Jump to content
talkfootball365
  • Welcome to talkfootball365!

    The better place to talk football.

World Cup 2018: Russia - General Chat


football forum

Recommended Posts

6 hours ago, Stan said:

Morocco and Tunisia the next 2 teams to qualify for Russia next summer. Apparently Morocco haven't conceded in their qualification campaign. That's some going to be fair. 

It feel for the Algerian fans seeing as all of their North African rivals will be there but they will miss out considering they had the best personel in their team 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sign up to remove this ad.
  • Replies 545
  • Created
  • Last Reply
5 hours ago, Azeem98 said:

New Zealand were the only team that remained unbeaten at the 2010 world cup. Those farmers did a great job. xD

I get it mate! xD  Don't mess with women because once you're married us men only pretend to have a theoretical sensation of control. hahaha

But no mate...  Even though Italy's football has practically never been my personal cup of tea in the way they've historically played due to the philosophy nearly always being the same (except for a few occasions under certain coaches) which is tactical discipline and maximum competitiveness even with lesser talented players (like I said, not always)...  They're a massive part of the World Cup.

The reason many don't get this in my view is because they haven't experienced Italy not being there.

Italy have only missed 2 World Cups!

They missed the very first World Cup in Uruguay (1930) simply because they couldn't travel to it as at that time not all the football federations had the money to invest in such an experimental idea (that's they way it was seen in that first edition)...  The teams were invited to the tournament and there was no qualification.  Europe was in constant turmoil and it was impossible to attend.

The only other World Cup they missed is the only one they've missed through genuine football reasoning which was the World Cup in Sweden in 1958 after drawing their final qualification game against Northern Ireland.

That's it!  They've been ever presents apart from that and 60 continuous years of being a major part of the tournament.  They've also won 4 World Cups!

Italy aren't as bad as people seem to think...  The Spain games aside (they should never have been in a group with Spain and the crap seeding system is to blame) because Spain are superior to Italy right now by a considerable margin...  Aside from this, they made a couple of errors in the rest of the qualifying campaign but even then it wouldn't have been enough but those errors battered their confidence and they've carried it forward to the first game against Sweden (the irony of this being Sweden after what I've just written)...  The side is practically the same one that had a decent European Championships under Antonio Conte two years ago and this does point a finger at Ventura.  But it's not all Ventura's fault because there are some issues in this present Italy side concerning the defence which has lowered its level massively.  Both Chielini and Bonucci are in terrible present form and they just can't seem to find goals.  Their most natural talented player which is Lorenzo Insinge and is in the form of his life, seems to have something personal going on with Ventura because against Sweden he was a sub and when he came on he approached the bench to ask on three separate occasions where he was supposed to play (not good).  Why the most in form Italian goalscorer Simone Zaza isn't there is a mystery!

A few small details when you're paired up in a group you should never have been in can make all the difference and I repeat that in my view we have a situation that revolves a lot around confidence.  Had they been in one of those various shit groups in the UEFA confederation qualification for the World Cup, they would probably have qualified first in the manner they've always done it which is without making too many headlines because Italy don't make headlines with their football...  They're just efficient!  They're the latin version of what Germany used to be like because Germany under Löw is something completely different which proves things can change and which Italy HAVE to do or they'll slowly die.  Prandelli tried to do it and was on course with it but was undermined and results started to drop...  They returned to their old methods and they just don't have the players to play the way they used to and another factor is that the evolution of football over the past decade or so has left Italy behind.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 11/12/2017 at 4:32 AM, SirBalon said:

This is true, but it's still a ridiculous result.  New Zealand are proper third world where it comes to football and the nations they play against (those islands) are almost non existent on a football scale.

 

Incredibly disrespectful. They have about the same EPL regulars as Australia does. :$

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just now, Cannabis said:

Watched that today actually, utter cringe.

They got some bits wrong (we had a national holiday the other day, not last month) but I liked the video. Its been 36 years and what Ricardo Gareca done was the impossible.

Coach of the year for me. Sounds crazy but he had a very unexperienced squad by the middle of the qualifiers, took them from 4 points halfway in and qualified. Given Zidane's decline too in mid year, I wouldn't be against it if he did win it.

