2014 FIFA World Cup Thread

[FarawayFairways]

Revenge is when you're the architect yourself, and don't rely on a proxy to do it for you. So this looks more like embittered bad loser

I don't think there's any hard and fast rule about this though. It would still be an anathema to support certain teams for us regardless of whether they gave us some reflected status, but that's to do with established historical rivalries which have built up over centuries in some cases, or decades where its restricted to football.

There was a time when losing to an eventual winner did less damage to your ranking, but I'm not sure what the rules are for that now

[David in FL]

Revenge is when you're the architect yourself, and don't rely on a proxy to do it for you. S o this looks more like embittered bad loser

You say tomato, I say tomauto.......

[FarawayFairways]

Oh... I don't think there's necessarily anything wrong with being an embittered sore loser so long as you recognise it and are able to laugh at your motives. Under certain circumstances it can also be healthy of course if capable of providing a focus for future engagements. It's actually the first step on the road to developing meaningful rivalries too. For heavens sake, England fans would know, they've had more practice than most over the years.

I think the other thing about revenge apart from inflicting it yoruself, is that it has to be meaningful. I remember our media trying to tell us that an English victory in a dead match in the final set of European Championship round over Germany, from a group which neither of us could qualify from, was revenge for 1996 (a semi final penlaty shoot out)  ..... urm didn't feel much like revenge. Knocking Argentina out in 2002 felt more like it for 1998, albeit we didn't delivery the final blow, but probably dealt them the critical one in the 1-0 victory (which incidentally we cheated in order to achieve - which made it even better)

Football can bring out the worst in all of us

[Abu3baid]

Looks like it is heading to PKs Not even going to stay up for this.. It's already 1:30 am Go costa

[RJH999]

Amazing Stuff! Where the hell do you live, Abu3baid? Lol

[FarawayFairways]

I'm trying to think if football has ever had a global result on this magnitude should the Costa's pull this off? Right now, I can't think of any

[RJH999]

I'm trying to think if football has ever had a global result on this magnitude should the Costa's pull this off? Right now, I can't think of any

Crushing for Costa Rica. Cameroon in 90?

[Golfingdad]

I never understood this logic.  I wanted Belgium to win the whole enchilada (but alas, no such luck).  Had Belgium won the World Cup, then I can say U.S. lost to the best, so there is no shame.  But losing to a mediocre team just makes the USA team look worse.

Are you me?? This is exactly my thought as well. Same goes for the dipshits who start the "over-rated" chants after their team just beat a powerhouse. Do they not even realize they are indirectly insulting their own team by trying to imply that the opponent is not as good as thought??

[FarawayFairways]

Cameroon was a group match, as was Senegal. Both Argentina and France were defending champions, but this would have taken Costa into the semis which was the magnitude I was referring to

The Dutch penalties were superb.

The ref should have intervened on Krull for ungentlemanly conduct. It's up to the ref to decide when the penalty is to be taken and if the spot kick taker is in place but the keeper is deliberately delaying, well the ref can blow the whistle and let them roll it into an empty net whilst he's parading around playingmind games

Not sure about the wisdom of kneeling either that the Costas did. If you're suffering cramps and tired legs, you shouldn't be doing that

[MacDutch]

Pff that was a close call. Never done before, to change your goalkeeper because the substitute is a better penalty stopper. Its Krul with one l by the way :-)

[FarawayFairways]

I've never understood this business of the third goalkeeper at a major tournament. I've felt for years that teams should select 2 goalkeepers and a specialist penalty stopper, precisely for this kind of occasion. The only time I can recall that a third goalkeeper has ever been used was in 1978 when the French needed theirs. Although this sounds like a sad piece of tivia, it's the goalkepers name that sticks in the memory - Dropsey! Possibly the worst named goalkeeper of all time.

I remember England nearly needing theirs once (Chris Woods) but they didn't. I also remember England flirting with the idea of nominating Glen Hoddle as their reserve keeper and thus allowing them to utilise an additional outfield player in the squad, as by all accounts Hoddle was a passable keeper if needed in an emergency. I definitely remember that at the last world cup and African nation or comparative minnow did this, and FIFA sanctioned them by insisting they he had to play as a goalkeeper (basically FIFA made the rules up as they went along).

You select your squad of players. There is nothing that says you have to pick X number of defenders, Y number of midfielders etc The balance of the squad is at your discretion. So far as I understood the team concerned were within their rights to do what they did, and the fact that FIFA intervened on their selection suggests so too

I have seen this specialist goalkeeper tactic used occasionally in play off matches, but what usually prevents it happening is that the number of substitutes allowed has been exhausted after 120 minutes. Krul had only saved 2 penalties from 20 for Newcastle prior to last night, which is hardly specialist territory, in fact it's below average (penalties go at about 78% in the Premiership) so he should be saving about 4-5.

I suspect that we'll discover in the next few days that all of this was done on the training ground, as the Dutch spot kicks themselves were very well executed and we'll probably find that Krul stopped more than the other keepers trying out, and that the penalty takers themselves expressed the view that he was hardest to keeper to beat.

[FarawayFairways]

Suggestions in elements of the British media today that the USA is being lined up to replace Qatar 2022

I wouldn't dismiss this as idle lazy media speculation just yet. The British media have been on FIFA's case more than any other single country. Both the BBC and the Sunday Times more recently have been the ones exposing FIFA's fraud through a combination of sting and research

Even by FIFA's admittedly very low standards, defending the Qatar decision is getting harder and harder as more and more pieces fall off it. The USA is now the stand out candidate to replace them. The stadium and infrastructure is in place, the consciousness that the game has will be even higher in 2022 (i think 1994 was a premature) and of course there's going to be no sponsorship issues (5 of FIFA's official partners are American firms)

If I were asked to predict a Yes/ No outcome on this, I'd say it's 60% likely to happen at this stage

[cipher]

Simple revenge..... :-) ...and the U.S. was never more than mediocre anyway.

A mediocre top 16 team in the world. Interesting point of view.

[jamo]

A mediocre top 16 team in the world. Interesting point of view.

T9, baby!

[Abu3baid]

I'm really torn right now.. Just want to see a good game but that is a given right?? So I'm rooting for the machine! Let's go Germany!

[Abu3baid]

Goooooooooaaaaaaaallll. Goal goal goal

[Abu3baid]

Muller has been produced from the depths of the German factory for years now

[yrew]

Yeah they perfected all the previous versions. But the defense of Brazil was terrible. They shouldn't let him wander around in the box like that.