new very small pet peeve: why is it necessary to put ™ beside every mention of FIFA WORLD CUP on ESPN?

kinda bugs me.

5/25/2010 7:53:06 PM

Honestly, one of England's best assets is the fact that they have the ability to match up well against any team. They've got possibly the best versatility out of any team in the tournament. They can match up versus height/strength/speed on either end of the field and potentially be the more dominant team as long as they're all playing decently, not even necessarily to their best.

Rooney and Defoe/Crouch is a pretty sick pairing based on form. Their inner midfield is as strong as they come with Lampard/Gerrard/Huddlestone/Carrick/Milner. They have speed, depth and skill on the wings. Ashely Cole is arguably the best left back in the world right now. Center backs are strong as long as Terry isn't wife-fucking and Ferdinand isn't hurt. Even past those two they have decent depth. Joe Hart and David James are on excellent form right now.

There's no reason to say England can't go far in this World Cup. Easily one the four strongest teams right now. Only two I would say compare are Brazil and Spain. Possibly Portugal, but they never have good World Cups. Argentina is up there too, but Maradona sucks ass so they won't do anything major. If ever there was a year for England to win it, this was it, but it basically comes down to how fit Rooney will be and how well he performs.

5/26/2010 3:03:08 AM

^Gets it.


And yes, Rooney is the difference maker. If he's anonymous, then England will do well, but won't win it. With Rooney on form, England are the most dangerous and well-coached team in the WC.


Capello had them playing the counter attack against a team that was faster and had more possession, and they held their composure to strike back almost at will. John Terry - as much of a prick as he is - and Ashley Cole both strengthen that back line to the point where I don't think you can point out a better one amongst the field of 32. Johnson and Cole's overlap play and speed on the wings will terrify most back lines, along with both of their ability to score.

The only weak points in the team to me are Carrick and Walcott. Walcott has really poor timing and decision-making ability, and it's obvious on the field that Rooney absolutely hates him. Lennon is the much better pick to play RW. Carrick is just soft overall, and if Barry can make it back, that hopefully means Milner can go back to a more attacking role as backup to Lampard, and Huddlestone can fill in for Barry when he needs a rest while Gerrard (with Joe Cole as his backup) gets a free pass to play a roaming attacking role.


It's hard to gauge right now, without having seen all of the players on the team yet, but I think at this point the players I'd leave behind out of the 30 are:

Carrick
Walcott
Scott Parker
Stephen Warnock
Matthew Upson
Darren Bent
SWP

[Edited on May 26, 2010 at 8:47 AM. Reason : .]

5/26/2010 8:47:20 AM

Damn I was drunk as hell when I made that post.

I agree with everything I said but for some reason I just feel like England doesn't have the focus to make it past the semis. I just feel like they'll like 7 points in the group stage, crush their first knockout round opponent, scrape by in the quarters and then get beat by Germany or Brazil or someone in the final.

5/26/2010 9:22:58 AM

I honestly don't know what I'd think if England made it past the semis. I've become so accustom to them NOT making it past such a point that I think a tear would form in the space-time continuum.

Holden should be up for the opener, as of this morning:
http://www.fifa.com/worldcup/news/newsid=1219085/index.html#holden+upbeat+over+fitness

5/26/2010 1:05:11 PM

a good reason to root against Argentina this summer: http://content.usatoday.com/communities/gameon/post/2010/05/diego-maradona-will-strip-down-for-world-cup-title/1

5/26/2010 2:39:17 PM

Anyone catch the USA - Czech game yesterday?

5/26/2010 4:58:56 PM

Quote :

"And yes, Rooney is the difference maker. If he's anonymous, then England will do well, but won't win it. With Rooney on form, England are the most dangerous and well-coached team in the WC."

Agreed. Just seems to me that teams will do whatever necessary to make somebody else be the difference maker.


I hope Group D ends up Germany #1 and Serbia #2 because I don't want to face Vidic/Subotic and I think Germany would be an awesome 2nd round draw.

5/26/2010 5:58:33 PM

Viva Italia!

5/26/2010 6:50:02 PM

YOU CAN GIT OUT

5/26/2010 11:38:17 PM

England better beware of Keisuke Honda's pinpoint set pieces on Sunday: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=furTyiSbiig&NR=1

There's not much else for them to fear from the Samurai Blue at the moment, however.

5/28/2010 2:19:16 AM

I'm really looking forward to seeing Argentina absolutely implode under Maradona's inept "coaching." I don't think even Messi can save them from losing in spectacular fashion way earlier than they should.

