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The World Cup In Russia 2018

on the final:

croatia had better football intelligence, but france had superior athleticism and a touch of luck. even though i am happy about the result from a social perspective, as a football fan, i'd like to see rule changes to redress the imbalance back a bit toward intelligence.

interesting to consider that a unified yugoslavia would have taken this AND wimbledon on the same day.
 
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worse than that, he refers to football as "nogomet". i had forgotten this little variation on serbo-crotatian over on the west/fascist side of the old country. in most ways, it's far worse than saying "soccer". very difficult to translate but, trying to maintain the essence, it would be something like "footsie-derby".

In a local open space, once an aristocratic estate, now owned by the local council, new direction signs have just been put up. One sign points to 'foot golf'. Presumably this is for people who can't afford golf clubs.
 
undeserved title?

for me it's hard to accept that any team who has 0 victories and 3 draws in regular time after the groups against (average teams like) denmark, russia, england, can claim a deserved title. meanwhile france beat argentina, uruguay, belgium without issues.

people fail to notice that ball possession or fighting spirit is not a condition to deserve a victory. croatia fell into a same trap as belgium in semi finals, endless inefficient circles around the box, better possession but without execution. meanwhile france played their game - routine defense and super efficient counter attacks ending with goals.
 
Sure, I'm only trying to put some balance into the comments that completely undermine what France played yesterday. They deliberately gave the ball to the Croats, focussing on counter attacks. It didn't work in the first half, it worked in the second. Some people will remember the finals for the Croatian possession (with hardly any clear chances produced), I will remember it for Pogba's goal, from his long pass for Mbappe at the beginning to amazing finish with right and left foot. At the moment I can't remember if I saw anything similar before, for sure not at the game of this level and certainly the moment of the WC2018. There was more football in these 10 seconds than in any 10 minutes of Croatian dominance yesterday.
 
I'll remember it for a couple of iffy refereeing decisions which forced Croatia to chase the game - little between the teams really and when Kante was withdrawn at 2-1, the French were hanging on
 
Personally I thought it was definitely one of the better World Cups that I have experienced.
Undoubtedly the best team won the tournament but hats off to Croatia for making it to the final.
I'm still trying to get my head around Olivier (scorpion) Giroud being a World Cup winner WTF:D
My personal choice for player of the tournament would have been Mbappé but I wouldn't begrudge Modric winning it as he performed at a consistently high level throughout.
 
I don't have an interest in football except the World Cup. A filthy habit picked up at work.
This has been an enjoyable tournament imo, and the final with Pussy Riot pitch invasion + Kylian Mbappes high five topped it off.

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Sure, I'm only trying to put some balance into the comments that completely undermine what France played yesterday. They deliberately gave the ball to the Croats, focussing on counter attacks. It didn't work in the first half, it worked in the second. Some people will remember the finals for the Croatian possession (with hardly any clear chances produced), I will remember it for Pogba's goal, from his long pass for Mbappe at the beginning to amazing finish with right and left foot. At the moment I can't remember if I saw anything similar before, for sure not at the game of this level and certainly the moment of the WC2018. There was more football in these 10 seconds than in any 10 minutes of Croatian dominance yesterday.

Seriously?
 
I don't have an interest in football except the World Cup. A filthy habit picked up at work.
This has been an enjoyable tournament imo, and the Pussy Riot invasion with Kylian Mbappes high five topped it off.

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The New Yorker have an article about the Pussy Riot invasion. https://www.newyorker.com/sporting-...y-of-pussy-riots-protest?mbid=social_facebook

"The four women, by taking the field, demonstrated exactly how that happens: the beautiful world of sport has its bubble punctured by people running and flailing haphazardly, intent on destruction. The group’s statement concluded with a list of demands:

1. Free all political prisoners.

2. Stop jailing people for social-media “likes.”

3. Stop illegal arrests at protests.

4. Allow political competition.

5. Stop fabricating criminal cases and putting people in jail for no reason.

6. Turn the earthly policeman into a Heavenly Policeman.

"And so Pussy Riot became the only people to make a meaningful statement about Russian politics during the World Cup—and it came on the eve of Vladimir Putin’s triumphant meeting with Donald Trump."

