That fact makes my heart bleed even more :cry:

...filthy traitors :evil:

Nevertheless, congratulations on Germany's performance, Barkworm. I watched their match against Costa Rica and it was very entertaining. Frings and Lahm scored some wonderful goals, Klose has a great chance to become the best scorer of the whole tournament. Something tells me Lehmann will lose his position in the German goal after this match and Kahn is going to play against Poland, tho'.

I made a new thread since at least two of us here care about this. I remember the thread for the last European championship where I basically talked to myself and Wingnut who didn't even watch the games. :lol:
Lehmann injured his foot in the Costa Rica match so he might not play against Poland. He won't lose his position permanently though. I don't know how much people outside of Germany know about this but after the horrible soap opera we had till he finally became #1, Klinsmann would lose all of his credibility if he changed back. The defence has to be re-organized though, I have no clue why they tried an offside trap all the time.
Ecuador's performance suprised me a lot, I always thought they'd be easy prey away from their mountain. Poland was really weak though, plus they had bad luck.
So how do you think will things develop?

Jolly good idea. I thought about creating a thread like this one too, but I was afraid it'd be totally ignored. I reckon there are going to be at least two-three more people to participate in it. But I don't want to call the names.

Yeah, we heard about that Lehmann-Kahn's rivarly, at least here. Lehmann did not play well yesterday, but he wasn't as bad as Friedrich - now that was what I call a terrible performance. But I should remain silent, as I support the team that screwed up yesterday really, really badly.

The said thing is, Poland played a friendly match against Ecuador last autumn in Barcelona. And they won 3-0. So we were all excited here after the Group A squad's been announced. That's why the yesterday's result is a full catastrophe. Of course they had terribly bad luck (2 posts, one bar and one goal scored from the offside) but they were extremely weak and totally unmotivated, unfortunately. And played a hilarious tactics - "4-5-1", something that might be good for the angrily attacking Germans and their weak defense of the counter-attacks - but not in the match where we should have scored as many goals as possible. But yeah - the Polish coach made a lot surprising decisions so far. For instance, he didn't call up Jerzy Dudek (F.C. Liverpool goalkeeper who won Champions' League last year), probably the most recognized Polish player. Oh well.

I suppose Germany and Ecuador are going to promote themselves to the next round. Poland's got a snowball's chance in hell to beat the Germans so my heart is going to bleed even more on Wednesday. But you guys definitely should do something with your defence line. Sweden or England in 1/8 round and The Netherlands or Argentina in the quarter-finals stage are going to be way more challenging than your group opponents.

Now I'm all excited with today's Argentina-Ivory Coast encounter. I hope the African team wins or at least draws.

The first half of the first day wasn't that much of a surprise. Germany beating Costa Rica... Wow, what a surprise. And the game wasn't that impressive, if you ask me. But Poland - Ecuador was a surprise. I totally expected the Polish to win, but apparently Ecuador's better than anyone expected. Nontheless, I hope that both Poland and Germany will make it to the next round. Germany's out of the question, but Poland has to work now. I don't really root for Germany because they're annoying me for months now, but for the sake of the game, they need to go further.

Anyways, here's my guesses for today:

UK - Paraguay: The UK wins. At least two goals ahead of Paraguay.
Trinidad/Tobago - Sweden: Sweden. Although they're both not extraordinarily good, they just might pull this off.
Argentina - Côte d'Ivoire: Another joke of a match, just like Germany - Costa Rica. They might as well just call it a day and go drinking. Argentina wins.

But can we also talk about the commercial side of the WM (as it's known as over here)? I must say that I'm so glad that they're finally playing soccer. I mean, we have had commercial overkill for months now. Soccerthis, soccerthat, singing flowers, Ballack in every other commercial. I seriously stopped watching TV for a while just because I was so pissed at the whole WM-sh*t on TV. But it's not just the commercials that piss me off, no, all those WM-specials just were too much. Kahn this, Ballack that and that damned arrogance the Germans have towards everyone else. It's sickening. From that point of view, I hope all those companies who had WM-commercials would have to file for bankruptcy (like plushie-manufacturer Nici) and that everyone loses a lot of money. I really hate the whole commercial crap.

And Goleo plus the song are just terrible.

HERBERT GRÖNEMEYER FTW!!!
I have learned to ignore commercials so I wasn't really bothered by all the crap. I pity all those people in Germany who don't give a crap about football because I'm sure this must be torture for them.
BTW, is Germany really that arrogant? I honestly never felt that way. I think the most arrogant football nation has always been Brazil (they do have a reason for their arrogance though). :dead:
I got tickets for this!!!!! My brother actually won them. I coulnd't believe it. I had been trying to get tickets for months and he simply wins some.

