FIFA World Cup 2018 (Russia) Thread

[Leinad]

The US didn’t even make it this year. Who am I suppose to cheer for? My eagle senses are not tingling.

Lots of people are going with Iceland due to the fact they're a very small country and people generally like Iceland. Panama's a bit awkward since they're one of the countries that advanced instead of the US but they're another of the "minnows" and theoretically North American countries doing well is good for the US in seeding. Peru is another of these countries that rarely make it but have that Americans are sometimes supporting. Australia is like America but upside-down.

You could also go by players, although that's not much help if you don't follow European club soccer

[Leinad]

(speaking of which, Fox's big thing since the USA isn't in it is "cheer for your roots!" lol)

Is that their big thing? I've also seen ads involving Mexico, Germany, Brazil, Spain, England, France, Messi, and Ronaldo. It probably depends on the programming--i.e. an ad on a soccer game with Real Madrid is probably more likely to show the Spain or Ronaldo ad than general programming would.

[Leinad]

Very surprised by Japan winning. Fun to see, though. Not too surprised by Senegal--they have some good players--but Japan from everything I've seen and heard in the lead-up have been at their worst. Kagawa looked like he really wanted to win, him and Osaka seem like a good pairing. I wonder if Colombia's failure was a blip and they'll play better if James starts, or if they're just crap this time around.

I could see Morocco forcing Portugal's old defenders into a mistake or two, but they would need to be more efficient than they were against Iran. Ziyech wasn't allowed into that game and they'll have trouble getting a point if that happens again (that being said Portugal won't pack players behind the ball like Iran does, but I don't think they'll get too opened up in the back).

Portugal only beat Spain because of mostly dumb defensive errors that gave one of the best players in the world chances to score. It's not wrapped up yet at all. Wouldn't be surprised if they flub one of these.

Spain vs. Iran will look like Argentina vs. Iceland if Argentina could somehow figure out how to play as a damn team.

A bunch of teams in this tournament have put on marvelous, disciplined defensive displays that can shut down superior-yet-maybe-not-on-form attacking teams to get results or almost get results. Uruguay fits the latter description, Saudi Arabia is about as far as you can get from the former, showing an adventurous instinct to possess yet absolutely no ability to string together passes or defend against counterattacks. Nothing is guaranteed but Cavani could win the Golden Boot off of this game lol

[Leinad]

I hate all these third world teams like Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Panama, etc.
They have showed zero progress all these years. Morocco and Saudi Arabia today could play till the cows come home and still they wouldn't score a single goal.
The Saudis faced elimination and yet you never saw more than one or two players inside Uruguay's box. How stupid (or scared) were they?

Panama has made the World Cup for the first time ever, if that's not literally the definition of "showing progress" I don't know what is...Morocco played better than the European champions FFS...

[Leinad]

Morocco played better than the European champions FFS...

No it didn't. Ball possession means nothing if you are unable to translate it to goals.

Who said possession? They outshot Portugal 15-10 and 4-2 on target lol.

[Leinad]

Germany have really good players, makes sense Sweden weren't able to hold them down for the whole game. That being said, I have my doubts that Germany can win it--they could've conceded more than just that 1 (if not for an ignored penalty call, Neuer saving their asses, Guidetti making a poor decision, etc.), and in general they seem very susceptible to the counter. Kroos is obviously world class but he doesn't have a Casemiro with him like he does at Real Madrid (or, looking at other top teams this tournament, a Kante or a Busquets).

[Leinad]

Seriously, Poland is the number 8 of the world and won 8 out of 10 games in their qualification group. But they were absolutely disastrous in their first 2 World Cup matches.

To be fair in the qualifiers they got smashed 4-0 by Denmark. They seem to struggle against good teams. I guess they're used to Lewandowski getting service to score 5 against the minnows, but they struggle to get it to him when they're outplayed.

