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The World Cup In Russia 2018

anubisgrau said:
guess what:

french possession against:

argentina 40%
belgium 36%
croatia 39%

seriously?
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I watched the Croatia v France match and I can't remember any part where France deliberately gave the ball to Croatia.

Happy to wait for you to find a youtube clip of a French player purposefully giving up possession.

I'm here all day...
 
Barryoke said:
The Sweden team that were so poor they finished top of a group that contained Germany, and beat a Mexico team 3-0 that everyone were wetting themselves over when beating Germany on the opening game. Colombia weren't that poor a team, yet they couldn't beat England with football, so resorted to cheating and dirty tactics. The Croatia team were that poor, they were beaten 4-2 in the final of a world cup by an own goal, a free kick that was a dive, and a penalty that was very harsh... need I go on? (whatever that disparaging remark is meant to mean) Talking from your ivory tower down on people impresses no one, and makes you look like a twunt, but thanks for the lesson in football mister.
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You seem to have posted this reasonable defence of something English in the wrong forum. This is the “everything English* is crap” forum. No successes are allowed to be praised especially sporting. Anything achieved is through luck, cheating, having an unfair advantage - preferably a silver spoon since birth, going to a posh school or taking drugs.

* British can be substituted for English when we compete together. See Olympic.
 
Ragaman said:
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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In the 80s, the best French teams played beautiful football with the likes of Platini and others, yet very rarely brought back the silver. The typical outcome was losing to more "realistic" teams, usually from Germany or Italy. My guess is that Deschamps decided fairly early on in his career that he was more interested in winning than in being a gallant, stylish loser. The other thing is that playing in top leagues outside France has made the players much more resilient, both physically and mentally. They previously tended to give up a bit more easily when things weren't going their way.

What Deschamps seems to have done very well is to build a real team. He got superstars like Pogba to subsume their egos and work hard for the whole team, even if that meant a lot of defensive work. Those unwilling to do that (Benzema?) just did not make the team.
 
PsB said:
What Deschamps seems to have done very well is to build a real team. He got superstars like Pogba to subsume their egos and work hard for the whole team, even if that meant a lot of defensive work. Those unwilling to do that (Benzema?) just did not make the team.
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i thought the benzema exclusion was down to his alleged connection to some sort of player "blackmail" scheme.
 
vuk said:
i thought the benzema exclusion was down to his alleged connection to some sort of player "blackmail" scheme.
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True, but that was in 2015, a long time ago (pre-Euro 2016). If Deschamps had wanted to include him, he could have done so, for instance when Benzema got his case quashed (on a technicality, but still) by the supreme court.
 
PsB said:
True, but that was in 2015, a long time ago (pre-Euro 2016). If Deschamps had wanted to include him, he could have done so, for instance when Benzema got his case quashed (on a technicality, but still) by the supreme court.
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maybe it was the correct decision in terms of team cohesion, but there is no arguing that benzema is a far, far better player than giroud and would probably have scored a goal or too 9factoring out possible lack of team cohesion).

anyhow, it all turned out very well in the end and i am tremendously happy for that.
 
Barryoke said:
The Sweden team that were so poor they finished top of a group that contained Germany, and beat a Mexico team 3-0 that everyone were wetting themselves over when beating Germany on the opening game. Colombia weren't that poor a team, yet they couldn't beat England with football, so resorted to cheating and dirty tactics. The Croatia team were that poor, they were beaten 4-2 in the final of a world cup by an own goal, a free kick that was a dive, and a penalty that was very harsh... need I go on? (whatever that disparaging remark is meant to mean) Talking from your ivory tower down on people impresses no one, and makes you look like a twunt, but thanks for the lesson in football mister.
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Just papering over the cracks i'm afraid.
Pointing out the obvious, if you prefer to bury your head, then who's the twunt.

England had a very easy route to a semi final then blew it with 20 minutes to go, in extra time they conceded defeat while the Croatian team decided to win it instead.
I criticise as i'm an ardent supporter from youth, I have seen this happen at every tournament bar '90 & '96.
You have to be realistic, pointless making excuses.
 
PsB said:
In the 80s, the best French teams played beautiful football with the likes of Platini and others, yet very rarely brought back the silver. The typical outcome was losing to more "realistic" teams, usually from Germany or Italy. My guess is that Deschamps decided fairly early on in his career that he was more interested in winning than in being a gallant, stylish loser. The other thing is that playing in top leagues outside France has made the players much more resilient, both physically and mentally. They previously tended to give up a bit more easily when things weren't going their way.

What Deschamps seems to have done very well is to build a real team. He got superstars like Pogba to subsume their egos and work hard for the whole team, even if that meant a lot of defensive work. Those unwilling to do that (Benzema?) just did not make the team.
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I have said this earlier, the name on the trophy is what is remembered, I do think your doing those teams a slight injustice with this post though, football style evolves, it's not only the French who played this way back then, Germany & Italy were anything but workmanlike, watch them back, they had flare to spare, Argentina too. The French team of today are playing like any other team around today, they are just better at it, as were Italy & Germany back in the 70's / 80's.
If you watch this final back, in it's entirety, without the hype of it being on the end of a month of build up to this point, France could easily have lost the match if not for a few small details, what they are good at is defending resolutely, then counter attacking, a style many adopt these days, no team around defends with such skill & determination & why they won the tournament, they also have better players in key areas than most.

Flare players & teams playing with flare & individual skill is just not possible in modern football, it's more a team ethic these days, still makes for a spectacle but comparing the 2 era's, as far as individual teams are concerned, is not really possible.