I haven't heard that song yet, and I don't care. I have heard the Sportfreunde Stiller and that terrible official crap-song. And what has a "love generation" got to do with Football?

Normally, I don't care about it all, but this is big. But it's not that big since it's been blown way, way out of proportion.

Yes, but it's not the players, it's everyone else. And it's not just limited to soccer. A prime example was the Eurovision song contest. First they were moaning about not winning, then they were accusing everyone of cheating and that they were all conspiring against Germany and so on... I'm convinced that the same thing happens when Germany finally gets beaten at the WM.

That's so awesome! I would have gone see Switzerland - Togo if I had some money. Now my buddy's sister is going with him and another friend of mine.

England's match with Paraguay just finished 1-0. England's second half performance was particularly dull.This is something that particularly annoys me about the World Cup, it just seems too easy for the bigger nations to make it to the knock-out stages. Even though England played poorly, there was never any doubt that they would win. That's why many managers and pundits agree that the European Championship is actually harder to win than the World Cup because the quality of the teams is much higher.
Just look at who Greece had to play to win Euro 2004: Portugal, Spain, Russia, France, Czech Republic and Portugal again in the final.
Meanwhile in 2002 Brazil played: Turkey (admittedly, they were impressive), Costa Rica, China, Belgium(!), England, Turkey and Germany (who surprised many in reaching the final).
I'm sure that England will pick up the pace now. They have to, afterall, as it is highly probably that England play Germany in the knockout stages which is a big deal to say the least. Having said that, I don't feel that England deserve to be ranked 2nd in the tournament.
About the whole naturalisation of footballers issue: I really dislike it. The associations of England, Portugal (even though they play Deco), Italy, Greece and Brazil have publically spoken out against it. Then you look at teams like Germany, France and Australia whose national teams consist of many foreigners. It's a real shame because France and Germany are certainly capable of fielding a strong team of home-grown talents.

You lucky dog you.

I watched England - Paraguay. It all ended up pretty early, after Paraguay's own goal. Then, the rest of the game was rather boring, except for a few rare more exciting moments.

I think Beckham should claim that goal. The defender's touch did nothing more than confuse the keeper. The cross was already going on target and the flick from Garrera hardly changed the direction of the ball at all. If Beckham does successfully claim that goal, he'll become England's first ever player to score in 3 World Cups.

Sorry to double post.
That's not true. Ivory Coast has a very strong team with many players in England (Drogba, Eboue, Toure) and the young Yaya Toure who currently plays for Olympiakos is sure to make an impact. It's also a very young, athletic team. African football is no longer in the state it used to be. Teams like Cameroon, Senegal and Nigeria have all played well on the world stage and many newspapers here in Britain rank Ivory Coast as dark horses to win. While I do feel that Argentina may be a bit too much for them, the Argentinians are hardly going to have an easy game. This could be a very entertaining, fast-paced match.

Amen to that.

And yay for Trinidad&Tobago for such a brave fight resulting in draw against the awkward Swedes. Hislop saved their asses quite a few times - his performance really cheered me up. Too bad that match was very boring in general and not worth watching at all.

Hislop was sent in at the last second, too after their number 1 picked up an injury. Did you see at the end of the game he started crying? That's how much it means to them. Trinidad managed to squeeze out 1 or 2 chances in an otherwise disappointing game. Ibrahimovic looks poor. This will give Trinidad huge confidence going into the England fixture.

Does anyone have any idea what the odds were for a 0-0 draw in that match? Presumably they'd be very high.

Well, presumably they'd be even more higher for Trinidad's victory.

And man... for the whole second half of that match, T&T had only ten players, as Avery John was sent away... that makes their draw even more breathtaking.

If you were Trinidad's manager, what would you do with Hislop? Today he was a hero but they expect their number 1 to get better. If I had a keeper who had the form and confidence Hislop has right now, I'd stick with him.

Hey, breaking news (from eight to ten hours ago): Togo's trainer, a Kraut, quit because of a money issue. I wonder if Togo will suck even more without a trainer.

I don't think it will severely affect their World Cup performance in any way, but it depends on how close he was to the players. They can't worry about that now, they just need a quick replacement, they need to concentrate on getting a new trainer as soon as the World Cup is over.

