World Cup...

[FredRydr]

Today in my barber's shop in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania USA, during the France v. Argentina match. I was warned not to touch the FIFA trophy because I am not English (my wife and his wife are English and support their home team by having all their local English (only) friends fondle the ugly thing "for luck").


40836

[although]

Well, they did invent the game... I guess I could allow them to keep their old trophy to themselves.

Shame that they can't remember how to play it :)

[Jon Szanto]

I keep some pens in a World Cup.

[RocketRyan]

It's coming home, it's coming home!

[fqgouvea]

My son once observed that the English are an extremely generous people when it comes to sports. They invent interesting sports for other countries to excel in.

Vai Brasil!

[RocketRyan]

The sobering stat I heard about the world cup was that since 1966 England have only won 6 knockout games.

[although]

Watched the Columbia match.... Wow, just wow... I'm exhausted

[mulrich]

My son once observed that the English are an extremely generous people when it comes to sports. They invent interesting sports for other countries to excel in.

Vai Brasil!

More depressing, the US has only won six games total since 1934.

[RocketRyan]

England win on penalties, well Hell must have frozen and I'm keeping an eye out for a flying pig.

[FredRydr]

:applause:

[SIR]

My son once observed that the English are an extremely generous people when it comes to sports. They invent interesting sports for other countries to excel in.

Vai Brasil!

More depressing, the US has only won six games total since 1934.

Until Spain won in 2010, England were the only country still plagued by the disease of royalty to have ever won the competition...

Despite France being a secular state, no country other than those with a majority population identifying themselves as Christian has ever won the tournament, and England is still the only winning country with a populace that doesn't predominantly identify itself as being Catholic - arguements about the relative lack of differences between the Anglican form of protestantism and Catholicism aside.

[Paddler]

My son once observed that the English are an extremely generous people when it comes to sports. They invent interesting sports for other countries to excel in.

Vai Brasil!

More depressing, the US has only won six games total since 1934.

For those who wish to watch a game involving total chaos, the US has basketball. Soccer is just not needed to fill that function.

[fqgouvea]

For those who wish to watch a game involving total chaos, the US has basketball. Soccer is just not needed to fill that function.

Nor could it, of course.

[mulrich]

For those who wish to watch a game involving total chaos, the US has basketball. Soccer is just not needed to fill that function.

Basketball is actually my favorite sport but I still enjoy international soccer (sorry MLS).

[RocketRyan]

It's coming home, it's coming home!

[Scooby921]

It's been an interesting tournament of surprise results. England definitely has the talent to be where they are, but I didn't expect them to have the cohesiveness necessary to make a run for the cup.

[Medieval]

Yeah there's been quite a few odd results in the competition so far but it's all good because that makes it more interesting. I'm glad to see the likes of Germany, Italy, Argentina, Brazil, and Spain get knocked out. I would like to see more outside team such as japan, South Korea, Iran, Australia, China, and other teams do well.

With England we've always had great players but the management have usually not been up to task. Being able to play well as a team has not always been there, and that's more important than having a collection of great players who can't play as a team. I think Gareth Southgate is the notch above many past managers and he's chosen a great squad with great team spirit, so I think we're actually in with a chance this year.

[mulrich]

Why did Alex Ferguson never coach the English national team? He seems like one of the better managers with an England connection (even though he was Scottish) so I’m surprised he never led the team.

[SIR]

Yeah there's been quite a few odd results in the competition so far but it's all good because that makes it more interesting. I'm glad to see the likes of Germany, Italy, Argentina, Brazil, and Spain get knocked out. I would like to see more outside team such as japan, South Korea, Iran, Australia, China, and other teams do well.

With England we've always had great players but the management have usually not been up to task. Being able to play well as a team has not always been there, and that's more important than having a collection of great players who can't play as a team. I think Gareth Southgate is the notch above many past managers and he's chosen a great squad with great team spirit, so I think we're actually in with a chance this year.

There is still some residual tending towards an attitudinal sense of entitlement in the England team, but one of the big benefits to having a lot of youngsters is that they're not such a bunch of overpaid egos and have not lost the drive to compete and perform as a team.

