Tolstoy Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 Germany has been better than England for as long as I can remember watching World Cup Soccer, but this year I am picking England, for a variety of reasons. As for the USA, for those of us who follow the national team year round, this was a tough loss to take. It was a game I think that the USA--given the development of the national team program over the last twenty years--should have won. Bradley has a lot of strengths as a coach, but when the game started, and I saw Findley and Clark in the lineup, I knew this was bad news. Bradley was over-thinking the game. He needed to go with our best 11--and that means the players who have produced. Findley's speed did nothing all tournament, nothing. Clark was useful at times, but overall no composure with the ball, and too many horrible mistakes. I really think that if the USA did not give up that early goal, we would have won that game. Oh well, no way to prove that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KD in CA Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 Capello my friend. He will have this team ready. As the old saying goes, he wins everywhere he goes. So he's like the Flutie of soccer coaching? Go England. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KD in CA Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 Someone really needs to explain to me how the supposed biggest sporting tournament on the planet can have a level of officiating that would be embarrassing for a Little League game. Exactly how far over the goal line does the ball need to be before one of these idiots can see it?? England will be talking about that one for the next 100 years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
meazza Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 Someone really needs to explain to me how the supposed biggest sporting tournament on the planet can have a level of officiating that would be embarrassing for a Little League game. Exactly how far over the goal line does the ball need to be before one of these idiots can see it?? England will be talking about that one for the next 100 years. Don't be surprised if there is a penalty called in England's favor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
meazza Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 So he's like the Flutie of soccer coaching? Go England. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabio_Capello Capello has the distinction of winning the domestic league title with every club he has coached throughout his career. In his first five seasons as a manager he won four Serie A titles with Milan, where he also won the 1993–94 UEFA Champions League, defeating Barcelona 4-0 in a memorable final. He then spent a year at Real Madrid, where he won the La Liga title at his first attempt, and in 2001 led Roma to their first league title in 18 years. The bolded portion is why I love the !@#$ing bastard. Of course players hate him because he's nuts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
meazza Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 !@#$ing Germans Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KD in CA Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 !@#$ing Germans Their counter attack is ridiculous. It's like they're playing hockey. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LewPort71 Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 I'm just not scared of England. I'm on the Alexi Lalas bandwagon with regard to his position that England has a few nice players but is otherwise very overrated. Rooney isn't a threat at all right now, and their overall team play has been mediocre at best. At least the Germans have had signs of busting out the offense, and that Wunderkind player we have....Ozil, or whatever his name is....might have a breakout match against the English. Besides, we get Klose back and he's much more of an offensive threat than anyone the English have right now. I'm going to call it as a 3-1 victory for the Germans! Good call on the score...Thing that makes Germany so dangerous is that they are so young... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
linksfiend Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 !@#$ing Germans Hell yeah! Forca Germania!! Siggi-Saggi, Siggi-Saggi, Oi! Oi! Oi!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heels20X6 Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 !@#$ing Germans It's nothing more than a tainted win. A 2-2 draw at the half makes for a much different game than England pressing for the equalizer in the 2nd. The officiating at this Cup has been horrendous and the truly archaic existence of FIFA was exposed further today. I'm not all for instant replay but would it kill the sport to have a GOAL JUDGE!?! That failure of a linesman was 20 yards away from the play. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ajzepp Posted June 27, 2010 Author Share Posted June 27, 2010 Good call on the score...Thing that makes Germany so dangerousis that they are so young... Well, that was a very satisfying win lol. The no-goal call that went against England was amazingly ridiculous, but didn't really matter. Like KD said, the counter attack with this team is just sick! With all these younger players I honestly didn't think we'd be this good, but I think it's ultimately going to be an issue with playing well consistently. Especially when you still have Klose playing well, holy crap, they are dominant on offense. If they can reign in their immaturity and not allow that to be a detriment, they might go another couple games and make some noise. I think that's probably what I didn't realize about Ghana, which is why I think Meazza and one or two others of you were not counting that as an upset at all. They have a lot of very good young players who already have club experience and are more seasoned than some of the veteran players on the US (in terms of playing against top competition). Kudos to them for yesterday's win. I remember our U-20 team being pretty darn good a few years ago, so I'm interested to see how we grow some of our own into top players. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ajzepp Posted June 27, 2010 Author Share Posted June 27, 2010 !@#$ing Germans Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ajzepp Posted June 27, 2010 Author Share Posted June 27, 2010 Germany has been better than England for as long as I can remember watching World Cup Soccer, but this year I am picking England, for a variety of reasons. As for the USA, for those of us who follow the national team year round, this was a tough loss to take. It was a game I think that the USA--given the development of the national team program over the last twenty years--should have won. Bradley has a lot of strengths as a coach, but when the game started, and I saw Findley and Clark in the lineup, I knew this was bad news. Bradley was over-thinking the game. He needed to go with our best 11--and that means the players who have produced. Findley's speed did nothing all tournament, nothing. Clark was useful at times, but overall no composure with the ball, and too many horrible mistakes. I really think that if the USA did not give up that early goal, we would have won that game. Oh well, no way to prove that. I totally agree about Bradley. I was reading a very interesting article about him last night. It discussed how his approach is to have the team play very laid back and conservatively for the first half in order to gauge the approach and strategy the other team is implementing. I absolutely HATE that. Winners dictate, they don't pussyfoot around for an entire half trying to figure out what the other team is doing, and then hope and pray they can come from behind. You can maybe do that against some of the CONCACAF teams that we beat up on, but you sure as hell can't do that in the WC! Speed is great, but I wish Bradley would maybe focus a bit more on a proper SKILL SET, too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevestojan Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 Well, it was fun while it lasted. This last !@#$ up by the refs in the Germany/England game just pushed me over the edge. I'll see ya in 4 years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ajzepp Posted June 27, 2010 Author Share Posted June 27, 2010 England has sucked in the group stages since I can remember, apart from the World Cup in Spain a long time ago. They were pretty awful even when they reached the QFs/Semis/won the thing. If the England from qualifying (who looked really, really good, hammering some good teams on the way (and in most of those games the scoreline flattered the defeated teams) with their only loss coming when they were reduced to 10-men) turn up then I suspect the Germans are going to find this difficult. If England play like they have, this tournament, then they are probably doomed. If they play like they have been doing for the rest of the last couple of years then Germany should be the ones catching the plane back to Europe. BTW I thought the US was crying out for a defender of the calibre of Lalas, he was a really class player when he was at his peak. Oh definitely....Lalas looked like a dweeb, but played like an animal. Even as an announcer he still exudes that swagger and confidence in himself. Would love to have someone like him on the team again! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ajzepp Posted June 27, 2010 Author Share Posted June 27, 2010 Well, it was fun while it lasted. This last !@#$ up by the refs in the Germany/England game just pushed me over the edge. I'll see ya in 4 years. I'm just happy to see you participating in the thread lol....I thought you were just here to keep your promise of hacking on the game every time we had a new thread about it, so the fact that you actually watched some of the matches is great! I agree about that non-goal....fuggin retarded that they didn't give it to them...today, though, it wouldn't have made any difference. Germany was all over them like Travis Henry on a pre-teen schoolgirl. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
syhuang Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 It's nothing more than a tainted win. A 2-2 draw at the half makes for a much different game than England pressing for the equalizer in the 2nd. The officiating at this Cup has been horrendous and the truly archaic existence of FIFA was exposed further today. I'm not all for instant replay but would it kill the sport to have a GOAL JUDGE!?! That failure of a linesman was 20 yards away from the play. After FIFA's review of Lampard goal, they conclude umpires didn't make any mistake, just like all other games: http://i.imgur.com/nrgC8.jpg </sarcasm off> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ajzepp Posted June 27, 2010 Author Share Posted June 27, 2010 After FIFA's review of Lampard goal, they conclude umpires didn't make any mistake, just like all other games: http://i.imgur.com/nrgC8.jpg </sarcasm off> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 I am going to buy a Bradley jersey. That kid is an animal and everywhere! It is like there are 3 Bradley's on the field at once Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrDawkinstein Posted June 27, 2010 Share Posted June 27, 2010 ANOTHER blown call in the cup?!? first england gets hosed today, and now argentina is given a goal when the player was a good 8-10 feet offsides! if the refs cant get the offsides calls right, how am i ever supposed to understand this stupid rule? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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