The clash between Argentina and Ivory Coast was very, very entertaining to watch. Definitely the best match so far, a fair spectacle for the end of the day after two rather moderate earlier duels. "Les Elephants" fought with passion, bravery and cunning - too bad they lost, they should have won this encounter. They totally pwned Argentinians who would have definitely lost if it hadn't been for Riquelme and his genius.

And I don't care much about Togo, they're a total outsider for me, a 100% candidate for the last place in a rather weak group. Too bad it is a team who stole the participation in this tournament from the more deserving one such as Senegal. Sheesh.

Argentina - Ivory Coast was a great game. Do you think they should change the rules of World Cup qualification and just let the 32 best teams in? It is annoying to see teams like Togo make it when you know they would never have made it if they were in a European group. Teams like Turkey, Greece, Denmark and Ireland would easily have made it through another continent.

Nonono, absolutely not! This is the WORLD championship, the weaker teams have to be in there. What would happen to all the surprises? People probably said the same thing about Senegal in 2002 and they were awesome. And I'm more than happy that Turkey didn't make it after all the sh*t they pulled last year.
To be fair, there are five players in our team who are of foreign origin (Klose, Podolski, Asamoah, Odonkor and Neuville) and four of them grew up here and have had the German citizenship since they were children. They ARE "home-grown" talents.

OK, well that's fair enough, but what about teams like France who deliberately get their players French citizenship just so they can play for the French national team?
Also, in Britain I read in a newspaper that a young Greek player called Masmanidis (could be mispelled) played for the German youth team and said in press conferences that he didn't want to play for Germany, but for Greece. When I see a player play for England, I want to know that he truly cares about England so that he will play to the best of his ability. If a player stated that he didn't want to play for England but for his fatherland, I wouldn't want him in an England jersey because I would feel as though he didn't care, and was taking the place of someone who may not be as talented, but has dreamed his entire life of playing for England.

Well... I don't think so. You mean the FIFA ranking of course? Getting rid of the qualifications would just kill the football. The teams would try to play as many matches as possible - only to desperately better their rank positions and qualify for the TOP32. And the only serious matches would be played every two years (Euro+WorldCup) Besides, I don't find the FIFA ranking totally reliable in some details.

Plus, the surprise factor mentioned by Barkworm is also very important.

I agree 100%. I'm glad Jürgen Klinsmann sees it the same way, his policy is that a player needs to have an emotional bond with Germany. We could have naturalised at least two great players in the last two years but Klinsmann disapproved of it.

Who exactly?

And even Poland has its own experience with football players' naturalization.

Bayern's Valérien Ismaël and the infamous Ailton.
I just learned that Klose and Podolski usually talk to each other in Polish on the field but aren't allowed to do so against Poland. :lol:

Hey, here's my today's estimates.

From the look at the gameplan, there's three completely WM-unrelevant games. I don't expect any of them to pass on over the next round. Mexico maybe, with luck, but the others? Naw...

Serbia - Netherlands: The Netherlands win. Serbia might be quite good, but the Netherlands will win.
Mexico - Iran: Who cares? Mexico will probably win, but nobody will give two sh*ts about it. Also, I don't expect any real good football from this match, so I'll watch it in the sports journal and not live.
Angola - Portugal: Yeah, right...

Whoever put together Group D, and be it by luck, is an idiot.

You're right that Portugal will probably win, but boy are Angola hyped for this one! Angola was a Portuguese colony and last time they played the match had to be abandoned because too many Angolan players were sent off.

About the FIFA rankings: they are the most retarded thing in world football. Mexico 5th in the world? Yeah, right... USA 6th? Ahem... Poland all the way back in 26th? WTF?

And on Olisadebe: what a legend! Before his injuries he was a fantastic player! Nominated for European Player of the Year when he was at Panathinaikos, if I'm not mistaken.

Serbia - The Netherlands. Not the best match I've ever seen but definitely one of the most interesting encounters so far. Arjen Robben is a fantastic player yet very selfish at the same time - the whole Dutch team could have scored a couple more goals if he had bestowed his team-mates with passing the damn ball from time to time.

And yeah - Olisadebe was awesome, he scored 11 goals in 25 international matches and was the main author of Poland's presence in Korea four years ago. We definitely lack someone like him in our forwarding line. :cry:

Mexico 3 - 1 Iran

Pretty good game, but it always seemed a matter of time before Mexico would win it. Iran lacked any ingenuity besides with set pieces.

I was afraid that Iran would fall asleep in the second half.

