VH-KCT* From Australia, joined May 2001, 479 posts, RR: 2 Posted (7 years 5 days 15 hours ago) and read 1101 times:
Now that everybody's played a match, what are your thoughts and notable moments?
Most exciting match not involving my team
TRI/SWE: Everybody seemed to be predicting a Swedish whitewash before the match. Yet despite losing their keeper before the match and playing almost half the match with 10 men, they held on thanks in no small part to some great keeping by Hislop. Seeing Larsson so angry near the end made it all the more sweeter.
Most boring match
ENG/PAR was awfully boring AND there was that strange spider-like shadow all over the pitch, but for me POR/ANG was utterly mind numbing. If ever I needed a good reason to get off the couch and do something else, there it was.
Worst ref's decision
Red card and penalty for Spain: Err, he tugged his strip ONCE outside of the box, and didn't really touch him at all when they were inside the box.
Worst player
Ronaldo: Plodded around at the front not doing much. The one time he made a strike (which wasn't bad) it seemed like the Croatian defence had just decided that he obviously wasn't playing and they could ignore him. He appeared to be carrying 10kg too much, and had other things on his mind (doughnuts, probably).
Best goal
The last goal by the Spaniards. Great build-up and no selfish play. Which leads me to...
Emerging trend
Strikers in African teams make absurdly over-cooked shots from too far away that risk knocking those seated in the very back row of the stands out onto the concourse!
Ryanb741 From United Kingdom, joined Mar 2002, 3219 posts, RR: 17 Reply 1, posted (7 years 5 days 14 hours ago) and read 1089 times:
Most exciting match not involving my team
Australia-Japan. The Aussie comeback was terrific. Interesting to see all the England fans in London supporting Australia - probably the only sport that would happen in.
Most boring match
Gemany-Poland. Poland utterly bereft of attacking options and Germany very predictable with the exception of the excellent Ballack
Worst ref's decision
Sending off and penalty for Spain
Worst player
Michael Owen. Did he actually turn up for the Paraguay England match?
Best goal
Torsten Frings' screamer for Germany against Costa Rica was an awesome strike.
Emerging trend
Woeful refereeing by Latin American referees.
I used to think the brain is the most fascinating part of my body. But, hey, who is telling me that?
I enjoyed the Austrailian comeback to win 3-1 in the last 10 minutes. Also enjoyed Togo scoring for the first time ever. The African teams should shoot at every chance they get. Its always worth a try, especially with the new lighter balls (football, you dirty minded A.netters ) this year. Im glad to see the African teams in the World cup this year!
Can you say 'Beer Can' without sounding like a Jamaican saying 'Bacon'?
Quoting VH-KCT* (Thread starter): Worst ref's decision
Red card and penalty for Spain: Err, he tugged his strip ONCE outside of the box, and didn't really touch him at all when they were inside the box.
I agree with this to and the AUS-JAP game where the Australian GK was taken out.
VH-KCT* From Australia, joined May 2001, 479 posts, RR: 2 Reply 5, posted (7 years 5 days 12 hours ago) and read 1047 times:
Quoting Legoguy (Reply 3): The African teams should shoot at every chance they get.
But if they stopped and had a look around, often they would have seen a passing option that would have created a better chance of a goal. Drogba made three attempts at a scissor-kick in about 10 minutes; if that's not showing off then I don't know what is!
Something else that I've noted - giant forwards!
Peter Crouch ENG 198cm - pre-cup performance was quite good
Josh Kennedy AUS 192cm - instrumental in Australia's comeback
Jan Koller CZE 202cm - scored a nice header before hamstring injury, bringing on
Vratislav Lokvenc CZE 196cm
Paulo Wanchope CRC 182 - Okay so he's not a giant, but he's incredibly gangly
I only saw the highlights of England-Paraguay, so I can't honestly say that was the one - though people who saw it say it was. France - Switzerland was pretty dull.
I suppose this is question of most disappointing player, really. That would have to be Brazil's (as opposed to Portugal's) Ronaldo. Reports today are that he ended up in a clinic complaining of dizziness last night. France '98 all over again?
