Discussion The Football/Soccer Thread

[Imperium]

^ lool. Cant say much back to that xD

Maradona can't coach, and Tevez can't be the main forward of a serious team. Looking at his stats (1 goal and 2 red cards) one'd think he's a defender.

I just looked at his stats for argentina. It would make emile heskey proud. Never knew he scored so little for them.

 

[Saintz0r]

I laughed when I read this

Given Diego Maradona's pharmaceutical history, it is probably fair to say he is no stranger to the odd nosebleed. Which may explain why he is so rubbish at managing teams at altitude.

Earlier this year Argentina were tonked 6-1 away to Bolivia, and last night they went down 2-0 in Ecuador after a match that saw Carlos Tevez miss a penalty and Leo Messi miss a sitter.

Never the most gracious loser, Maradona insisted his side had deserved to win.

"(Ecuador) didn't do anything in the first half," he said. "In the second half, they got a couple of rebounds and they scored two goals.

"If we had scored a goal, it would have finished the game off."

Probably not at 2-0 though, eh?

Rather excitingly, Maradona's men are now in genuine danger of not qualifying. They are in the fourth and final automatic qualifying position, two points ahead of Ecuador and another two ahead of Uruguay.

Their next game is a nice, easy one against group leaders Brazil, and even in Argentina questions are being asked over the managerial credentials of somebody who is considered half-man, half-deity.

Argentina have failed to qualify only once in their history, and there would be a neat symmetry if the man who won the World Cup almost by himself manages to lose it just as single-handedly.

Maradona's is being as 'good' as Dunga was in the begining. Luckily by now he understood he can't let Josue play and Ramires has a place in this team. Now, if he can just send Pato and Gilberto Silva back to hell I'll be a happy person

Eres grande Brasil? Ganar cagando aceite y defendiendo en el área chica todos los partidos significa ser grande? Estás seguro?

Every single national team sucks. Period.

I never cease to be amazed at MandrilMadrid's spending capacity. Their debt must be similar to a small county's foreign debt.

Winning on the defense all the matches? I tought we had the best attack of the south american qualifyers xD
The match against Equador, ok. We were in thedefense all the time and only got a draw cause Julio is the best keeper in the world. But most games we're attacking as much as defending.

About Madrid... well if they don't buy an entire defense it won't matter much. Pepe/Heinze are laughable. Casillas is very good, but he's not a miracle worker. I heard somewhere they'd try to buy Vidic too, if that's true then Madrid will become something fearsome. With Kaka, CR, Villa, etc and this defense I'm not so sure.

 

[L0ki]

Winning on the defense all the matches? I tought we had the best attack of the south american qualifyers xD

Seeing how pitiful the current level of south-american national teams is, that's not saying much.

The match against Equador, ok. We were in thedefense all the time and only got a draw cause Julio is the best keeper in the world. But most games we're attacking as much as defending.

The point was that Brazil doesn't play like a big team. They usually can't keep control of the midfield, they defend close to the keeper and try to launch fast counterattacks. Their passing ability and team play is atrocious (for a brazilian team) so they try to keep their attack style direct. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but that's not Brazil's historical style, is it?

 

[blai]

This does not seem to hard, but there`s the whole thing about only 8 runner ups from 9 groups will go to the playoffs, and I feel if Portugal finishes second they might as well be the bubbler, I don`t think Portugal will get first the dannes have a 7 point lead and there's only 4 games remaining.

Portugal will beat dear Hungary and take the 2nd place in the group , no doubt. Even though Hungary did play good these qualifications I doubt It's enough.

 

[Mendes]

I could see Madrid going for a right back, like Maicon, so that Sergio Ramos can go back to the center of the defense. Wait a sec... they got Ronaldo and Kaka!!! OMFG who needs defenders? they'll most likely win every match 15-14! xO
Seriously, I'm impressed... never thought they could actually pull it... I'm starting to believe they'll buy Messi, Villa, Silva... Pelegrini will have to decide between Ronaldo and Villa to play as center backs :P

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Portugal will beat dear Hungary and take the 2nd place in the group , no doubt. Even though Hungary did play good these qualifications I doubt It's enough.

I'm not so sure 'bout that... it'd be a miracle looking at our recent performances. We won 2-1 to Armenia with a late goal after 90' in a corner... how can we beat Hungary like that?

 

[blai]

I'm not so sure 'bout that... it'd be a miracle looking at our recent performances. We won 2-1 to Armenia with a late goal after 90' in a corner... how can we beat Hungary like that?

Well don't forget Hungary also only beat Albania with 1-0, though after 38mins but they did not rule the game. They're playing against Sweden next round and that will be really interesting. Don't know which team to support tho... And in Feb we lost vs Israel with 0-1 after the 70-something minute.

So, yeh we took on Malta and 3-0'd them but that was in the beginning of April and much could've happened.

The Portuguese might just've had a bad day...

