that went 125 mins and ended 0-0.  Today I walked away for like 20 mins. and came back and score was already 5-0. 

[albrecht]

The other day I watched an entire game that went 125 mins and ended 0-0.  Today I walked away for like 20 mins. and came back and score was already 5-0. 

It has been a very, very odd World Cup. My cableguy came to fix a problem. He was a immigrant from Ghanian so we talk a bit, while he worked to fix the problem, about their performance (scoring 2 against Germany) etc. Plug back in cable and tv, and after the 15 minutes it took for him to monkey with the cable, 4 goals were scored against Brasil!! We were amazed/shocked.  He predicted that people needed to leave ("there will be much trouble"), I guess he think riots by angry Brasilians (angry at Germans, angry at team, angry at the excessive spending for WC.) Though, at this point, I think they would be more sad and embarrassed than violent.

[jazmunda]

What the world would be like if people reacted the way soccer players do.

http://youtu.be/rvsuYssoTw0

[136 or 142]

OK, this isn't exactly the World Cup, but it's an interesting story.

BBC World Football story on Dallas Tornado 1968 soccer team.

World Football goes back in time to 1967 and 1968 to relive an incredible chapter in football history. The Dallas Tornado World tour. A team of young players went into some of the world's most difficult locations. For six months they travelled 25,000 miles around Africa, Europe, the Middle East, Asia,
Australia, and finally Central America.

They played games in Saigon during the Vietnam War, nearly died at the hands of Greek Cypriot terrorists, came face-to-face with Chinese militants and survived a riot in Singapore. It was an amazing World tour that will never be repeated again.

The former Dallas Tornado players have reunited for a special programme to tell the story of that trip.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p023275c