Cornish From United Kingdom, joined Feb 2005, 8187 posts, RR: 55 Reply 7, posted (7 years 5 days 11 hours ago) and read 1034 times:
Quoting Banco (Reply 6): Definitely Australia-Japan. I thought it wasn't going to happen for them, but a fabulous comeback at the end had me jumping the air.
Everyone taking shots from 30 yards with this new ball.
So lets hope Gerrard gets a few more cracks at that sort of thing in games to come. He's one of the best around at that sort of thing with any sort of ball, so god knows what he could come up with this latest one given the opportunity.
Just when I thought I could see light at the end of the tunnel, it was some B*****d with a torch bringing me more work
VH-KCT* From Australia, joined May 2001, 479 posts, RR: 2 Reply 10, posted (7 years 5 days 9 hours ago) and read 1008 times:
Quoting Cornish (Reply 9): Was it Togo that did that fantastic tribal dance?
It looked a bit like they were nibbling at something with their beaks! We had only just scored our first-ever World Cup goal, so I was very happy for them.
What about the Ecuadorians and their shining the fingernails on the jacket?
TheSonntag From Germany, joined Jun 2005, 3350 posts, RR: 30 Reply 12, posted (7 years 4 days 20 hours ago) and read 970 times:
Quoting Tiger119 (Reply 11): How many venues/stadia are being used in Germany for the World Cup? Where are they located?
Berlin (East)
Munich (South)
Cologne (West)
Leipzig (East)
Kaiserslautern (Ramstein military base is close)
Hamburg (North)
Stuttgart
Hannover (100km south of Hamburg)
Frankfurt
Gelsenkirchen (Ruhr area)
Dortmund (Ruhr area)
All stadiums are good. The biggest are Dortmund, Munich, Berlin.
Defense tends to become less important, or better said, playing in a more offensive way seems to be the way to go. Traditional defensive playing teams like Germany and Italy played attractive, beautiful football, while Brazil ironically seems to be more defensive.
I think this is a nice trend. As much as I admire Greece for their success in 2004, I do not want to see such football anymore...
BartiniMan From Australia, joined Jul 2001, 315 posts, RR: 0 Reply 14, posted (7 years 4 days 19 hours ago) and read 956 times:
Quoting Ryanb741 (Reply 1): Gemany-Poland. Poland utterly bereft of attacking options and Germany very predictable with the exception of the excellent Ballack
Excellent Ballack?? Did you watch the game? Many German players outplayed Ballack on that night. Overrated superstar Ballack did nothing special. Chelsea must be thinking about their wasted money.
Quoting TheSonntag (Reply 13): (Insert player from Poland here). Everybody bashes Ronaldo (me too), but I was especially disappointed from Poland, and this includes many players.
No surprise a German saying it. Whats your grounds for thinking it? Is it because Polish players denied germany a goal for a whole 90 minutes even with 10 men?
Polish players the worst, pfft, Germany barely scraped through, BARELY. If you wanna know about worst players look at your own team. MegaSuperstars Germany had trouble finding the net for the whole game against 'crappy worst' polish players, even with overrated Ballack playing.
Ryanb741 From United Kingdom, joined Mar 2002, 3219 posts, RR: 17 Reply 16, posted (7 years 4 days 10 hours ago) and read 930 times:
Quoting BartiniMan (Reply 14): Excellent Ballack?? Did you watch the game? Many German players outplayed Ballack on that night. Overrated superstar Ballack did nothing special. Chelsea must be thinking about their wasted money.
Ballack effectively controlled the midfield for Germany, preventing Poland building attacks. For me he was Germany's best player even though he did nothing spectacular. He is a very intelligent footballer and controlled the pace of the midfield. If Germany had effective strikers they would have won the game by three clear goals
I used to think the brain is the most fascinating part of my body. But, hey, who is telling me that?
9V-SPF From Germany, joined Sep 2001, 1375 posts, RR: 3 Reply 17, posted (7 years 4 days 7 hours ago) and read 913 times:
Quoting BartiniMan (Reply 14): Polish players the worst, pfft, Germany barely scraped through, BARELY. If you wanna know about worst players look at your own team. MegaSuperstars Germany had trouble finding the net for the whole game against 'crappy worst' polish players, even with overrated Ballack playing
Did someone pee into your coffee this morning? Nobody claimed that Germany´s performance was brilliant but you just can´t deny that Poland´s offense has been horrific in this World Cup so far.