Just my 2 pence worth.

[Medieval]

Yeah there's been quite a few odd results in the competition so far but it's all good because that makes it more interesting. I'm glad to see the likes of Germany, Italy, Argentina, Brazil, and Spain get knocked out. I would like to see more outside team such as japan, South Korea, Iran, Australia, China, and other teams do well.

With England we've always had great players but the management have usually not been up to task. Being able to play well as a team has not always been there, and that's more important than having a collection of great players who can't play as a team. I think Gareth Southgate is the notch above many past managers and he's chosen a great squad with great team spirit, so I think we're actually in with a chance this year.

There is still some residual tending towards an attitudinal sense of entitlement in the England team, but one of the big benefits to having a lot of youngsters is that they're not such a bunch of overpaid egos and have not lost the drive to compete and perform as a team.

Just my 2 pence worth.

Yes that's right. Many of our squad in the past were more brand names than great team players. Beckham, for example, was overrated. In the present young squad, the focus on brand names is mostly gone.

Being young players they will be more eager to play well than pose for the world cameras.

[SIR]

Being young players they will be more eager to play well than pose for the world cameras.

May I suggest they are equally eager to pose for the cameras but they actually recognise the need to justify the posing with exemplary performance?

[Scooby921]

Why did Alex Ferguson never coach the English national team? He seems like one of the better managers with an England connection (even though he was Scottish) so I’m surprised he never led the team.
Probably timing. SAF was on a mission when he started at MUFC and after those first few years of building I don't think he wanted to walk away, nor did the ownership want to let him go. By the time he retired I think he had built up enough other interests and investments that coaching the national team was stress he didn't need.




Being young players they will be more eager to play well than pose for the world cameras.


May I suggest they are equally eager to pose for the cameras but they actually recognise the need to justify the posing with exemplary performance?
I think it's more simple. I think friendship is the difference. The older generation had developed too many years of disdain for club rivals and didn't come together as a cohesive unit for the national team. The younger players, and Southgate as a manager, are developing and promoting friendship in the team. They get along. They want to play and fight for each other. Football is more fun and much easier when you like the people you are playing with.




Also...someone more competent than Joe Hart is between the goal posts. Stopping balls from going into the net goes a long way to helping the team win.

[mulrich]

Probably timing. SAF was on a mission when he started at MUFC and after those first few years of building I don't think he wanted to walk away, nor did the ownership want to let him go. By the time he retired I think he had built up enough other interests and investments that coaching the national team was stress he didn't need.


I also keep forgetting that a national team's manager is a full-time position, unlike basketball (which is my favorite sport) where the national coach is a part-time position.

[Scooby921]

I'm a Manchester United fan and a fan of English football in general. I want to see England win because these are the players I watch every weekend for 2/3 of the year. But being American I feel like a certain break-up letter in 1776 means I should be cheering for Croatia instead of the imperialists. I'm torn.

[mulrich]

I should stop picking teams to cheer for; every time I do they get eliminated. Sorry England for wanting you to win and making you my next victim.

I don't have strong feelings about Croatia but I can't root for France. Sorry Croatia but it looks like your run is about to end.

[Medieval]

That's ok, Mulrich. We played well but it wasn't to be. We just lost confidence in the later part of the 1st half and it went down hill from there.

[adhoc]

I'm happy Croatia won. They don't have money to just import the best players and give them citizenship. They have 4 million people to pool from and they beat an absolute favorite with near limitless amount of money.

[mulrich]

England should be a powerhouse but has underperformed for a LONG time. The fact that either England or Croatia were in the semifinal was surprising.

England started really well but seemed to quit after ~30 minutes and allowed Croatia to dictate the game (or Croatia imposed their will and England was helpless to stop them).

[Morgaine]

For once, I actually like this England team. They seem more genuine people, unlike some of the rich celebrity players of the previous decade, including the one who had a broken metatarsal.

[adhoc]

England should be a powerhouse but has underperformed for a LONG time. The fact that either England or Croatia were in the semifinal was surprising.

