football cliches that drive you mad

Without wishing to reopen the Heskey debate, I think in my post above I was just bemoaning the patronising nature of being told, in effect, "you, the thicko public, just don't see how great he is"

...just before Barrow were about to play Stevenage in the, errrrrr, FA Trophy Cup Final

Would that be the final of the FA Trophy Cup?

Invoking Greek mythology whenever Greece or a Greek team are playing

Yes, Tom, and that old one about Greeks bearing gifts.

World Cup revive, by the way.

They're just happy to be here

This sums it up nicely: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2010/jun/05/world-cup-2010-cliches

The Italians 'revert to type'

Just about everybody connected with English football believes that when push comes to shove Italy always fall back on defensive-minded cynicism. The finest example of this attitude came from Barry Davies after the Azzurri's defeat by South Korea in 2002: "And you have to say they have got what they deserve, because they just will not learn." Italy have won the World Cup four times; England have won it once. This suggests that whatever the Italians have failed to learn was maybe not worth knowing in the first place.

Considered zing

I had the conversation about the Germans with a work colleague earlier on. "Like a machine" he said. I pointed out that they were great to watch, inventive and quick the other night, but he was having none of it.

Germans passing the Turing test

It's not exactly news that Barry Davies is an idiot, but nevertheless it's always worth restating.

Machines can be great to watch and quick imo, so your colleague gets a pass xps

Only a matter of time before those manufacturing segments in kid's tv shows just default to Klinnsman passing it into the far corner every time.

I had the conversation about the Germans with a work colleague earlier on. "Like a machine" he said. I pointed out that they were great to watch, inventive and quick the other night, but he was having none of it.

― Daniel Giraffe, Wednesday, 16 June 2010 11:34 (21 minutes ago)

haha

i think it was established in an earlier thread that a lot of casual or stupid viewers srsly seem to take the cliches and phoned-in punditry shite as read

or heard

xpost re:'Italians revert to type'
The thing is, that doesn't really disprove anything. The Italians have a reputation for falling back on defensive-minded cynicism because they have a track record of falling back on defensive-minded cynicism. They've won more World Cups than England, sure, but that's because they're often very effective at defensive-minded cynicism, not because they're crazy all-out-attack kings of flamboyant lunacy. England are neither of these things.

england reverted to kick'n'rush type against USA, tbh

Germany have been fun for a while!

Germany have been the most consistently entertaining international side for nigh on a decade now

xp since 06 at least? iirc they were still quite dreadful in 02 wc

I thought they were okay in 02, but yeah they've been great since they got a bit cavalier to cover up their vulnerabilities

They were okay in '02 but in '06 their battle against Italy took on almost a moral character for me, like the good vs the dark side of football.

the current Germany is definitely a beautiful machine! Actually so are all good football teams to me. I guess I just love the idea of machines.

Voller took them down a bad path but credit goes to both Jurgen and Jogi for the marked difference in the last 4 years

"just banter"