(Cristiano Ronaldo by himself is better than anyone on Iran's team)

You can say that for arguably any team though

If we're making predictions I'll say:

Uruguay 2-1 Russia (bonus: late set piece winner by Godin)
Egypt 2-0 Saudi Arabia
Spain 2-1 Morocco
Portugal 1-0 Iran

[Leinad]

Morocco and Saudi Arabia today could play till the cows come home and still they wouldn't score a single goal.

[Leinad]

Curious how that British teacher justified that.  I don't think it sounds pompous or correct, just strange.  "England is" is pretty clearly referring to the unit that is the team of England or the unit that is the country of England.  "England are" just seems like a really lazy, socially-normalized-in-soccer way of saying "the English are" to me.

It makes sense to me--I think of it as referring to "England" the team. Just like how you'd say "the Cubs are" you'd say "England are." Not sure if that's correct or it just /feels/ correct because of English soccer commentary and that's how I justify it.

Regarding the matches, I'm just glad I feel no hope about Argentina advancing to the knockout rounds, so I'm surprisingly calm, I'm going to sleep like a baby tonight

Did you stay calm?


It's funny how a quick glance at which teams advanced out of groups B and D makes it look like "business as usual," which is the opposite result of what you get if you watched the games. What is that? A re-upset?

[Leinad]

The last time Germany were allowed to qualify for a World Cup and didn't make the last 8 was 1938. Not a good sign.

Lots of talk about Belgium and England maybe preferring to lose, so they can go in the quarter of the draw that has Switzerland and Sweden instead of the one that has Brazil. I'd say realistically it would be better to get the momentum from winning--and that's probably what the players think as well--but I do definitely get the argument that 2nd in group G is advantageous. Taking that into account maybe you could say a 0-0 is likely...but considering the strengths and weaknesses of these teams I highly doubt it.

Predictions for tomorrow:
England 3-2 Belgium (Bonus: Sterling scores the winner and The S*n takes the "should've lost this game" narrative and bashes him)
Panama 0-2 Tunisia (Bonus: Blas Perez wins a penalty but it gets overturned by VAR)
Japan 1-1 Poland (Bonus: Lewandowski scores early in the second half, a substitute--probably Honda or Okazaki--gets the equalizer late)
Senegal 1-3 Colombia (Bonus: James will score his first goal of the tournament, thereby taking Jamesmania to 10)

Fun Fact (In The Form Of A Dad Joke): Groups G and H are the groups of no love--they've both yet to have a game with <3 goals.

[Leinad]

0/5 for African teams. For whatever reason, African football has done steps backwards since the the days of Cameroon 1990, Nigeria 1994 and 1998, and Senegal 2002.

I mean, Morocco had a hard group, Nigeria were beaten by Argentina on two great goals and arguably a missed penalty call, Senegal were knocked out on literally the last tiebreaker, Egypt's best player was nowhere near 100%. I guess it's convenient the facts lined up with your narrative

[Leinad]

Further evidence great teams > great players.

Uruguay vs. France is going to be really good. 2 of the 5 teams I think have a realistic shot to win this.

[Leinad]

I mean, except of Cheryshev, all russian players play in Russian Football League. Not as good as fuil team of Real and Barcelona's players

True, but Golovin is probably going to join a bigger club.

As far as I know lots of them are there because domestic players get paid more in Russia. Maybe they don't like leaving, perhaps for similar reasons to English players. But your point is definitely right that on paper they're not as good as most of these "top teams."

Russia
Croatia
Sweden
Switzerland
Colombia
England

One of these teams will be in the World Cup final.

I KNOW. This is excellent. Now all we need is Brazil and France to go out...CHAOS WILL REIGN!!!!!!

[Leinad]

Neymar sold it melodramatically but you can't step on people like that. Layun knew exactly what he was doing.

Re: Belgium vs. Japan, even if Belgium can win this (2-2 as I post this), holy sugarplums they are abysmal defensively. A team like Brazil or France on all cylinders could score 5 against this team. (It'll be more fun if Japan win, though.)

[Leinad]

Neymar sold it melodramatically but you can't step on people like that. Layun knew exactly what he was doing.

