FIFA 2014 World Cup - Official Discussion Thread

[GMantis]

Somehow one of these results is utterly unsurprising...

FPÖ?

[GMantis]

The Brazilian defense seems to prefer attacking rather than defending...

[GMantis]

Time for the obligatory dubious penalty for the host.

[GMantis]

Diego Costa must have very thick skin.

[GMantis]

Vile thuggish play from the Dutch as usual.

While Costa head-butting a Dutch player in the nose is what exactly?

[GMantis]

What an annoying last minute goal! Cost me three points in the tipping competition...

[GMantis]

Honestly, (and I'm no fan of the English team), they are more deserving of a lead than Italy are.

[GMantis]

Nice advantage ruling by the referee.

[GMantis]

From what I can determine (mostly by judging by their names) of the Bosnian players all starters (with the possible exception of Mujdža who might be Croat) are Bosniaks (Muslim). Interesting whether many Bosnian Serbs or Croats actually support this team...

[GMantis]

Claims of German weakness seem to have been somewhat exaggerated (especially in defense). Also:

Portugal needs to score one for a point for me.

[GMantis]

The ease with which Spain loses possession is staggering. The Tiki-taka seems dead and buried.

[GMantis]

I've never seen six minutes additional time being awarded. Someone desperate to prevent Spain's elimination?

[GMantis]

Beautiful result! This is what true fans of the game have been waiting six years for. Today, attacking football triumphed over defensive keep-away. Today, humility triumphed over arrogance. Today, fair play triumphed over cynicism and diving. Today, simply, football triumphed. God willing, we will never have to suffer through this horrible little team again.

Onwards to the 23rd, when Australia will complete the humiliation.

To be fair to Spain, it has been generally their opponents who've resorted to cynicism and defensive keep-away. When this didn't happen (see the last Euro final) Spain has proven that they can play some pretty good attacking football. Of course this doesn't to the pale shadow that appeared during this world cup.

[GMantis]

Drogba has been playing for only about five minutes and has already put his "artistic" skills in action...

[GMantis]

If Italy beat Costa Rica and Uruguay and England beat Costa Rica by several goals, England are through.

Two would be enough, though the idea of England scoring more than once in a game...

[GMantis]

With this score, there are twelve minutes until England's elimination.

[GMantis]

FIFA might want to consider taking away some spots from uefa and giving them to concacaf for 2018.

FIFA should also have removed the 1/2 spot from CONCACAF after the 2006 World Cup, but since it didn't do so, it would hardly be fair to remove spots from UEFA now (not that fairness matters or UEFA wouldn't have lost two spots without justification).

[GMantis]

Perhaps FIFA should reconsider their seeding system...

[GMantis]

Benzema seems to have taken pity on the Swiss.

[GMantis]

Side note:

Iran and Bosnia were clearly robbed.

And FIFA seems to think that this is not a big deal at all, as they've appointed for the South Korea-Algeria the same referee that disallowed two legitimate Mexican goals in the Mexico-Cameroon game.

[GMantis]

Mexico seems to have really bad luck with referees this World Cup. First the two denied goals against Cameroon and now they were denied a clear penalty against Croatia.

[GMantis]

So there will be a Republican landslide in November now?

[GMantis]

Oh, and lets hope that Uruguay is demolished by Colombia in the next match, while Suarez gets something like a 20 match ban, so he misses all of Uruguay's 2020 qualification games as well.

_{Though to be fair to Uruguay, it probably wouldn't have happened if the referee had correctly awarded a penalty to them...}

[GMantis]

The penalty for Greece looked suspicious, to say the least. Well, one more reason to root for Costa Rica!

[GMantis]

Apparently Bosnia played a very good game against Iran, as if to underscore what a loss to the tournament their unjust elimination is. And a nice display of fair play, considering the multiple incentives they had to throw that game.

Reza's goal means that every team at this World Cup has scored at least one goal. When was the last time that happened?

1998