Shouldn't imagine Mr Putin was too happy about this, or Trump given that he seems to hate women.

Jack
 
In a local open space, once an aristocratic estate, now owned by the local council, new direction signs have just been put up. One sign points to 'foot golf'. Presumably this is for people who can't afford golf clubs.

another one (for nogomet) would be "leg polo".
 
I will remember it for Pogba's goal, from his long pass for Mbappe at the beginning to amazing finish with right and left foot.

That was a superb goal between Pogba and Mbappe. Just as well for Pogba as he missed an absolute sitter minutes later and then tried to detract attention by appealing for handball.

Still it was a very entertaining final. Points for determination and athleticism go to Croatia, but the points for clinical finishing go to France - and that's what really counts. That's always been England's undoing - the strikers can't beat the keeper.
 
I have to say that, with different tactics, France could have swamped Croatia. There's not one player in that team the big clubs won't be chasing shortly. Deschamps was lucky that he had such a talented team to using his pedestrian tactics. Fair enough, he went for the safe option, but I can't imagine Klopp, Fergusaon or Southgate not adopting a more attacking strategy.

France won, and they deserved to win. Croatia played well, and Dalic outpointed Deschamps on tactics, but that didn't matter, not with the talent they were facing. 4 shots on goal, four goals. Says it all.

Despite the plaudits, I'd pick not Mbappé but Griezmann and Pogba as being the outstanding contributors to France's success, with honorable mentions to Mtiti, Hernandez, Mbappé, Pavard and Varane. As to Mbappé his last goal was brilliant.
 
A lot of that is down to the non-stop anti-Putin/Russian propaganda spewed by May and her government through the BBC and Murdoch outlets.

I thought there might have been trouble with Russian football hooligans, who are very heavy, but there wasn't. The whole thing came across as an epic jamboree of football and it was good to see VAR in action.

Lots of England supporters said they had a great time and how friendly the Russians are. Of course this doesn't mean to say it isn't an authoritarian state, but England isn't far from that.

I switched between ITV and the BBC in the build up to the game. On ITV they showed the World Cup celebrations in the stadium, with lots of singing and dancing featuring people like Will Smith. I didn't see this on the BBC when I turned over. It if wasn't covered, it's all part of the Tory propaganda game.

May wants us to hate the Russians and Putin, while she ideologically fellates Trump.

Sky are on the attack again. A correspondent said Russia might have looked good during The World Cup, but it will soon be back to its normal repressive state.

The Russians did well and their stadiums looked cool. It's a pity the wrong team won with the help of the ref. Mbappe is excellent, but it was good to see the French getting soaked as they went to collect the Cup, even if two of them play for Chelsea.

Jack
You must remember Putin is the master of propaganda, May has a long way to go before she reaches these heady heights.
 
Sure, I'm only trying to put some balance into the comments that completely undermine what France played yesterday. They deliberately gave the ball to the Croats, focussing on counter attacks. It didn't work in the first half, it worked in the second. Some people will remember the finals for the Croatian possession (with hardly any clear chances produced), I will remember it for Pogba's goal, from his long pass for Mbappe at the beginning to amazing finish with right and left foot. At the moment I can't remember if I saw anything similar before, for sure not at the game of this level and certainly the moment of the WC2018. There was more football in these 10 seconds than in any 10 minutes of Croatian dominance yesterday.
Very few will remember how France played or how poor Anderson was in both finals, the name on the trophy lasts forever.
That old cliché of playing ugly & winning is better than playing pretty, intelligent football & losing, ask any fan of a particular country or league team.
England need to learn to get their hands dirty, I don't mean fouling the opposition or cheating to win but watch Pogba in the quarter & semi, this is how the biggest stars play when they have to, they help out doing the ugly stuff, not afraid to sacrifice their instinctive talents to win, Modric almost ran a half marathon against England to ensure his country reached a world cup final, when England heads dropped, he carried on regardless, he reaped the rewards of his hard earned toil. Ironically Harry Kane was the only England player I saw do this, rather than stand around waiting, he often found himself just outside his own box to enable him to get hold of the ball & get things moving through midfield, who struggled through this world cup.
 


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