Iranian performance has positively shocked me from the very beginning. I mean - I supposed they were going to be just a background for the mighty Mexicans. And hell, they weren't. They deserved a draw for the first 75 minutes of their quite good game. But after that, two terrible mistakes occured and so did the Mexican victory.

Nevertheless, that match proved that Mexico's FIFA rank is highly over-rated.

Dinny - if not by means of the FIFA ranking, then how would you like to choose the best 32 teams? Looking at their past achieviements?

Okay, today was excrutiatingly boring. I will no longer watch the games live. I can waste six hours a day better with other stuff. I might watch "Dead like me again" or I could go play soccer myself.

Here's my guesses for tomorrow:

Australia - Japan: All the australian japanophiles and anime idiots can rejoice tomorrow, because "kawaii nippon senshi" will beat "Foster's mate". But on the other hand side, the anime idiots (you know the kind of people who use "kawaii" and "nani?" in real life despite not being able to stutter a complete sentence in japanese) will be disappointed, since they won't see any of the great moves seen in "Captain Tsubasa".

USA - Czech Republic: The USA will probably win that one, despite the Czechs being quite good. Too bad nobody in the USA will give two sh*ts about it, because if the USA is not the best at something, it doesn't care about it.

Italy - Ghana: You gotta be kidding me. Seriously. That's just idiotic. The poor Ghanians (Ghanans? Ghanites?) don't stand a chance against the freaking italians. They're just too strong.

No, I just think there needs to be some room to accomodate those European teams that should be there and would be there if it weren't for geographical location. Mind you, I do enjoy the participation of teams like T & T and Senegal. The underdogs are what make the tournament more exciting, but something needs to be done about qualification. The big nations of Asia and North America have an easy job of making it to the finals every four years while better teams from Europe and to a lesser extent, South America have a much harder job. I have no idea how they would do this, and I don't expect them too, it's just a shame that the World Cup never represents the top 32 nations in the World because if they did, it would be full of European and South American teams (hardly a world affair).
I'm not sure I'd like the World Cup to change because it never fails to deliver, but I'd certainly like to see a competition held between Europe and South America where the top teams from each continent play each other (where they could find time for this, I don't know).

And Anarky - I don't see the USA getting a result against the Czech Rep.. In my opinion, the Czechs are the 3rd/4th strongest team in Europe and if they can get the sort of form they had in Euro 2004, they have a chance to win. USA would be happy with a draw in this one. USA probably won't qualify for the next round. The match between Italy and Czech Rep. will be the group decider.

I wouldn't underestimate Ghana. They might steal the precious points from Italy, Czechs or the USA. However, they are going to stay in this group.

Perhaps Ghana can sneak in a draw while the Italians are concentrating on matters going on in Serie A. Plus, in recent tournaments the Italians have been as disappointing as the Spaniards.

Angola - Portugal = BOOOOOORING! :ohwell:

The pleasure from watching this match was merely the same like watching England-Paraguay. Exactly the same scenario: BANG - the early goal is scored and then one of the strongest European teams starts to defend itself for the whole encounter. How... exciting.

But this match left me in some deep sadness too. Angola at least fought fiercely and with a style... unlike some European team, ranked much higher than Angola. :roll:

This championship definitely lacks surprises so far. The Portugal match felt like a re-run of the England and Netherlands match. Early goal, then boredom.

The big European teams are being too cautious and are making sure they win their opening games. I expect the same to come from the Italy match today, Italy afterall are the masters of defensive play.
I thought the Netherlands - Serbia Mont'gro game was much better than England - Paraguay or Portugal - Angola. The only thing that disappointed me in the Netherlands first game was Arjen Robben's selfishness after he scored. He would never pass to team mates in better positions and he probably cost his team a goal.
And Barkworm - you're so lucky to be going to Argentina - Netherlands! That match will be incredible. Both teams need to win and have great attacking capabilities. Argentina wants revenge for France '98.

You got that wrong, I said I'd probably be going to see Argentina or the Netherlands in the quarterfinals. ;)
If my masterplan works out it'll be Germany-Argentina.

Germany will win the tie 7-6 at which point the world media will start to think that maybe this young, German team can win the world cup. Then they'll meet Brazil in the final and win 12-11, Owen Hargreaves making a surprise appearance for the Germans :P

You've got to get through England first... Although judging by our opening performance... I wouldn't worry about that too much :dead:

My guess is that we'll get Sweden instead of England since England is going to win group B.

Yes, but you ain't gonna win Group A, so you're going to meet England anyway.

:P

*is overfilled with patriotism*