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World Cup 2006

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Regrettable Juvenilia

15:18 / 23.06.06

Yes, I certainly have been unable to avoid watching all the matches that have been on during the day in particular. My employers had it written into my contact that I had to keep checking the BBC website. Then on my way home I was frogmarched by the Polizei to one of the special 'Fussballen Viewen Kampf' that have been set up, where I huddled with my comrades behind barbed wire and was forced to stare up at the screen at gunpoint.

Kiltartan Cross

15:20 / 23.06.06

Tunisia was robbed. First Ukraine save with a handball, then they get a penalty, for no good reason, which they score from. Shame.

15:50 / 23.06.06

sleaze, why must you be comedy fall-guy of every football thread on Barbelith? Still, congratulations on maintaining your 100% record.

Goodness Gracious Meme

16:36 / 23.06.06

Indeed.

Y'know, some of us might actually agree with you regarding the 'everything-draped-in-a-St.Georges-cross' syndrome.

This, mind you, is a thread for discussion of the football. You'll deduce this from the fact that aside from yourself and grandma, pretty much every post here is about the game in some way.

I know this has been asked before, but why actively seek out a thread discussing football to complain about the World Cup? Glutton for punishment?

17:00 / 23.06.06

Hapless seeking of revenge? Worth noting also that Pato hasn't posted here, so anyone else seeking said is - at best - misdirected.

17:02 / 23.06.06

Funny you should ask that GGM, there was once a thread in this very forum dedicated to the non-enjoyment of the tournament. It was dumped out of here and is currently subject of the ire of a variety of people who have expressed the opinion or implied that such a thread shouldn't even exist, elsewhere others seem to be implying that multiple threads on what is ostensibly the same topic is something that is undesirable.

Where is the right place to express exasperation at the multifaceted all enveloping tendrils that surround all things football?

Goodness Gracious Meme

17:40 / 23.06.06

I would say, at the risk of dragging this thread even further off-topic, that the thread devoted to complaining about the WC is still the place to do that.

You might want to note that none of the regular contributors to this thread have been posting in that one making the suggestions you're complaining about.

It's a couple of posters behaving like fucking idiots. NOT a grand conspiracy of football-love.

So, raise problems with that thread threre/elsewhere rather than polluting a serious, on-topic thread in 'retaliation'.

Mod hat: Such threads would be moved from G&G IMO because they do not concern the game in question, nor, given Tom's useful early exhortation to think carefully about starting threads in a new forum/make sure they have a point/value, do they add anything to the forum.

It's also, as you well know, about tone. A thread analysing sporting cultures and their problems/interrelations with nationalism/gender stereotypes in a thoughful fashion is one thing, and I'd be very interested to see such a thread .

A 'I hate x and I'm going to shout about it BECAUSE I HATE IT' is a conversation thread, whatever the subject.

17:41 / 23.06.06

You have your thread, which I think fully one person has implied should not exist, and I'm not even sure of that - I certainly haven't, so do please take your colourless whinging about Asda adverts, etc. there. kthxbye.

20:22 / 23.06.06

about to watch togo and france; got up for swiss match to find the station had switched advertisedf programs - the swiss korean game was live - if aussies beat italy (o, easy, easy, easy. we got guus! he intones with forced confidence... ) and the swiss win their 16 round match with ukraine, we'll meet swiss

i have close italian friends i'll watch the first match with, then swiss chums with whom i'll watch the 1/4 final.. now i need to cultivate a couple of appropriate ethnic friendships for the semis!

21:21 / 23.06.06

I have been so busy with work and my hangover I didn't evne posted after Brazil' game with Japan

My feeling is we're finally getting it right. traidng Adriano for Robinho made all the difference, and event though Japan isn't the hardest of foes, a 4 x 1 victory in a World Cup is always good. And even better, we played a beatufil game, thatr mix of samba and football i was missing (Ronaldo 2nd goal was a piece of art). Let's see how we do from now on.

Oh, and astrojax, I was happy to know Australia made it. You got a hard roll of the dice, facing Italy next, but hey, I'm beting you people will give the Azurra a hard time. And who knows, like you said yourself, "this is football". Maybe we'll face each other again in the finals... if Ghana doesn't take us down, that is.

