World Cup Russia 2018 Thread

We should have a bit of sympathy for those who lost last night.

The Scots.

But then again, maybe not...…….

Probably not the best display by England last night but they showed up to play football and found themselves in a stop/start street fight.  The fact that they remained composed and didn't succumb to a red card retaliation (presumably Columbia's game plan) speaks volumes for their professionalism and coaching. Imagine the old England guard in similar circumstances - it doesn't bear thinking about. So they were rattled by the late goal and could have well lost it in the 1st extra period, but they got their composure back for the 2nd and ended the game with at least some momentum and raised spirits.  

Sometimes you need a little luck - but the right team won last night even if just by a whisker.

MDS posted:

Thought Southgate spoke very well again when interviewed after the game. Focussed and measured. He's growing, like his young squad.  While England could and should have won it in 90 minutes, that extra-time and victory through a penalty shoot out might have the effect of bonding the young team even more powerfully.  They faced a big disappointment and came through it together. They will all remember that game and the moment of victory for the rest of their lives. 

Good points. In the last 5 minutes of play when were still one goal up why did they not just hold the ball which they had spent most of the previous 90 minutes doing quite well and force Columbia to chase the ball. If they don't have the ball, they can't score! It is also very tiring constantly chasing possession of the ball and not succeeding. Instead England elected to boot the ball up field giving Columbia possession and then trying to defend against their attack where they came unstuck and almost threw the game away.

Taking the positives out of the the disaster it almost became. The period of extra time they came through will booster their confidence and the penalty shoot out jinx has finally been broken. They will go into the next game against Sweden with far more confidence and less fear of another penalty shoot out should it come to that. We have a chance to make the semi final though I am not suggesting Sweden will be a push over. We will have to be at the top of our game to beat them but hopefully we will have two teams wanting to win by playing football and not rugby or wrestling nor spending the majority of the game cheating, gamesmanship and trying to con the referee like Columbia, Tunisia and Panama did. 

Ken

What is this "Columbia" y'all keep talking about? On my telly, England played Colombia.

And it's hilarious that none of you see the gamesmanship when it's committed by the noble boys from England.

dtchayes posted:

And it's hilarious that none of you see the gamesmanship when it's committed by the noble boys from England.

You mean like roughing up the penalty spot, delaying the taking of the penalty by 4 - 5 minute, head butting  Jordan Henderson, elbowing Sterling when he walked off at half time, surrounding and harassing Harry Kane before taking the penalty, intimidating the England players to react and get them sent off, surrounding the referee at every opportunity to delay the flow of the game and intimidate the official to the point where he couldn't work out who to book next? The most disgraceful behaviour I've seen in a long time.

Ah, gamesmanship - let's call it what it is: cheating - of course the Colombians did all those things you catalogue, and such behaviour is without a doubt despicable. But, no. What I mean is "Hendo" waiting a second then collapsing theatrically; the "reformed" Ashley Young still milking every contact; Raheem Sterling, a player with much to admire about his game, but who is prone to being prone. Vardey is, of course, vile, but is rarely on long enough to display the, ahem, dark arts. I am also referring to Maguire mixing it at every opportunity. Was it Big Harry who raked Falcao's head with his studs? No one is innocent, Stokie. And they haven't been for many years. 

dtchayes posted:

Ah, gamesmanship - let's call it what it is: cheating - of course the Colombians did all those things you catalogue, and such behaviour is without a doubt despicable. But, no. What I mean is "Hendo" waiting a second then collapsing theatrically; the "reformed" Ashley Young still milking every contact; Raheem Sterling, a player with much to admire about his game, but who is prone to being prone. Vardey is, of course, vile, but is rarely on long enough to display the, ahem, dark arts. I am also referring to Maguire mixing it at every opportunity. Was it Big Harry who raked Falcao's head with his studs? No one is innocent, Stokie. And they haven't been for many years. 

Whatever, only one team turned up last night wanting to play football.

That it turned into a street brawl was not England's fault.

England 13 fouls, 2 bookings

Colombia 23 fouls 6 bookings.

dtchayes posted:

 No one is innocent, Stokie. And they haven't been for many years. 

???? DTCHAYES,.....We're talking here about when you very,very much pass all the limits of what is an acceptable behavior.
That all teams,in some way,are doing different small things (except Japan),...we all know.
But this is at a completely different level.!!

Shameful of Colombia.!!

Peder????

dtchayes posted:

Ah, gamesmanship - let's call it what it is: cheating - of course the Colombians did all those things you catalogue, and such behaviour is without a doubt despicable. But, no. What I mean is "Hendo" waiting a second then collapsing theatrically; the "reformed" Ashley Young still milking every contact; Raheem Sterling, a player with much to admire about his game, but who is prone to being prone. Vardey is, of course, vile, but is rarely on long enough to display the, ahem, dark arts. I am also referring to Maguire mixing it at every opportunity. Was it Big Harry who raked Falcao's head with his studs? No one is innocent, Stokie. And they haven't been for many years. 