IFEMaster From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 18, posted (7 years 4 days 5 hours ago) and read 900 times:
Most exciting match not involving my team
The Germany - Costa Rica match was pretty exciting, given that Costa Rica exposed Germany's woeful defense. But I think the Australia - Japan match has to rank as most exciting for me so far.
Most boring match
England - Paraguay and France - Switzerland were completely lacking in any entertainment value.
Worst ref's decision
Ukrainian red card in the match against Spain. Terrible piece of officiating.
Worst player
Ronaldo looked piss poor and fat. He needs to cut down on his pork life and get some exercise.
Best goal
England's first goal against Trinidad & Tobago. It had everything - vision, idea, pin-point passing, unselfish lay-off, killer final lofted ball in, and Crouchaldinho towering up to nod it in. Awesome goal. And Gerrard's was quite sublime too.
Emerging trend
Bad refereeing. See the other thread that discusses that. Some of the decisions - obvious, unmissable decisions - have been atrocious.
Derico From Argentina, joined Dec 1999, 4233 posts, RR: 13 Reply 19, posted (7 years 4 days 4 hours ago) and read 898 times:
Quoting IFEMaster (Reply 18): England's first goal against Trinidad & Tobago. It had everything - vision, idea, pin-point passing, unselfish lay-off, killer final lofted ball in, and Crouchaldinho towering up to nod it in. Awesome goal. And Gerrard's was quite sublime too.
Spain's last goal was the best, until Argentina's 2nd today.
My internet was not shut down, the internet has shut me down
IFEMaster From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 20, posted (7 years 4 days 4 hours ago) and read 895 times:
Quoting Derico (Reply 19): Spain's last goal was the best, until Argentina's 2nd today.
It certainly was good, but I don't think it was the best. The reason being that the entire move started with the ball luckily falling to the feet of a Spanish player when he tried to go through a couple of defenders. He lost control and he got lucky. If he'd actually attempted the maneuvre and succeeded, then it would get best goal. But because of that luck/loss of control factor, Crouchaldinho's goal gets it for me.
27 MartinairYYZ: Most exciting match not involving my team CIV/ARG and CIV/HOL ... Ivory Coast really deserves to go through, and both the matches were lucky wins that
28 LTBEWR: Stangest thing: The best player in a match gets a modest trophy from the makers of Bud beer (a USA company and official beer sponsor on the field of t
29 ZRH: For an airliners.net member an interesting question: which airport for which stadium? Hamburg: HAM Berlin: TXL, SXF, THF Hannover: HAJ Leipzig: LEJ Do
30 Banco: To be fair, I think three minutes into a match is just a shade early to talk about a goal being "badly needed"....
32 Ezeiza: I'll vote for Brazil-Croatia. Portugal - Angola .... it started great but man that was boring! No booking to the Ghanian player that fouled Italy's I
33 Tiger119: - Do teams in the pools play in the same stadium throughout pool play? Do the teams stay fairly close to those statiums? - Excellent map, I just wish
34 TheSonntag: No, in fact the contrary is the case. For example, the Netherlands play in Leipzig, Stuttgart and Frankfurt. Of course, travelling in Germany is very
35 Tiger119: - Never having been in Germany, are the travel times fairly short? What kind of distances do they have to travel (in miles)? David
36 TheSonntag: Germany is 1100km long (I think that are around 700miles) and 700km broad (450miles). Our Autobahn system is one of the best in the world, with 12000
37 Tiger119: - I would love to go there sometime to study the transportation system there. Seems really good. David
38 Aleksandar: It's a bit too early to review the first round, but I can say that my team did exactly what everybody here expected of them. . Kind of, because nobody
Sponsor Message: 
From Australia, joined May 2001, 479 posts, 
From United Kingdom, joined Mar 2002, 3219 posts, 
From Bulgaria, joined Mar 2003, 2342 posts, 
) this year. Im glad to see the African teams in the World cup this year!
From United States of America, joined Sep 2003, 1919 posts, 
From Germany, joined Jun 2005, 3350 posts, 
From Argentina, joined Dec 1999, 4233 posts, 
From Switzerland, joined Nov 1999, 5544 posts, 
Printer friendly format 