England started really well but seemed to quit after ~30 minutes and allowed Croatia to dictate the game (or Croatia imposed their will and England was helpless to stop them).

Looking at stats, I'd say Croatia pretty much dominated across the board.

[Scooby921]

I'm happy Croatia won. They don't have money to just import the best players and give them citizenship. They have 4 million people to pool from and they beat an absolute favorite with near limitless amount of money.
Is this a dig at England? I thought their entire team was natural born English citizens, unlike the USA where we import half the team and still can't find good players. Also, money has little to do with football talent. Brazil is nearly bankrupt and still produces some of the best talent on the planet, most of which comes from families who have no money. On the flip side, how many world class talents have come from families of Russian oligarchs or the House of Saud and all of their oil money?





England should be a powerhouse but has underperformed for a LONG time. The fact that either England or Croatia were in the semifinal was surprising.

England started really well but seemed to quit after ~30 minutes and allowed Croatia to dictate the game (or Croatia imposed their will and England was helpless to stop them).

Looking at stats, I'd say Croatia pretty much dominated across the board.
Yeah. It was pretty even for the first part of the game, but England just couldn't get the ball through the midfield and didn't have enough attacking support. As soon as they started playing long-ball it was over. They couldn't get bodies forward with the ball, Harry Kane didn't win enough (any?) headers to maintain possession. In England's defense, Dejan Lovren should have been sent off before half time. That early elbow to Kane's ribs to stop a counter attack really was worthy of a yellow card. Hacking late on Sterling's leg shortly thereafter was worthy of a second. Then in the second half he could / should have been cautioned for throwing Lingard to the turf after the whistle had blown. He's a first-rate asshole and would fit right in with Argentina. If you can't beat them, injure them.

England's other problem is Gareth Southgate's belief that Jordan Henderson is a good central midfielder. Eric Dier is better. Jack Wilshere is better (though still not as good as he believes himself to be). Scott McTominay is better and Southgate should have promised him a spot on the Cup squad to get him to play for England instead of Scotland. An old, retired Michael Carrick is better than Henderson has ever been. A retired and out-of-shape Gerrard or Lampard would have been better than Henderson. This is why I expected Croatia to win. Modric and Rakitic are better midfielders. They controlled the center of the pitch and made it hard for England to develop the play.

[Morgaine]

Raheem Sterling was born in Jamaica.

Does anyone wear waistcoats?

[adhoc]

I’m sorry, but there’s no logical cohesion to your post. You also make a bunch of assumptions I never said. Looks to me like England had a pool of 1.200 million africans plus 80 million people from UK plus probably another billion from the rest of the world. Croatia had a pool of 4 million people to draw from. The only reason I mentioned money is because one country can afford to import anyone and the other doesn’t. I didn’t say you have to be a billionaire to be good at football. That would be idiotic.

Yes, yes, the only reason Croatia won was because they cheated, the judges were on their side etc.

UK imports an entire Croatia worth of people every decade. If you don’t see how utterly impossible it should be for a small country like Croatia to win through statistic alone, then I don’t know.

[mulrich]

I’m sorry, but there’s no logical cohesion to your post. You also make a bunch of assumptions I never said. Looks to me like England had a pool of 1.200 million africans plus 80 million people from UK plus probably another billion from the rest of the world. Croatia had a pool of 4 million people to draw from. The only reason I mentioned money is because one country can afford to import anyone and the other doesn’t. I didn’t say you have to be a billionaire to be good at football. That would be idiotic.

Yes, yes, the only reason Croatia won was because they cheated, the judges were on their side etc.

UK imports an entire Croatia worth of people every decade. If you don’t see how utterly impossible it should be for a small country like Croatia to win through statistic alone, then I don’t know.

Croatia defintely deserves substantial credit; I thought they'd be gassed after the Russian game but they continued to attack against England and England did little to stop them.

I hope Croatia's streak continues against France.