If the likes of Platini & co were in the French team today, they too would have evolved this style, they would be completely different players today than they were back then, due to training & fitness levels.
 
Ragaman said:
Just papering over the cracks i'm afraid.
Pointing out the obvious, if you prefer to bury your head, then who's the twunt.

England had a very easy route to a semi final then blew it with 20 minutes to go, in extra time they conceded defeat while the Croatian team decided to win it instead.
I criticise as i'm an ardent supporter from youth, I have seen this happen at every tournament bar '90 & '96.
You have to be realistic, pointless making excuses.
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I'm not burying my head, far from it. I'm seeing a young England team who many of the players have not won a trophy at club level, getting to a semi-final of a World Cup, regardless of who they played. Winning a penalty shoot-out for the first time in English history, and then being knocked out by the most talented Croatian team, that most were their last chance for glory, and the linchpin of which is a serial winner of European cups. Lets not forget, the previous tournament England went out to Iceland of which I bet you were highly critical, as were many others, yet now England progress beating better teams than that Iceland team, you're still not happy. A team can only beat the teams put in front of them, if you were German I could fully understand your position, and by the way, pointing out the obvious doesn't have to be condescending. ;)
 
Ragaman said:
Where is it condescending, calling me a twunt is hardly polite, personal & disrespectful, yes.
I agree reaching a semi is progress but until we play the better teams we will be in the dark, we played a better team in the semi (all previous teams we played were inferior I felt) the superior ball control & skill level of the Croatian team is something many England players do not possess & unless we change things at grass roots level, never will. It's why Croatia looked fitter & stronger in the second half. It's no coincidence England waned as the individual matches progressed, neither is it a coincidence we finished bottom of the table for chances created in open play during this world cup. The play off was also quite informative, Belgium had hunger, they looked like they wanted it, I felt we, yet again, looked weary both mentally & physically, this can be easily remedied but the ability to pass a ball throughout the team with speed & precision is much tougher.

We had a young team at this world cup & there is time for them to gain experience but unless Gareth sticks his neck out & holds onto them for future tournaments it will matter not.
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As I've posted before, this England team is the first foray into tournaments with a new system running through the FA. The fact that our u17's, under19's and under 21's have been successful goes to show that this is no fluke. The kids in one final even came from behind in the final to win 5-2 from 2-0 down vs Spain, hence why I think the future looks very rosy, and that the current team should be given some credit, and seen as a glass half full. These players will be the old heads when the future youngsters earn their stripes for England, and positives need to be taken, not only from the players, but also from the manage who is also cutting his teeth. I was looking forward to watching England in this tournament, as I mentioned in the regular football thread for the above reasons pre tournament, but this is a young team, not a 'golden generation' by any stretch of the imagination. So there will be shortcomings and mistakes made... I was particularly surprised to see the team doing spin classes together, no doubt in competition, which can't have helped their energy levels later on in the tournament, especially when previous managers have banned shagging during tournaments.
In my humble opinion, the game management side of things was huge against Croatia, not only from the players, but also from the manager, and it was clear in the latter stages in the Croatia game, but they can learn from that. They held onto the ball, and passed it well enough in the first half to the point that Croatia barely had a sniff, and England should have been 3-0 up easily. Look at France, when they played a better team in Belgium, Deschamp for best part of the game crowded out the creative players with sheer numbers, and for large parts played direct balls up to the forward line, not pretty, but effective. That kind of game management will come to Southgate too, it's what good managers do. I agree, we don't have players like Iniesta that don't hold and control the ball, but even when we did we didn't utilise him enough, only Hoddle did that with Paul Scholes, everyone else chucked Scholes out wide, and got caught up in this daft Lampard/Gerrard conundrum down the middle.
Sometimes you have to cut your cloth to suit, I think Southgate's use of what he had at his disposal was admirable. You can with good management sometimes make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, Harry Redknapp is a good example of that when manager of Portsmouth. He took David (Calamity) James and made him look England class again by telling him to stay on his goal line, and have Sol Campbell and Silvain Distin to clear any cross into the box, and likewise with Glen Johnson, he cut out his defensive mistakes by keeping him attacking for most of the game and relieving him of his defensive duties. It can be done, and if the youngsters coming through can add to the first team with a more ball control style and endeavour as was seen in their own tournaments, then who knows what the future may hold?
I too remember watching the likes of Robbo scoring the fastest goal in Spain 82, and standing on the terrace of Wembley vs Denmark, when England attendances were at an all time low, and they only opened half of Wembley with the cameras on the empty side to make it look full, so I've done my time too... and come on, Raga, admit it, you are a bit of a twunt. ;)o_O:D
 
Rack Kit said:
I watched the Croatia v France match and I can't remember any part where France deliberately gave the ball to Croatia.

Happy to wait for you to find a youtube clip of a French player purposefully giving up possession.

I'm here all day...
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sorry, i don't think YT can help anyone to understand football... cheers!
 
Weekender said:
You're both right: the glass is half empty and half full.
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As has been pointed out, England beat all opponents ranked beneath them and lost to all ranked above them. They achieved what they should have, no more and no less.

edit: sorry, that was up to the semis - on ranking they should have won against Croatia then lost the final.
 
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Barryoke said:
Raga, admit it, you are a bit of a twunt. ;)o_O:D
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Noun. twunt (plural twunts) (Britain, slang, vulgar) A fool; an extremely objectionable person.

You may want to read your post back :D
Admittedly, I gave up after line 3, it was enough to confirm matters.
 
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