World Cup 2014

half the time argentina looked like hwhaaaa?!!? whenever they tried their fancy stuff & bosnia'd hulk smashed through the middle

kinda cool

not pictured: the crying child that Messi traumatised for life

lol

hahaha

messi hates children more at eleven

but they're cool with him when they turn twelve idgi

bahaha

Btw, goals after 11 WC games:

2010: 18
2014: 37

o_O

goaltenders are not flopping the ball to the safety zone

is there a serious, tangible reason for why there's so many more goals?

genuinely interested in any theories floating about

Strikers been at it

there's prob a theory about the heat and how that means players are tired sooner thus leaving more spaces for strikers. and that would also mean more late goals too i guess. there's my bs theory for you

... and the crowd jeers you every time you don't pass the ball forward

Vuvuzelas were off-putting.

Peter Serafinowicz is going to attempt a live commentary of usa v ghana tomorrow, should be a laugh

http://mixlr.com/peterserafinowicz

xpost yeah i heard a lot of stuff from players abt how they couldn't talk on the field at all bc of the vuvu noize, might be part of it

miss the vuzus was cool to have sports and avant garde music concert at the same time

i liked them myself

beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees

I remember lots of complaining about the ball in 2010 having too much movement on it when hit hard. Could have been a combination of psychology and physics causing the lack of scoring last time.

there was an uptick in steroid use. there will be messi vs. ronaldo big mac commercials for a year. eventually messi will retire into bitter court battles. then ronaldo's leg will break mid match, revealing it was corked all along.

otm

defending has been getting steadily worse for the last 4 years

see prem thread

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/jun/15/croatia-players-refuse-talk-press-after-publication-nude-photos

glad to see that what Henry Winter has learned from the Italy game where Sterling and Studge were probably England's best 2 players is that one of the 2 should be moved somewhere else to make room for Rooney because "he must play central"

Shearer pleading the same case on the BBC website, tho the stats for the 4 main forward players are interesting if correct - Rooney no less effective than the other 3 really

wd still drop Rooney for being a whining inflexible oaf so far over the hill he's looking up at the start of the next hill

this week has made me wonder if he really gets to be in shitty Nike cartoons all over the world with genuine world class players or if they just edit it him in for the lol England market

always bugged me, that one, ever since Gary Doherty made the box of Fifa 2002 over here

There's probably loads of reasons (no Jabulani, better communication on the pitch, climate) but it's mostly down to tactical changes and personnel. Teams are starting on the front foot a lot more, there are relatively few teams playing two holding midfielders, and the quality of defences in general is worse than four years ago. How many teams at this tournament have a genuinely World Class centre back, let alone two?

The style of play of the most successful teams in the Champions League has changed as well and international football has responded to that.
The order of today's games is extremely annoying by the way.

three points for a win finally sinking in

Portugal really aren't any good anymore, barring Ronaldo. Then again if Lahm is in midfield then the weakest area of the Germany team is full backs and defending in transition both of which should suit CRon.

yeah i heard a lot of stuff from players abt how they couldn't talk on the field at all bc of the vuvu noize, might be part of it

I don't really get this though, isn't lots of crowd noise usually supposed to be a good thing? When Liverpool beat Chelsea in the Champions league in 2005, everyone said the kop was just a wall of noise, loudest they'd heard- but if Jose Mourinho had used that as an excuse for losing, he'd have been laughed out of town.

Also, the sound wasn't that much different to the airhorns that were popular in Europe in the seventies.

I think the vuvuzela noise was significantly higher than a standard noisy crowd. 70s airhorns were used sparingly by the odd punter rather than by 50,000 people for 90 minutes straight.

I don't think anyone actually used the vuvus as an excuse for losing btw, they just complained about not being able to communicate properly.

Given the vuvus drowned out the sound of all cheering and singing I think it can be safely assumed they were louder than a standard football crowd. The sound of the stadiums didn't even change when a goal went in.

Vuvus got louder iirc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btWXBpcQ138

^ wow @ this!

Vuvuzela hate was bullshit though. Never bothered me. Don't like African things don't have World Cup in Africa. Same bullshit that has banned the Samba bands that are 100% always present in Brazilian football, in case some prissy, fussy over serious and over outraged European doesn't get his football how he wants it, nicely sanitized.

^

OK I take it back ilf regulars only

> Vuvuzela hate was bullshit though. Never bothered me

they filtered the worst of it out of tv broadcasts:

http://www.timeslive.co.za/sport/soccer/2010/06/15/broadcasters-filter-out-vuvuzela-noise

"We have already taken steps to minimize the noise and are continuing to monitor the situation," the BBC said in a statement.

Vuvuzela hate was bullshit though. Never bothered me. Don't like African things don't have World Cup in Africa. Same bullshit that has banned the Samba bands that are 100% always present in Brazilian football, in case some prissy, fussy over serious and over outraged European doesn't get his football how he wants it, nicely sanitized.

agreed but then on the other hand I was so happy re the below:
http://www.itv.com/worldcup/england-brass-band-not-welcome-at-2014-world-cup

> Vuvuzela hate was bullshit though. Never bothered me

they filtered the worst of it out of tv broadcasts:

http://www.timeslive.co.za/sport/soccer/2010/06/15/broadcasters-filter-out-vuvuzela-noise

"We have already taken steps to minimize the noise and are continuing to monitor the situation," the

should filter out phil neville's voice amirite

Why is Dzeko invariably referred to by commentators as Edin Dzeko and not Dzeko?

Celtic legend in the bbc studio. With Neil Lennon.

LOL yes. The two worst teams in the tournament so far (apart from Spain) have had Celtic players in them.

Vuvuzela hate was bullshit though. Never bothered me. Don't like African things don't have World Cup in Africa. Same bullshit that has banned the Samba bands that are 100% always present in Brazilian football, in case some prissy, fussy over serious and over outraged European doesn't get his football how he wants it, nicely sanitized.

This is pretty reductive, especially given what actually happened four years ago (Blatter actually defended their use iirc) but banning samba bands is straight up bullshit. On the plus side, no fucking England brass band this year.

Are Europeans to blame for banning samba bands?

just read the shearer article on bbc. the title is 'play rooney in centre or not at all' but it is really more about the latter. i say bravo for backdooring the dropping of rooney into the conversation.

I didnt know samba bands were banned. Thats incredibly lame.

RMDE playing Rooney on the left side of a 4-3-3 is not playing him on the left side of midfield, playing Rooney in the centre basically means reverting to a shitty 4-4-2 while pretending he's a competent #10.

Is it me or did Phil Neville sound EXACTLY like the whinging long-haired Stockport stoner kid on The Island with Bear Grylls?