[Scooby921]

I’m sorry, but there’s no logical cohesion to your post. You also make a bunch of assumptions I never said. Looks to me like England had a pool of 1.200 million africans plus 80 million people from UK plus probably another billion from the rest of the world. Croatia had a pool of 4 million people to draw from. The only reason I mentioned money is because one country can afford to import anyone and the other doesn’t. I didn’t say you have to be a billionaire to be good at football. That would be idiotic.

Yes, yes, the only reason Croatia won was because they cheated, the judges were on their side etc.

UK imports an entire Croatia worth of people every decade. If you don’t see how utterly impossible it should be for a small country like Croatia to win through statistic alone, then I don’t know.
:baby:

If you want to talk statistics and impossibilities, you have to account for things in the other direction as well. China and India are the two largest populations on the planet. Statistically, Hong Kong, Shanghai, or Bejing as cities should be able to field a better football team than Croatia as a country. The United States should be fielding a better team than everyone not China or India. Yet this isn't what happens. Population and money have nothing to do with which teams are good. This is entirely my point. You've said, twice now, that countries with money are buying talent and that's why they are good. Yet historically that is not how it works in the world of football.

It is not the large countries or the rich countries which are always at the top. People choosing to emigrate to England or the USA or Germany or Italy and attain citizenship is not that country importing players. England didn't ask or pay Raheem Sterling's mother to move from Jamaica. Italy didn't ask or pay Mario Balotelli's parents to move from Ghana. Spain didn't buy Diego Costa. His professional career took him to a club there and over years of living and working in Spain he gained citizenship. He chose to play for Spain over his native Brazil.


Please don't mistake my disdain for Dejan Lovren as suggesting England only lost because of the referee. I believe the better team won. Croatia played harder. They played more cohesively. They earned it. I simply think Lovren to be an first-rate asshole. He pulls the same bullshit for Liverpool. Like Martin Skrtel he can't play clean or fair. He is constantly grabbing, holding, tackling, and attempting to injure his opponents to compensate for his lack of pace and ability. Had the ref made the right call and handed out a caution for that first hack on Harry Kane it might have kept Lovren under control. Instead he continue to kick and hack the entire game. Ignoring that asshole, I think Modric and Rakitic owned the midfield as expected. I think Perisic played his best game of the cup thus far. I am not the least bit surprised to see Croatia in the World Cup final. I know that doesn't line up with your statistics, but you can't judge football by statistics.

[adhoc]

I can’t believe I have to explain this...football isn’t a popular sport in China, India or even USA, really.

[titrisol]

Hravtska is home?

England only won in 66, thanks to the ghost goal...

[titrisol]

Uruguay has less pop than that and has won 4 cups ;)

[Medieval]

I supported England but I have no hard feelings towards Croatia and wish them the best. The better side won and that's all the counts.

There was an interesting article in The Economist in June entitled: "What makes a country good at football?"
https://www.economist.com/international/2018/06/09/what-makes-a-country-good-at-football

[Morgaine]

Any Icelandic members here? They have a higher chance of being part of the national... whatever, team

[Scooby921]

I can’t believe I have to explain this...football isn’t a popular sport in China, India or even USA, really.
Is this just your opinion, or did you look up specifics and still post this knowing it is incorrect?

The Chinese Super League is one of the biggest spenders in the world of football. I'm not sure how a club can justify a €60m transfer fee and a €30m/yr player salary if the ticket and merchandise sales aren't there to back it up. As far as viewership and popularity football is #2 to basketball, though articles note that football fans spend more on merchandise than basketball fans. One site I read indicates that 12% of athletes in China play football. I didn't find a number on how many total people are classified as athletes, but even if a lowly 10% of the total population were considered "athletes" then that 12% is nearly 20 million football players.

I can't find much data on India, but it does classify football as a rising sport. It's still behind cricket, but the youth in India has greater interest in football because it's less boring. There are groups in India working to establish playing fields and teams across the majority of schools in the country. The do have their own professional league and at apparently had a season-long viewership of more than 200 million. 10 team league means 18 games (home and away for each) and a total of 180 games if my math is correct. So on average they have more than 1 million people tuning in on TV to watch each match. If only 1% of India's population is interested in or plays football it's still 13 million people.