22:07 / 23.06.06

dm, you should account for ghana, but ya just never know in football. i agree robinho is a key facet of the brasilian forward game at the moment, with kaka feeding him, he looks likely each time he gets near it. but i like adriano - he needs the right feeding style to make the most of him, robbie just gets in and does it - and mebbe would replace ronaldo with him? spoilt for choice!!!

italy have not been impressive, so i fancy guus hiddink's magic to give our socceroos every chance of going on to meet the swiss...

france v togo is a disappointing encounter. togolese never really of that class, but french v. lucky to get their first - it was a whiloe coming. viera and thuram france's stars, lucky they've got them. henry is a passenger, and ribery will thank buddha when it's all over and his three sitters all missed wildly. always fancied trezeuget, what's happened to him? togo keeper a legend!

shall we pass on comments on refereeing so far?? if fifa are serious that mistakes by refs will be punished, they could run out of refs before the semis...

ok everybody: group phases over, teams ranked 2, 5, 15 and a couple other fancies go home. the french the only seeded team not to top their group. no korea, no croatia. most dramatic fixtures in the next round probably holland v portugal & spain v france, the rest should be academic for the seeded teams...

so, quarterfinalists should be, from my perspective:
england, germany, argentina, portugal (poor holland, i gave them such a hope), australia (heart of hearts, i expect italy should be too strong, but i have faith! we can go a long long way!! what a group to get out of!), brasil, switzerland & spain.

entirely plausible upsets: ecuador over england, holland over portugal (this is really tough to call - penalties?) and ukraine over swiss... would also fancy seeing swedes beat hosts, but can't imagine where they'll do it.

incredible upsets? ghana, france, mexico - everyone else should make close encounters.

what do others fancy?

& drat, a day of no football. what shall i do? sleep!

23:16 / 23.06.06

i like adriano - he needs the right feeding style to make the most of him, robbie just gets in and does it - and mebbe would replace ronaldo with him? spoilt for choice!!!

I like him too, but with Ronaldo in the field, he's found himself superfluous. And the truth is Ronald simply can't be benched: he's a fucking genious, even when not in his best shape. The two goals he made show it.

And any results from now on is anybody's guess, to be honest.

08:43 / 24.06.06

Hi all

Just a quick post to apologise for expressing my exasperation at the three ring circus associated with the world cup in the thread that is focused on talking about the game. I still think that exasperation at the the impact of the world cup is as valid as any other response to it, but this is, as others have said, not the correct venue for it.

17:13 / 24.06.06

While we're at it, may I offer apologies for prior misogynistic phrases in an earlier post complaining about not enough football on the highlights shows, which I would have thought better of in the sober light of day. Think was meant to be humerous monty python reference, albeit out of context & misquoted, but sorry for offensiveness.

Anyway, back to the good stuff, thought Germany looked frighteningly good against Sweden today. The Swedish keeper had a great game and didn't deserve to be on the losing side. It was a shame about the couple of unsporting moments by some of the German players (encouraging the referee to issue cards, playing on when players were down injured etc), but didn't detract from the fact they are looking very strong.

However, the winners from Agrgentina vs Mexico tonight will provide a difficult game for them the quarters. Can't really see Mexico winning this, much as I would like them to and I think it's a fair bet that the winners from Germany Argentina will make it to the final.

Congratulations to the Aussies for qualifying from the group rounds, I'm hoping that they or someone from Ukraine, Switzerland or Ghana (sorry DM, but it's an upset that everyone outside of Brazil would love), can make the Semi's and then who knows...

nedrichards is confused

20:02 / 24.06.06

I just had a matrix moment.

A small person just burst in shouting 'Mexico have gone 1-0 up against Argentina'. I ran, *ran* across the room to the TV. Come on you Mexicans!

(although as I write this it's 1-1 entering extra time)

06:51 / 25.06.06

what a scintillating game of football... whosoever beats argentina will probably win the world cup; and - again apologies to dm! - i don't know who that might be: england? ha! the hosts? well, i haven't seen anything of their swedish encounter, but what i saw in the group games and given they did what they did against a sweden lucky to get out of their group and playing half a game with ten blokes... hard to see this being enough to get past the south americans...

spain? we'll see... they'll be something of a wall to get past. holland or portugal? certainly a hurdle, something italy australia france etc shan't be in all honesty from what's been on display... brasil argentina final? or argentina spain?

or england australia!!

...or what's up teams' sleeves we haven't seen yet? a deco decider? delicious delgardo? a rooney riot, viduka virtuosity, robinho ridiculous? a ghanain gasp??

i'm so excited about the australia italy encounter. will be at my italian hair cutter's funky salon, coffee, wine, beer, he's a great chef so yum food, wide screen plasma tv and surround sound, massage chairs! what an event, no matter the result. o boy o boy o boy!

i must say, the arg v mex game really highlighted what every four years wait is worth it for, eh? whatever happens, seems we're in for a high quality 'football as beautiful game' world cup to enjoy - may we all win!

