2022 FIFA World Cup - Qatar, November 21-December 18

[GenerationTerrorist]

It was painful to watch, from an England perspective.

[YL]

Thanks to Costa Rica, Germany can now afford to lose to Spain.

[Meclazine for Israel]

Qatar is already eliminated. What a pathetic host team.

It's Qatar. They probably only have 300 fit men of sporting age to choose from.

[buritobr]

Qatar is already eliminated. What a pathetic host team.

It's Qatar. They probably only have 300 fit men of sporting age to choose from.

Sparta had also 300 very fit men

And they lost too

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

The Iranians are complaining that the Muslim sign thing on their flag was taken out of a random USMNT graphic and are now calling for the US to be expelled from the tournament.

Sorry, I will not take lectures from a country that throws gay people off buildings, least of all from said nation's leftist defenders.

[The Right Honourable Martin Brian Mulroney PC CC GOQ]

Oof, that loss to Belgium stings a lot harder after today's events. Even if we beat Morocco, Canada can't accumulate enough points to qualify for the Round of 16, meaning that last game is effectively pointless. As for the Morocco vs Belgium match, I think it proves that this Belgium team is just not what they were in the past few tournaments. Which from a Canadian perspective sucks even more, because coming so close to Belgium gave us false hope...in reality, Belgium is a beatable team and we could've gotten a result from them.

Proud of the boys regardless, and especially Alphonso Davies for going in history as Canada's first FWC goalscorer. Deservedly so, as he's the best player Canada has had to date, and he needed a chance to vindicate himself after that poor penalty. Our defence was just not there, the boys burned themselves out too early and got lethargic, and as much as I respect Milan Borjan for all he's done for this team, he's not a World Cup tier goalie and we'll need better going forward. Also a sad night for Atiba Hutchinson, the man's a legend as far as Canadian soccer goes, but at 39 he clearly doesn't have the athleticism to keep up with a world-class team like Croatia.

Onward and upward, we'll get 'em in '26! Hopefully we can get a consolation result out of Morocco. After that, I guess I'll just so what Canadian soccer fans have always done, and cheer for foreign teams that I have a bare minimum connection to

[LAKISYLVANIA]

I've told it that we weren't as great as we used to be, and i turned out to be right.

And my very premature knockout stage predictions (obviously subject to change):

Second Round:
Netherlands vs USA
Argentina vs Denmark
Germany vs Croatia
Brazil vs Uruguay
England vs Senegal
France vs Poland
Belgium vs Spain
Portugal vs Switzerland

Quarter Finals:
Netherlands vs Argentina
Germany vs Brazil
England vs France
Belgium vs Portugal

Semi Finals:
Argentina vs Brazil
France vs Belgium

Match for Third Place:
Argentina vs Belgium

Final:
Brazil vs France

I can't see how we would get fourth place. Our golden generation is over. Many players aren't in great shape and especially defensively we're doing horrible, lacking some pace and only having 3 players. Someone like Jonathan David (Canada) is gonna laugh with our flank players. I think 2022 will be the realization that we're done being a top tier team or even sub top tier team.

Perhaps with some luck we survive group stage, but we're gonna likely face a strong competitor in the second round and i don't see how we can win from Spain or Germany. And even like a team with Japan we're gonna have trouble.

Hazard is done. Lukaku misses confidence. We don't have great subs in many positions and our defence is way too weak. We miss flair. We miss the ability to change strategy and tactics. It's not going to be us.

Some people have been treating our n°1 (now n°2) position on world ranking as very normal, and after a while even winning a match is tiring because than you got the criticism how we won with luck or on "safe mode" by people or journalists. Some even would argue for the manager to be fired after we won a match, since it was expected we would win the match but the way we won it wasn't great. There has been a kind of campaign to lower expectations, even by our star players like Kevin De Bruyne (the famous: "we're only Belgium") and the results of the last 2 years esp. our disappointing performances in Nations League seemed to have lower expectations as well. The manager has been criticized for not giving new or other younger players enough chances, which is why we will have one of the oldest national teams on the world cup on average.