The USA is far different from what you think you know. Football is now the 3rd most watched sport in the country. The MLS has grown from its original 10 teams in 1998 to 23 teams in 2018, and will expand to 26 teams by 2020. Instead of teams sharing stadiums with hand-egg (American football) teams they now have dedicated football-specific venues with seating capacities similar to many clubs in Europe (20,000 to 60,000). A recent study indicates that 7% of the country plays football. It might be a small overall percentage, but that's still 24 million people. I'm one of that 24 million. I've been playing for 30 years.

Now that we've established that these significantly larger countries have more soccer players than Croatia has total people, how is it that the large, rich countries are importing talent to make themselves better?


I get it. You're proud of your neighboring country. I'm happy for them too. They work hard. They play hard. They earned it. If you want to say it's impressive for a country with 1/10th the population of England I agree. In theory a smaller talent pool makes it more difficult to assemble a team of this caliber. But for some reason you decided to bring money into the equation and suggest that all these other countries are buying / importing their players. There is no relationship between money and how good a national team can be. I also don't see a big trend between population and the talent which comes from any given country.

[adhoc]

I see you are unable of grasping economies of scale, you don't know that Croatia threatened us with war just half a year ago over a border dispute, so we're not in a great relationship, and you also think that England, the country where the sport comes from and domestic violence raises by 38% whenever their team loses, has somehow a lesser motivation to win than Croatia.

Either way, I find your arguments intellectually unstimulating, and hence no longer wish to spend my time in such an unfruitful endeavor.

[mulrich]

[QUOTE=adhoc;244522]
The USA is far different from what you think you know. Football is now the 3rd most watched sport in the country. The MLS has grown from its original 10 teams in 1998 to 23 teams in 2018, and will expand to 26 teams by 2020. Instead of teams sharing stadiums with hand-egg (American football) teams they now have dedicated football-specific venues with seating capacities similar to many clubs in Europe (20,000 to 60,000). A recent study indicates that 7% of the country plays football. It might be a small overall percentage, but that's still 24 million people. I'm one of that 24 million. I've been playing for 30 years.

Small correction, MLS is the 3rd most attended professional sports league in the US, not the 3rd most watched (maybe you meant all forms of football, not just MLS). It's surprisingly hard to find the average number of TV watchers by the various US sports leagues but I did find TV revenues by league, and MLS ranked last on the list ($90m/year, also behind various college sports and other sports like gold, tennis, or NASCAR).
I really enjoy watching soccer but have no interest in MLS; the quality of competition is just not high enough to keep my interest. The US has a long ways to go in developing a real soccer talent development system. I think we'll eventually get there but we're still a ways off.

[fqgouvea]

Uruguay has less pop than that and has won 4 cups ;)

Only two, 1930 at home and 1950 in Brazil.

[Scooby921]

I see you are unable of grasping economies of scale, you don't know that Croatia threatened us with war just half a year ago over a border dispute, so we're not in a great relationship, and you also think that England, the country where the sport comes from and domestic violence raises by 38% whenever their team loses, has somehow a lesser motivation to win than Croatia.

Either way, I find your arguments intellectually unstimulating, and hence no longer wish to spend my time in such an unfruitful endeavor.
What economies of scale? What in the actual hell are you talking about? You've gone from suggesting Croatia is wonderful because they are small and beat a giant who imports all of their players, to now suggesting that because their fans are just as stupid as anyone else on the planet that it means they had any more or less motivation to win. You change your comments and deflect more than most politicians.

At least we can both agree that it's been unfruitful.

Let us go back to talking pens :)

[HitBoi]

Engerland is SHITE at football and their stars seem to peak in their mid 20s. "B-but it was coming home, la-." No, it never was. The generation before this one had better quality players in almost every position sans striker but they didn't know how to play together and they seemed to have overachieved in this world cup. I'm almost certain Columbia would've trounced them with James.

[RocketRyan]

Don't hold back with your opinions