5/28/2010 2:47:14 AM

^ interesting that was the last post in the thread because I came in here to post this

http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/05/28/argentina-tactics-world-cup-2010-diego-maradona/

Quote :

"But then, how many criticizing Maradona’s selection have actually seen Argentina’s games to judge the usefulness of either to the side? Zanetti was widely considered to be playing very badly when Argentina were at their worst during qualification. Building a good international side is not about selecting the 11 (or 23) players performing well at club level, and at least Maradona understands that, in his own way. And besides, now the squad selections have been made, the players omitted are fairly irrelevant. Argentina still have one of the best squads in the tournament, and within that, a solid first XI. Whereas England are still trying to find their best shape and seemingly have no idea who to play in the fairly crucial central midfield roles, Spain have a dilemma about whether to play one or two strikers, and France appear to have stumbled upon a brand new formation days before the World Cup, Diego Maradona’s Argentina line-up has been predictable for months."

5/28/2010 8:09:09 AM

Soccer aka futbol.

5/28/2010 3:56:47 PM

Saudi Arabia just scored an equalizer against Spain to make it 2-2 late in the second half. Spain might have removed Puyol and Ramos too early.

5/29/2010 1:43:40 PM

Podolski does it again. He's invisible in club matches but becomes Superman in his Germany kit.

5/29/2010 2:13:59 PM

Friendlies.

Slovakia draws with Cameroon 1-1.

Spain gets an injury time winner over Saudi Arabia 3-2.

New Zealand upsets Serbia 1-0 in Austria.



wow @ the last two, especially the last one

5/29/2010 4:15:45 PM

Zero goals for England. Three goals for Japan. Unfortunately for the Japanese, two of them were own goals.

5/30/2010 10:16:41 AM

that's the team that's gonna win the world cup?


hahahahaha

5/30/2010 11:13:28 AM

Forcing own goals is just as valid as scoring them, broski.


England were still completely dominant. Take off the spin of Rooney not scoring every time he touched the ball to satisfy the media, and they're still one of the most solid teams in the cup.


Honestly there were players that made Capello's final selections very difficult today.

5/30/2010 11:23:16 AM

Quote :

"England were still completely dominant."

Interesting.

5/30/2010 12:21:36 PM

Quote :

"Limp England ride their luck"

Quote :

"Two own goals gave lacklustre England a 2-1 win against Japan. "

fail to see dominant in any of that...

5/30/2010 2:10:15 PM

Youre reading the ESPN analysis. I watched the game. England dominated posession and had more shots, and forced Japan into two own goals.

England has unreal expectations placed on them by the media. If they had won the game 4-1 they still wouldve found shit to bitch about, as evidenced by the win against Mexico being "not good enough."

Even if we win ugly, we still win, which is all that really matters.

5/30/2010 2:24:21 PM

kiljadn writes for http://www.goal.com

but not the front page article

Quote :

"England's Three Lions will feel lucky to have escaped their friendly with Japan as winners. After falling behind to a nicely played corner, England got two own goals from the Japanese and managed to win the match 2-1 despite Frank Lampard missing a penalty. "

[Edited on May 30, 2010 at 3:29 PM. Reason : ]

5/30/2010 3:28:38 PM

was listening to someone on 99.9 the fan this morning breakdown the world cup teams and list the favorites, it seems like this World Cup is going to be wide open with a lot of good teams, but no real GREAT teams. Should make for a very exciting tournament, I cant wait for it to start.

Also, he pointed out that it is winter in South Africa now, so the games will be played in cold temps, as opposed to just about every world cup that I can remember being played in warm to hot conditions. The commentator was saying that the game should be quicker since its going to be colder, but I dont know if I buy that.

Anyone have any idea what times the games are going to be played? Like what is the time difference and what time of day are the games gonna be taking place? I would love to be able to watch some games while at work to pass the time, instead of waking up super early or staying up late to watch.

5/30/2010 3:39:23 PM

i think most of the games will range from 8 or 10 am to like 2 or 3 pm, so most in the morning to the early afternoon. i think its like a 6-7 hour time difference.

also, england didn't score a goal themselves, so it can't be considered a dominant performance. just because the dominated ball possession in the second half, that doesn't account for almost losing to japan. they may have played better than japan, but they got lucky that japan scored 2 own goals.

5/30/2010 3:48:08 PM

You have to applaud Japan's keeper, Kawashima. The result could easily have been 4-1 England. He dove on Lennon's first-half strike just in time and guessed perfectly on Lampard's penalty kick. Martin Tyler said Kawashima may have studied Lampard's miss in the FA Cup final.

5/30/2010 3:59:03 PM

That first own goal was terrible. Keeper would have parried it unencumbered, maybe even caught it, but apparently the defender had no clue that there was nobody anywhere close to the near post.

And lol at Lampard's spot kick. It was absolutely terrible.

[Edited on May 30, 2010 at 4:34 PM. Reason : .]

5/30/2010 4:34:04 PM

Quote :

"Honestly there were players that made Capello's final selections very difficult today."

