I’m not trying to be controversial or trolling even. I’ve had a few days to let things sink in, to examine my feelings during the matches and post match (where i was mostly disappointed, but not always). As a person from the uk i have followed football most of my life, even if rugby was my first sport of choice to play and follow. One of my favourite computer games of all time is the old Championship Manager (now the Football Manager series) games, i’m playing it right this moment with a tricky match against Everton coming up!
I really like football, and i’ve never believed England really had a chance of a big result (well except that Euro 96 year when we played very unlike our usual stodgy selves) even with all our newspapers banging the drum of our supposed greatness. I also know that the Premiership is a top footballing competition and every week i can mostly see matches of a high quality. I also get to see some of the bigger teams in La Liga (Spanish), the Bundesliga (German), Ligue 1 (French), Serie A (Italian), Primeira Liga (Portugal) and the occasional south american matches.
Outside of the freak upset results, the common extra time penalty shoot-outs, the biting thing, the bad injury to one of the few really exciting players to watch at this world cup and America doing much better than anyone was thinking, it was pretty much a let-down, speaking in terms of the actual football and performance from some of the best (and most highly paid) players in sport. Don’t get me wrong, there was a lot of drama (not least being the backdrop of local discontent and all that political stuff), which is fun - but that is not all what football is.
For me i think it was in particular the fairly average football on display (lots of poor passes, even from the best players), the lack of fight from some teams (big players especially) when up against it (the final comes to mind for this). But yeah outside of the excellent Neymar (Brazil) and Robben (Holland), most of the worlds best players were distinctly average at best, and pretty poor at worst.
Hmmm…this might be the most exciting thing i’ve seen to come out of the 2014 WC (ymmv):
I’d beg to differ - watching Germany was amazing, and it would have been interesting to see if Ghana hadn’t been stuck in the Group of Death, as they looked really good.
Even the final without much scoring was light years better than the other recent 0-0 regulation finals. 2010’s Spain Netherlands was a dull slogfest, while the 1994 final (which I went to) was even worse. The play through both the German and Argentinian midfields was superb - with 1 touch passes right on the foot all over, and constant probing for attacks. Yeah, a lot of the attacks didn’t pan out well, but it was a far cry from the turtles in 2010 and 1994.
But yeah, the Quarters and Semi’s in Argentina’s half of the Draw were pretty dull - and even the initial knockouts outside of the US/Belgium and Mexico/Netherlands tilts. The Round-Robin was probably the best we’ve seen in decades however.
The Costa Ricans, Mexicans, Dutch, Colombians, Swiss, and Algerians beg to differ with you.
Here’s why the tourney was great that hasn’t been touched on. So many underdogs to root for, playing so well…
…and then as the knockout round proceeded, teams tended to sort themselves out. Quality began to assert itself, and we got a final between two traditional powerhouses, and a game that–especially in the second half–produced scoring chances and ended in extra time.
That worked for most observers. For the self-loathers perhaps not.
So who would help me with a rundown on MLS? I was checking out their site today but it´s a bit cluttered and with no previous knowledge of the teams and players it becomes hard to follow, at least for an old dude like me.
So, great rivalries? local talent to watch? any asshole owners I should know about in advance? any full of themselves team everybody loves to hate but play really well damnit? nicer fans? most idiotic fans? best sheer talent? educate me!
(Did see some videos of Thierry Henry scoring, nice)
All of this is, well, hypothetical. Obviously. And while it would be interesting to see how 2002’s Brazil or Spain at their prime would have fared at the tournament I’d say 1990’s Germany wouldn’t have done overly well and probably would have lost against an average modern team.
Soccer has changed a lot since then. Germany 1990 would put up a good fight, but it would be outclassed on several fronts. Defenders like Jürgen Kohler and Thomas Berthold–then the backbone of the German defense–wouldn’t be able to hold a candle to the likes of Mats Hummels and Jerome Boateng, neither technically nor tactically. Man marking was a thing then; today it’s zonal marking. Today’s game is about pressing, flexibility and pace. The game is a lot more demanding now. For a keeper it doesn’t suffice to be have quick reflexes and be tall. You need to be a lot more involved in the general flow of the game. Let’s assume Bodo Illgner (1990) and Manuel Neuer had similar classic goal keeping skills - the latter still is a far more complete soccer player than the former and a lot more involved in what’s going on on the pitch. Let’s not even talk about advances in training techniques, medical assistance and other means of support players receive nowadays. Germany 1990 operated with a classic playmaker and two classic strikers, neither of which would be able to offer the positional flexibility you get with players like Schürrle, Özil, Müller and Kroos.