But he won't.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It really is the best World Cup story though. I'd say only Egypt and Iceland challenge us for that title.

We all said we would qualify for Russia 2018 after the 2015 Copa America but we said it because we were optimistic. Not because we were better than Chile, Colombia, Uruguay, Argentina or Brazil.

We had a really poor start gathering 4 points by the halfway point of the qualifiers or around it. Gareca got rid of all the "star" players except Guerrero, called up a squad of Peruvian league players, marketed them in the Copa of 2016 and were a decent side. He developed them and they really turned up the heat in October of 2016. By november, we were playing absolutely brilliant football and the results began to come.

36 years without a World Cup. So many years of constant disappointment and overall we had some very good players and some teams capable of challenging but didn't. They also lacked balance and some pathetic tactical decisions (Pizarro playing as a number 10 for example) and players focusing on other issues back at home rather than on the NT itself.

Look at the Copa America centenario squad (first image) compared to now (second image)

4df141b107946627a2204324e4dd0337.png

1bd39f07e837aae7425012846c550b68.png

Thats progress - and not to forget the fact that some dreadful players in the Peruvian league played like if they suddenly became top players for the national team and some even improved infinitely. Miguel Araujo was awful last year. Now he's one of the top defenders in the league. Linked with Benfica.

Gareca has taken a squad in the nothing and about to waste their potential and prevented it. Everyone had us as eliminated last year and we qualified. He took a nation where it seemed impossible to go back to the World Cup and did it.

We've come a long way since this:

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 minutes ago, Cannabis said:

I was more pointing at the fact the league got cancelled just so that you had a chance of a World Cup. Strikes me as a bit small-time.

Ahhh, well it didn't actually get cancelled. That's the wrong terminology. We did stop it a bit earlier though so that they can concentrate on qualification.

It would have been embarrassing if it backfired but luckily it didn't. Even so, it was still a bit of an odd decision given almost our whole starting 11 plays abroad.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Juan Antonio Pizzi is the new Saudi Arabia manager xD

a translation of the tweet even said that he was the manager who "kept Chile out of the World Cup". It seems even in the Middle East no one wanted Chile to qualify.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 minutes ago, Blue said:

Juan Antonio Pizzi is the new Saudi Arabia manager xD

a translation of the tweet even said that he was the manager who "kept Chile out of the World Cup". It seems even in the Middle East no one wanted Chile to qualify.

Pizzi seems to be desperate and he shouldn't be... I doubt that in the Middle East they care too much about whether Chile qualified or not though. :ph34r:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, SirBalon said:

Pizzi seems to be desperate and he shouldn't be... I doubt that in the Middle East they care too much about whether Chile qualified or not though. :ph34r:

Feel for Bauza in all of this. I'm probably missing something but what did he even do wrong?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

56 minutes ago, Blue said:

Feel for Bauza in all of this. I'm probably missing something but what did he even do wrong?

He didn't do anything wrong... The Gulf states don't know anything about football and have no care for it for what it is. They use it to promote themselves and everything about them to the rest of the world. They're trying their hardest to maintain what they're about but with that being able to integrate into the world's media and productivity market without actually giving two hoots about anything we're about.

What does this mean where Bauza is concerned?

Well that he didn't convince them according to what they were seeing with their basic football knowledge. They employ a lot of westerners from the football world but they constantly override their advice. Bauza from what I heard wasn't integrating at all into life out there and kept himself to himself which must've grated on them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Administrator
1 minute ago, ScoRoss said:

Just noticed the Final kicks off at 18:00 Moscow Time, so 16:00 GMT. Quite early for a World Cup Final. Can't remember one, outside of Japan/Korea, that wasn't at primetime on Sunday evening.

same day as the Wimbledon final xD 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Since 2002, the World Cup has been slowly edging further and further into the summer. Whilst the Europa League and Champions League have been edging back into summer as well.

The World Cup beings on June 14th, the first qualifying round of the Europa League starts on June 28th.

Kari Arneson could well be playing in the World Cup on the 26th for Iceland, and be needed two days later for Aberdeen.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    No registered users viewing this page.


Sign up or subscribe to remove this ad.


×
×
  • Create New...