[President Johnson]

Germany vs. Spain ended 1:1 was actually a pretty good, high-energy match. Didn't expect us to do that well, especially towards the end. So Germany needs Spain to beat Japan now and win against Costa Rica in order to stay on.

[LAKISYLVANIA]

Germany vs. Spain ended 1:1 was actually a pretty good, high-energy match. Didn't expect us to do that well, especially towards the end. So Germany needs Spain to beat Japan now and win against Costa Rica in order to stay on.

Japan is gonna regret not winning their match against Costa Rica, just like Canada is regretting not winning the match against us.

They should've won, they would've had a chance defeating Morocco.

With hindsight, we were the weakest team of our group. We didn't deserve the win against Canada (i mean, we made the goal), but it didn't reflect the match.

I hear a lot of talk also about team spirit being absolutely at an all-time low or major disagreements among players. All of them are not getting the level they normally get at their club teams. The manager probably will be highly criticized and sacked which the fans of Belgium are already demanding for months, but given criticism among journalists and even players theirselves is growing, his fate probably has been sealed.

Since we have an old team, people are now being loud about moving on to a new younger and next generation and a more energetic and dynamic gameplay.

Hazard, Witsel, all examples of players that are done and IMO should no longer be selected for national team. Vertonghen didn't play a horrible tournament, but is also an example of an older player that need to be replaced with a younger defender like Faes or Theate.

[Santander]

Belgium have some top young players like Onana and Doku, and players like De Bruyne, Lukaku and Courtois have at least another World Cup in them - they'll be just fine. Defensively, not the level they should be, but that's been a problem for a long time.

[buritobr]

Germany vs. Spain ended 1:1 was actually a pretty good, high-energy match. Didn't expect us to do that well, especially towards the end. So Germany needs Spain to beat Japan now and win against Costa Rica in order to stay on.

Germany's probability to go to the next round is not low

[buritobr]

This is the population and the age piramid of Uruguay. The country has only 620K men between 15 and 40 years old. It needs to find very good 26 soccer players in this small group in order to have a good national team. Uruguay's team overperforms.

[Deep Dixieland Senator, Muad'dib (OSR MSR)]

Germany vs. Spain ended 1:1 was actually a pretty good, high-energy match. Didn't expect us to do that well, especially towards the end. So Germany needs Spain to beat Japan now and win against Costa Rica in order to stay on.

Germany's probability to go to the next round is not low

The Socceroos are better placed than die Mannschaft to advance.

[DavidB.]

Literally none of the England team except maybe Trippier could make the Brazil starting XI, and only a few would even make the bench.

This isn't how you spell Bellingham.

Otherwise fully agreed. England are always among the most overrated squads.

[Meclazine for Israel]

Those last two goals by Cameroon looked offside.

[DavidB.]

They looked offside, but they weren't, because Milenkovic doesn't understand how an offside trap works.

Incredible how Serbia defended with such a high line on a 1-3 advantage and then took out their fastest CB Pavlovic too. Compare this to Croatia's much more mature handling of its 1-3 advantage against Canada. That is the difference between success and failure.

[buritobr]

Nice to see the seleção winning even if it's not playing very well

[buritobr]

The winning ticket celebrating the victory against Switzerland and the advancing to the 2nd round

[Santander]

Portugal and Ghana were both lucky to win. But that's tournament football - sometimes it's about sh**tting your way through the tournament, which Portugal are experts at.

[DavidB.]