I accept your point that they are not all angels and there are levels of 'professional' fouling that go on by all teams but last night was something else, it bordered on complete and total intimidation at every opportunity. It could of course all be stamped out if Fifa seriously wanted to and referee's penalised it in the early rounds and set the standard. We have VAR at this competition but it's use seams inconsistent so far. Like most things standards seam to deteriorate with time. We have Sweden next and as said in a previous post I hope we will see a game of football, there will no doubt be 'professional' fouls on both sides but hopefully not to the disgraceful levels of last nights debacle and the best team will win by the quality of the football played and by nothing else.

The thing that I find quite shocking last night and through out the tournament is the 'in the face' (literally) intimidation of the referees and that isn't acceptable at any level and should be stamped out with a few red cards. 

Bob the Builder posted:

The thing that I find quite shocking last night and through out the tournament is the 'in the face' (literally) intimidation of the referees and that isn't acceptable at any level and should be stamped out with a few red cards. 

Kuipers is the ref on your next match, he is a great ref having much more authority than the one on the whistle in England Vs Columbia.

Ardbeg10y posted:

Bob the Builder posted:

The thing that I find quite shocking last night and through out the tournament is the 'in the face' (literally) intimidation of the referees and that isn't acceptable at any level and should be stamped out with a few red cards. 

Kuipers is the ref on your next match, he is a great ref having much more authority than the one on the whistle in England Vs Columbia.

Glad to hear it the American ref last night almost lost complete control.

Peder posted:

dtchayes posted:

 No one is innocent, Stokie. And they haven't been for many years. 

???? DTCHAYES,.....We're talking here about when you very,very much pass all the limits of what is an acceptable behavior.
That all teams,in some way,are doing different small things (except Japan),...we all know.
But this is at a completely different level.!!

Shameful of Colombia.!!

Peder????

Agreed, Peder. And in looking forward to the quarter-final I'm confident that while it will be a physical and robust game, the Swedish and England players will approach it in the right spirit and we won't see the sort of behaviour that now seems to be a regular feature from Latin-America teams.  The French would do well to steel themselves for what they are likely to experience from Uruguay. Suarez and co are every bit as capable as Colombia in this respect. 

dtchayes posted:

Ah, gamesmanship - let's call it what it is: cheating - of course the Colombians did all those things you catalogue, and such behaviour is without a doubt despicable. But, no. What I mean is "Hendo" waiting a second then collapsing theatrically; the "reformed" Ashley Young still milking every contact; Raheem Sterling, a player with much to admire about his game, but who is prone to being prone. Vardey is, of course, vile, but is rarely on long enough to display the, ahem, dark arts. I am also referring to Maguire mixing it at every opportunity. Was it Big Harry who raked Falcao's head with his studs? No one is innocent, Stokie. And they haven't been for many years. 

I was very impressed by all the English players you mention by name, they dealt with the Columbians In an extremely professional manner. 

Even Harry Kane gallantly went down at every opportunity..... it’s very refreshing that finally the England team has learnt to subtly dish out exactly what Columbia deserved......

England this Saturday.

I think Southgate needs to make a few starting 11 changes, Sterling has had more than his fair share of chances and lets be honest has been totally ineffective in his role.

Also, I am not keen on Henderson he spends far too much time facing his own goal passing it backwards. No creativity whatsoever. He should also be removed from any further penalty taking duties!

If you could have Ramsey and Bale (both 100% fit) you would win this world cup.

Best of British for Saturday.

A biased Welshman.

???? MDS,...And we get a good referee,... Björn Kuipers 45 years and from the Netherlands.
He has previously judged Egypt against Uruguay. Brazil against Costa Rica and when Russia knocked out Spain.

According to our Swedish TV referee expert... Jonas Eriksson,he judged in Brazil in 2014.... so is Björn Kuipers  a brilliant referee.

/Peder ????

Happy Listener posted:

A game we didn't deserve to lose given the antics of the Columbians but, equally, we showed little goal threat in general play. I thought Alli, Lingard and Sterling were ineffective - you know the midfield has issues when the centre backs march forward with the ball. Trippier, once again, did very well. 

Why oh why though did we as a team get involved in the various melees with the Columbians, especially after the penalty award. Why not walk well away and let the ref sort things out, and exhibit a positive influence on the ref. For the good of the game in general, I was hoping for a flurry of yellow cards after the Columbians surrounded and harassed the ref - but no. What a sad state of affairs. 

We won but, once again on a world stage, the game in general lost last night.   

I didn't realise you were playing, HL! Well done. I don't know how you have time to post here, though.

MDS posted:

Peder posted:

dtchayes posted:

 No one is innocent, Stokie. And they haven't been for many years. 