Quote :

"England manager Fabio Capello has confirmed he already knows his final 23-man squad for the World Cup and no players have forced their way into the reckoning following two poor warm-up matches."

lol nick, were you watching the same game as the analysts and england manager?

5/30/2010 5:32:55 PM

Quote :

"http://soccernet.espn.go.com/world-cup/story/_/id/791243/ce/uk/?campaign=rss&source=soccernet&cc=5901&ver=us"

Quote :

""I more or less know," he admitted. "Not 23 but maybe 20. It will be disappointing when I have to tell some of the players that they must go home because all the players here have trained really well. I am really happy with their focus and the job they have done. But I have to choose.""

Unless he made his mind up immediately after giving this interview and immediately before the game and failed to tell everyone - which may have been the case - I fail to see what point you're trying to make. He's going to pick some of the players who didn't play during the Mexico game, and other players - hopefully Walcott - will be going the fuck home.

5/30/2010 5:57:41 PM

i dont even understand how walcott has made it this far. he has proven literally nothing in his career. the guy has like 30 starts in his whole career but has been on two world cup teams for england, which is insane. if he can't start for arsenal, over emmanuel eboue at right mid, how does he deserve to play for england.

5/30/2010 9:34:13 PM

It's probably that he just matches up very well against certain opponents. But if you have Lennon on that team too I don't see how Walcott would be useful as they're basically the same player

5/30/2010 10:15:43 PM

Walcott must only match up against slow, sloppy LBs with terrible touch (worse than his, even).


Unfortunately, I don't think that there's going to be very many of those at the World Cup.

5/30/2010 10:33:09 PM

He may be luck if Bornstein gets on the field June 12th.

5/30/2010 11:04:17 PM

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/world-cup/i-scored-a-goal?cc=5901&ver=us

I scored a goal in the World Cup final

cool series of short videos from ESPN, definitely worth the view... each one is about 3 minutes

5/31/2010 3:11:01 PM

^those r awesome

5/31/2010 3:42:38 PM

^^Yeah I'm pretty sure I posted that link at least a page ago, unless I'm going crazy.

[Edited on May 31, 2010 at 5:56 PM. Reason : checked just to be sure...page 16.....[OLD] ]

5/31/2010 5:54:40 PM

^^^The Marco Materazzi bit is sick... I didn't know he had so many tattoos, and the fact that he dedicated the goal to his mom is equally cool.

[Edited on May 31, 2010 at 8:19 PM. Reason : ]

5/31/2010 8:19:04 PM

That 500 greatest goals show is on Fox Soccer Channel at 9 tonight.

[Edited on May 31, 2010 at 8:26 PM. Reason : fff]

5/31/2010 8:25:46 PM

Quote :

"checked just to be sure...page 16.....[OLD] "

you got pwnt by the Nike commercial

5/31/2010 9:55:31 PM

Those videos were way better than the Nike commercial.

5/31/2010 10:24:08 PM

totally agree

I didn't notice your link though

5/31/2010 10:32:20 PM

6/1/2010 8:28:17 AM

So far out for sure for England:

Walcott
Adam Johnson
Darren Bent
Baines


Yet to be confirmed:
Scott Parker
Michael Dawson
Tom Huddlestone

[Edited on June 1, 2010 at 8:30 AM. Reason : According to the BBC. And Walcott being out makes my heart happy.]

[Edited on June 1, 2010 at 8:35 AM. Reason : update]

6/1/2010 8:29:10 AM

Pretty much expected for all of those... except Walcott

I can't believe Carrick found a place on this team. He's been shit all season.

[Edited on June 1, 2010 at 8:40 AM. Reason : Barry injury concerns, I guess... but still]

6/1/2010 8:40:10 AM

There's a rumor now that Ledley King is OUT and Michael Dawson is IN.


That'd be an amazing turnaround.


And I was reading last night that the idea is to keep Milner in the middle to start, but there will be tons of diversity on the wings with SWP, Lennon, Milner, and Cole all able to play out there.

6/1/2010 8:53:40 AM

^ and Gerrard too?

6/1/2010 8:59:20 AM

and Gerrard, but I'd expect to see him in the middle more often than not, especially with Barry being available.

6/1/2010 9:25:21 AM

Final England Squad announced:

Goalkeepers: Joe Hart, David James, Robert Green.

Defenders: Jamie Carragher, Ashley Cole, Rio Ferdinand, Glen Johnson, Ledley King, John Terry, Matthew Upson, Stephen Warnock.

Midfielders: Gareth Barry, Michael Carrick, Joe Cole, Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard, Aaron Lennon, James Milner, Shaun Wright-Phillips.

Forwards: Peter Crouch, Jermain Defoe, Emile Heskey, Wayne Rooney.

6/1/2010 11:40:29 AM

no theo...lol

6/1/2010 11:42:27 AM