Meanwhile, the Belgian squad have had a crisis meeting because the players apparently hate each other. Juicy details are being leaked. Kevin De Bruyne and Thibaut Courtois "haven't spoken for years", strikers Romelu Lukaku and Michy Batshuayi are "not best friends" and Eden Hazard and Leandro Trossard ("everyone in Belgium thinks I should play" but Hazard is actually playing) also don't talk. In an interview, Hazard had apparently blamed the bad results on the old, slow center backs; after the Morocco game, center back Jan Vertonghen implicitly hit back by saying the lack of chances created "was also our fault, or not?" 🍿🍿🍿🍿 I expect this chapter to close after the Croatia game.

https://twitter.com/rtlinfo/status/1597287227008045056

[Mike88]

Portugal and Ghana were both lucky to win. But that's tournament football - sometimes it's about sh**tting your way through the tournament, which Portugal are experts at.

That and being able to avoid the toughest teams until the end.

The most infuriating thing about the match was commentators trying to force us to believe that Cristiano actually scored.

[Logical]

Meanwhile, the Belgian squad have had a crisis meeting because the players apparently hate each other. Juicy details are being leaked. Kevin De Bruyne and Thibaut Courtois "haven't spoken for years", strikers Romelu Lukaku and Michy Batshuayi are "not best friends" and Eden Hazard and Leandro Trossard ("everyone in Belgium thinks I should play" but Hazard is actually playing) also don't talk. In an interview, Hazard had apparently blamed the bad results on the old, slow center backs; after the Morocco game, center back Jan Vertonghen implicitly hit back by saying the lack of chances created "was also our fault, or not?" 🍿🍿🍿🍿 I expect this chapter to close after the Croatia game.

https://twitter.com/rtlinfo/status/1597287227008045056

I wonder who deserves more blame in this situation. The manager, who failed to impose control on the dressing room? Or the players, who let their egos destroy the team?

[Alcibiades]

Portugal and Ghana were both lucky to win. But that's tournament football - sometimes it's about sh**tting your way through the tournament, which Portugal are experts at.

Although they haven’t had a good World Cup run since 2006, and I’m not sure I’d back them to change that this year.

[The Right Honourable Martin Brian Mulroney PC CC GOQ]

Meanwhile, the Belgian squad have had a crisis meeting because the players apparently hate each other. Juicy details are being leaked. Kevin De Bruyne and Thibaut Courtois "haven't spoken for years", strikers Romelu Lukaku and Michy Batshuayi are "not best friends" and Eden Hazard and Leandro Trossard ("everyone in Belgium thinks I should play" but Hazard is actually playing) also don't talk. In an interview, Hazard had apparently blamed the bad results on the old, slow center backs; after the Morocco game, center back Jan Vertonghen implicitly hit back by saying the lack of chances created "was also our fault, or not?" 🍿🍿🍿🍿 I expect this chapter to close after the Croatia game.

https://twitter.com/rtlinfo/status/1597287227008045056

Oh dear.

Yeah, they'll be lucky to get a result out of Croatia after a lucky escape against Canada and an underwhelming loss to Morocco, if this is what's going on behind the scenes.

[NewYorkExpress]

Meanwhile, the Belgian squad have had a crisis meeting because the players apparently hate each other. Juicy details are being leaked. Kevin De Bruyne and Thibaut Courtois "haven't spoken for years", strikers Romelu Lukaku and Michy Batshuayi are "not best friends" and Eden Hazard and Leandro Trossard ("everyone in Belgium thinks I should play" but Hazard is actually playing) also don't talk. In an interview, Hazard had apparently blamed the bad results on the old, slow center backs; after the Morocco game, center back Jan Vertonghen implicitly hit back by saying the lack of chances created "was also our fault, or not?" 🍿🍿🍿🍿 I expect this chapter to close after the Croatia game.

https://twitter.com/rtlinfo/status/1597287227008045056

Oh dear.

Yeah, they'll be lucky to get a result out of Croatia after a lucky escape against Canada and an underwhelming loss to Morocco, if this is what's going on behind the scenes.

This honestly reminds me of the 2010 French squad, and that team horrifically underperfomed in South Africa that year, not winning a single match and only getting a draw against Uruguay. I mean, for God's sake, they lost to South Africa, the second-lowest ranked team in that World Cup (only North Korea had a worse World Ranking at the time).