 

[Mendes]

Our bad day was against Denmark... we were winning 2-1 at 90' and ended up loosing 3-2 I dunno, things are dark here

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I think I hit the bull's eye... Maicon will most likely go to Madrid... excellent signing imo

 

[kkck]

Eres grande Brasil? Ganar cagando aceite y defendiendo en el área chica todos los partidos significa ser grande? Estás seguro?

Every single national team sucks. Period.

I never cease to be amazed at MandrilMadrid's spending capacity. Their debt must be similar to a small county's foreign debt.

A la hora de la hora nada de eso importa. Nadie se va a tomar la molestia de recordar los detalles del partido(ni ahora ni nunca). Brasil gano y punto. Esto no es captain tsubasa.

I don't think national teams suck but it is true clubs are overall better...

 

[Mendes]

You could have an all stars nation (Brazil often makes some) and there'd still be alot of clubs who play better. The training routines (which the national teams have not) are very important and that's why I think Hiddink is being so successeful in the national team business. What he made of Russia in the last Euro Cup was simply amazing, and you could tell his team was physically dominant over most adversaries.

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Porto sold Cissokho to Milan for 15M€! We bought him for 300thousand € 6 months ago, so its a super investment. Its also true that the first good left back we had since I can remember has come and gone... Now we'll most likely live another 10 years without finding another good one.

 

[digitaldude]

Russia almost did not make it, after getting beaten by Israel, but that England blunder, got them all the way to the semi finals and it was awesome since I`m Russian, and we always joke how bad our national team is, but not anymore!

 

[blai]

Hmm that goal wasn't all bad...
U21-EC
Check out Belarus's goal, and Swedens fifth goal...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5jWPZWfI8fE&feature=related

Some big cannons there.

 

[Saintz0r]

The point was that Brazil doesn't play like a big team. They usually can't keep control of the midfield, they defend close to the keeper and try to launch fast counterattacks. Their passing ability and team play is atrocious (for a brazilian team) so they try to keep their attack style direct. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but that's not Brazil's historical style, is it?

Well, I agree it's far from being a awesome team, I'm just saying it's also not as bad as some people here in Brasil think.
That way we play is veeeeery boring when we face small teams that defend all the time and usually the game ends with a 0x0. But it proved to be fairly good when we faced the big teams who attacked us, 6x2 in Portugal, 3x0 in Argentina and 2x0 in Italy. Besides, in a penalty match Julio's one of the most trustworthy keeper so I'd bet in us

@Confederations Cup
Nice, South Africa! I'm really hoping you'll go to the semi-finals xD

Dunga you #$¨#&#@!, called Kleberson completely ruined Flamengo's midfield and he hasn't even played yet! He better play tomorrow or ...

 

[ibra87]

1-0 Egypt - Italy

Seems like Egypt is on fire. First they almost score a tie with Brazil and now they beat the world champions. I think they're probably performing 110% and may soon break down but for now kudos to them.

 

[Pirulito]

I'm not surprised.
Italy exudes not the least of confidence. The only thing that supports current italian team is the tradition.

 

[thsv]

Egypt performance has impressed me. It's even more impressive when you find out that they're third in their world cup qualifying group. But then I always felt the African groups were hardest to get out of.

 

[Mendes]

Tevez is leaving MU. The club has stated they wont pay the price set by the shareholders of the player. I guess he'll be going to Man City, unless some big club opens their wallet. Personally, I'd like to see him in a club he could play as a 1st team regular, like Inter or Barça (if they loose Eto'o and don't buy Ibra). He'd do fine in L'pool too or FcPorto :P

 

[◆ T.D.A ◆]

Egypt performance has impressed me. It's even more impressive when you find out that they're third in their world cup qualifying group. But then I always felt the African groups were hardest to get out of.

They've only played 2 matches, there's still plenty of time for them to get on top of the group, I expect them to qualify.

 

[Lelo]

Tevez is leaving MU. The club has stated they wont pay the price set by the shareholders of the player. I guess he'll be going to Man City, unless some big club opens their wallet. Personally, I'd like to see him in a club he could play as a 1st team regular, like Inter or Barça (if they loose Eto'o and don't buy Ibra). He'd do fine in L'pool too or FcPorto :P

Liverpool maybe? That sucks hes leaving too. Now Man U has got some signing to do and they better not disappoint.

 

[Lohnt]

Liverpool should get one of Villa/Arshavin/Lisandro in that order of preferance.

I really dont understand why they would waste this opportunity of MU's weakness to become champs again by investing a little money.
Instead it seems like Liverpool will sell out all of its top players like Torres, Xabi, Reira and Mascherano. Gerrard is probably next with Galacticoz if he performs better next season than he did this year.

 

[predsfan]

How about that? I had given up on the U.S. in the Confederations Cup. They needed to make up six goals on Italy to advance. What do they do, beat Egypt 3-0 and get help from Brazil (they beat Italy 3-0). Our reward for advancing: Spain . I'm not stupid enough to hope for a win, but I'll be interested to see how they play against the World's #1. Hopefully, we keep it respectable.