???? DTCHAYES,.....We're talking here about when you very,very much pass all the limits of what is an acceptable behavior.
That all teams,in some way,are doing different small things (except Japan),...we all know.
But this is at a completely different level.!!

Shameful of Colombia.!!

Peder????

Agreed, Peder. And in looking forward to the quarter-final I'm confident that while it will be a physical and robust game, the Swedish and England players will approach it in the right spirit and we won't see the sort of behaviour that now seems to be a regular feature from Latin-America teams.  The French would do well to steel themselves for what they are likely to experience from Uruguay. Suarez and co are every bit as capable as Colombia in this respect. 

A team has always a choice of sticking to its own game without being dragged into exchange of flagrant fouls and yellow cards. That was not the case in the game against Columbia.

Why badmouth Uruguay? Their game against Portugal was well played. It is a miracle that a country with a meager population of less than 3.5 millions can produce such a supreme group of players.

No more excuses for the UK. The difference in the quality of the teams in their bracket versus the other one is night and day. They clearly have the easy way.

 I agree that Sterling has had enough game time to really prove himself but I have a feeling he is an integral part of Southgate's tactics  that is to create space for Harry Kane to move into and so I think he will stick with him again.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          

I also agree with the above regarding Jordan Henderson but can't really see who he will replace him with,  for me Eric Dier gives the ball away too much and too cheaply and apart from the penalty he wasn't great when he came on against Colombia.  I also think that the passing of the ball back which all of the England defence did repeatedly was also a tactic to build from the back so if there is no obvious forward pass then pass back and rebuild. 

There also seems to be a tactic of passing the ball out of defence so no long balls which is great but does create some scary moments as it did against Colombia the 2014 version of Falcao would have punished those little passing mistakes in and around the England area as will any top striker.

All in all I think they defended well and we know they can score goals and in Harry Kane we have a player that defenders seem petrified of so Southgate was right to build a team around him and in light of any other stand out candidate make him captain but Kane and Southgate need to address the fact that late on in the match and in the first period of extra team he did disapear a bit and can get lost.

So there is a lot of hope and England are very capable team but we are at the sharp end of this tournament now and they need to get mentally ready it would be a massive mistake to listen to the voice that says we have the easy draw against Sweden and the easier route to the final.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

I thought Henderson actually had a really good game, his work rate is exceptional. 

To build from the back instead of a long ball game is something the England team have struggled with over the years, it’s very refreshing to see them actually become far more confident and successful at that part of the game....

Their will always be difficult passages of play, hairy moments  during a game, last ditch defending,  but that’s the nature of knockout football .... many a team perform better because they have nothing to lose.

I think Southgate will stick to his preferred line up, and the team will continue to improve as the manager maintains his confidence in them...

I agree with everything Bob's posted above. Southgate's a smart cookie, and knows what he's doing with his players. Sterling's come in for a lot of stick, but us watching on the box are limited to what the camera chooses to show, which leads us to follow the ball. In that last game I made a point of trying to watch what Sterling was doing, and it's clear that defences are very wary of his speed, so tend to keep him under tight marking. There were a couple of really clever little feints and backheels from him as well, at least the ones you could see on TV.

Haim Ronen posted:

MDS posted:

Peder posted:

dtchayes posted:

 No one is innocent, Stokie. And they haven't been for many years. 

???? DTCHAYES,.....We're talking here about when you very,very much pass all the limits of what is an acceptable behavior.
That all teams,in some way,are doing different small things (except Japan),...we all know.
But this is at a completely different level.!!

Shameful of Colombia.!!

Peder????

Agreed, Peder. And in looking forward to the quarter-final I'm confident that while it will be a physical and robust game, the Swedish and England players will approach it in the right spirit and we won't see the sort of behaviour that now seems to be a regular feature from Latin-America teams.  The French would do well to steel themselves for what they are likely to experience from Uruguay. Suarez and co are every bit as capable as Colombia in this respect. 

A team has always a choice of sticking to its own game without being dragged into exchange of flagrant fouls and yellow cards. That was not the case in the game against Columbia.

Why badmouth Uruguay? Their game against Portugal was well played. It is a miracle that a country with a meager population of less than 3.5 millions can produce such a supreme group of players.

No more excuses for the UK. The difference in the quality of the teams in their bracket versus the other one is night and day. They clearly have the easy way.

 

Being a small nation doesn't justify dirty tricks and unsportsmanlike behaviour. Iceland is a tiny nation, too, but its players don't behave that way. 

It's going to be a tough game on Saturday,saw some stats.
Since 1986,..England and Sweden have met 14 times,where Sweden has won 5 times and England 2 times.

And as MDS said... " I'm confident that while it will be a physical and rugged game,the Swedish and England players will approach it in the right spirit "

/Peder ????