Re: Belgium vs. Japan, even if Belgium can win this (2-2 as I post this), holy sugarplums they are abysmal defensively. A team like Brazil or France on all cylinders could score 5 against this team. (It'll be more fun if Japan win, though.)

Argentina did put 3 against France though.

And? I never said anything about Belgium scoring against those teams, in fact I think they probably would, but the way Martinez is setting them up basically guarantees a plethora of chances for whoever they're playing against. Japan and Tunisia were each able to score 2, a better team (such as the one they're playing next) will punish this naivety even more.

Anyway, crushing for Japan, but no one predicted them even getting out of the group. They can be happy with how they did overall.

[Leinad]

Not a terrible chance we have a rematch of the 1958 final (Brazil vs. Sweden) in the final, and a fairly likely chance we get a rematch of the 1998 final (Brazil vs. France) or the 1950 pseudo-final (Brazil vs. Uruguay) in the semis this year.

The unbalanced nature of the bracket--how we have a "dark horse half" and a "favorites half"--is bad in some ways I guess but as a mostly neutral spectator it's absurdly fun. We get games like France-Argentina, France-Uruguay, and Brazil-Belgium, but we also get these "smaller" teams making deep runs.

Switzerland isn't the only team in the World Cup history to be screwed by bad luck.

I mean they got good calls in the group stage, so it kinda evens out.

[Leinad]

Unlucky Switzerland, but surely whoever wins this equally dire game has a real chance go to the Semis now.

I want the England hype train to choo choo forward but then I don't want to hear the marching band every other day either, and progressing further than the rosbifs after Farage's comments would be sweet.

Yeah. The people who are claiming that 'football is coming home' are the worst. Football was taken from the home by the child protection services because England was molesting it, it's not coming back.

They're pretty much all saying it ironically.

[Leinad]

I hope Mark Geiger will never ever referee a game again.
He's completely incompetent.

Most MLS fans would agree with that.

I think he used to be better, but has been in a several-year funk since he eliminated Panama on behalf of Mexico in a Gold Cup semifinal, and now is simply the default "best American ref" by name recognition from 2014. (I attended that Gold Cup game, so maybe this is all my fault )

I mean, yes the Colombians are making obvious fouls and deserve the yellow cards, but the English did some obvious fouls too with not the same sanctions from the referee.

Barrios headbutted a player and just got a yellow. Shocking call.

[Leinad]

An interesting scenario just came into my mind:

If Colombia and Spain played against each other, who would Shakira root for?

Pointless facts that are definitely not related: 2018 is only the second time both of them got out of the group stage. The last time was in 1990 (they were both knocked out in the round of 16, Spain by Yugoslavia, Colombia by Cameroon). Shakira's debut album was released in 1991, the year after.

[Leinad]

Will the "England sucks at penalty shootouts" narrative be multiplied or obliterated here?

*plays dramatic music*

[Leinad]

Why don't they just pull a 'van Gaal' and send Hart in? The Netherlands also had a penalty syndrome and switching our keeper 1 minute before the penalty shootout did wonders. Is Pickford a penalty killer ? Otherwise you might just try to surprise your opponent lol.

Butland and Pope are the others on the squad, no Hart.

[Leinad]

I think Ospina has gone the right way every time so far.

[Leinad]

That reminds me of how blonde the Swedish team is. I think it's the blondest team of the World Cup, even blonder than the German one.

Surely Iceland is blonder, right?

[Leinad]

Brazil or France will steamroll whoever is the other finalist. But at this rate we'll see an Uruguay v Sweden final. And Sweden would probably win lol.

They're not gonna "steam roll" Croatia lol

Also I don't buy the idea that Uruguay and Sweden are the most "dark horse"-y teams left. Surely I'm not in the minority thinking that Uruguay > Belgium, right?

[Leinad]

I guess they value UEFA qualifying a lot in their formula, which explains England and Belgium over Uruguay. I feel like the order is right-ish, I'd probably swap Uruguay and England. Maybe put Croatia over Uruguay given the former's easier path to the final and Cavani's injury (which will hurt Uruguay a lot if it's true at all).