[but go aussie, go aussie... - harry is in our press saying we can win the world cup; why not? i say, go harry! yeah harry! go harry! and swivel my hips...

]

Suedey! SHOT FOR MEAT!

10:49 / 25.06.06

I like Harry, he had a special World Cup haircut and everything.

Elijah, Freelance Rabbi

15:18 / 25.06.06

Good shot David.

Kiltartan Cross

19:58 / 25.06.06

That was just silly.

21:05 / 25.06.06

i watched the first half of england and saw too much... went to bed (game starts 1am for me) and got up again fifteen minutes into the fiasco that was portugal beating holland - as i tipped. 4 from 4...

what a bizarre affair. deco was giving the ball back, how do you get a yellow for that? what a shame if that isn't rectified. maybe england have a hope against such a depleted lineup? probably not... the portuguese defence is pretty tough to get past - where will england's inventiveness come from? still, be some good football.

tonight, o tonight... c'mon aussie, c'mon. c'mon...

12:44 / 26.06.06

I haven't written about then World Cup for a bit, so ...

the Germans are unsurprisingly very happy with themselves. Sweden are not that weak and the contest was over in 15 minutes. If they do manage to beat Argentina they'll be very hard to stop. Argentina themselves continue to look very, very good, but hardly unstoppable any more and Mexico were so unlucky to meet them that early. Mexico are better than some of the teams that will reach the quarter finals. It was a great game.

England, ... well, after that I think Posh is a very shallow woman.

Benny: deco was giving the ball back. Ha! He had no business having the ball in the first place and no, he wasn't giving it back. Don't players ever waste time in Australia? And, at that stage of the conflict it was clearly just another provocation too.

Anyway, good luck today! You'll need it, but the Italians are definitely weaker without Mr Nesta. Football immortality beckons.

Elijah, Freelance Rabbi

13:22 / 26.06.06

The Dutch and the Portugese teams played what could have been the dirtiest game of foosocbaler I have ever seen. The insane tackle from behind because the Dutch player wasn't polite enough, the elbow to the face as retaliation for the HEADBUTT earlier.

crazy I tells ya.

13:56 / 26.06.06

Ha! The Italians have strong B'lith candidate, 23-obsessive Marco 'Matrix' Materazzi, the dirtiest player in Serie A, to replace Nesta. Best believe he wears the number.

13:57 / 26.06.06

Meant to say - appreciate the apology, sleaze, hope you'll accept likewise from me. Nearly over now.

15:03 / 26.06.06

Well the sccoeroos have kept it goaless in the first half, although big Mark in goal's made a couple of decent saves, can they break down the tight Italian defence in the second half?....

I say yeh

ONLY NICE THINGS

15:16 / 26.06.06

Italy down to 10 men! Come on you sheilas!

Ooh, isn't it exciting?

ONLY NICE THINGS

15:43 / 26.06.06

The possibility of an upset, that is, rather than the grindingly dull prospect of Italy nicking a goal and shutting down completely.

15:58 / 26.06.06

I'd say you cursed that Haus.

15:58 / 26.06.06

What a rotten way to go out. So sorry, astro.

ONLY NICE THINGS

15:58 / 26.06.06

Called it.

So, Portugal. Anyone know how bad Ronaldo's injury is? Only, if he is looking likely to play, I can see Eriksson panicking and putting a barely-fit Gary Neville back in the team to mark him, with predictable and sickening consequences.

ONLY NICE THINGS

15:59 / 26.06.06

Oh, and commiserations to Australith - that was never a penalty. Shocking decision.

16:01 / 26.06.06

The Guardian says he is likely to recover. Also, Portugal are considering appealing against Deco's ban - pfft to that (I hope).

You half called it - they didn't really have any time to shut down...

ONLY NICE THINGS

16:02 / 26.06.06

True, true. I was expecting early in injury time.

Elijah, Freelance Rabbi

16:06 / 26.06.06

I agree Haus, that was one of the worst Italian dives I have seen.

Deco is the one who got his second yellow for picking up the ball and delaying the game right? I think Portugal is lucky the ref in their match wasn't the same guy who gave Englands keeper the delay yellow card, their keeper was in slow motion on every goal kick for the last 10 minutes of play.

Suedey! SHOT FOR MEAT!

16:12 / 26.06.06

That was harsh. You wuz robbed, etc! Still, at least going out like that... well, you've got something to blame. Australia didn't just play like shit and whimper out or anything.

All I hope is that if Ronaldo plays, somebody makes him cry again. Gary Neville can give him a good thigh karate kick like what Holland did, and I'd be fine with that. Also he can man mark his Manchester United team mate and make constant comments about his Dad, like Ruud Van Nistlerooooooj.

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