Yeah, maybe i didn’t give enough credit for those aspects, but i dunno - overall it felt a bit flat for many of the games i saw (i didn’t watch them all, about half as full matches), i was looking at these incredible players and most of them, most of the time seemed to not be giving it their all. I see them performing much better in most club games. And that was a sentiment that just grew as the games progressed.
I know that at the international level it is much harder to play well, compared to club level, but really, overall and not taking anything away from Germany, America, Holland and a few others, i felt like i’d seen better. It will be interesting when i meet up with my football mad friends (i do know a few like that) what they have to say on the issue over a beer. If i end up with a black eye and a spilt pint i’ll let you know :)
Guess who will not playing for Germany anymore: Philipp Lahm. Quitting after winning the World Cup is not an unusual thing, but at the age of 30 he surely would have had one or two more international tournaments in him.
I suspect the lack of response on this is because all of us here are equally ignorant. I only kinda-vaguely knew that there was an MLS before I watched this year’s Cup and decided that paying attention to soccer was worth continuing. So about all I know is that my Portland Timbers are great rivals with the Seattle Sounders, that this is not looking like the Timbers year, Donovan Ricketts is a really good keeper but getting long in the tooth, and Darlington Nagbe has some serious offensive potential that has yet to reveal itself fully.
As for the Canadian angle, yeah, there’s three Canadian sides. Most of our professional sports are like that: MLB, NBA, and NHL all have Canadian teams. Only NFL/CFL have different leagues for what is basically the same game. As I understand it, the Canadian teams work a bit differently for purposes of the CONCACAF championship league, but otherwise are no different than the USA sides.
Generally speaking every country which held a World Cup or EURO within the last decade would be able to organize a reasonable tournament within 6 months because the infrastructure is still in place.
Why are you skeptical about Russia? They got Sochi handled - a much bigger event.
Yeah, it’s the fact that right now Russia is about as loathed as a major power can be, amongst anyone who isn’t China, Iran, or Syria maybe. But given that FIFA is about as amoral, corrupt, and venal as any organization in the history of man, I’m pretty sure that Putin’s money will keep the tournament right where he wants it…:)
UPDATE: Ok so it is about a 50/50 split between a bunch of football fans that i know and myself on the quality of this years World Cup. I didn’t get a black eye, but my pint was jostled a few times. Apparently i was being too hard on Messi, he was often well marked (which is true), but most agreed that many of the top players (from Ronaldo to nearly ALL the Spanish team and most of the better Brazilian players (Hulk etc)) were poor this WC.
The younger guys seemed to like it more (the DRAMA etc - i blame reality TV for that, and the New Star Wars!) than some of the more gritty previous world cups i had mentioned up thread. Now whatever all that is worth, considering that this is a bunch of British (not all were English) people talking about football, and we haven’t produced a good national football team (of any of our collective nations) that can compete at the top level since the 60’s, well take it with a pinch of salt maybe? We can talk a good game (part of our cultural DNA probably), but really what do we know about football these days!
Thanks for the great response Ineffablebob. I was thinking it was just people had their fill of footie for 4 years :) . So Seattle the team to beat and therefore to cheer against yes? and Portland tree cutters (seriously guys get a more environmentally friendly name)* the lovable and not quite there yet but never give up small team? bah, gotta stop trying to get a Hollywood vibe out of it and just man up and watch as many game as I can before I settle on a favorite.
Actually I don’t know that their name has anything to do with cutting down trees, it just sounded to me like that for some reason, I’m drawing a blank trying to remember what Timbers means and google translate seems to think “timbers” in english means “timbers” in spanish.
Would you like to try an MLS team with a little Latin American flavor? The Columbus Crew has a Venezuelan (who scored two goals last night), an Argentinian playmaker (whose younger brother played on the national team), and three Costa Ricans (two of the defenders from the national team). Throw in a Spanish supporters group (La Turbina Amarilla) and you’ve got a little taste of Central and South America in the middle of Ohio.
Seattle’s good this season, no question, but I dunno that anyone other than us Portland fans really hate them all that much. The LA and NY sides probably are the least liked outside of their own areas just because they’re LA and NY. As for the Timbers name, as I understand it, it was inherited from a NASL team back in the 70s when talking about logging was more common. I bet any Portland supporter you care to name is willing to defend cutting timber as environmentally friendly, renewable tree farming. :)
Hate LA and NY teams. Even for a non-US dude, that should be easy.
Timbers are unrepentant about their tree cutting ways. Hate on them too.
Eye Seattle with suspicion and a bit of resentment because they are good this year, damn them!
Think I’ve got my bases covered here :)
Ohhhh that sounds perfect. Plus, “Columbus crew” has this “we are just gonna go hit that bank over there and then meet at Mac’s to divvy up the loot” sound to it that I kinda dig. Long as I don’t have to become a Buckeye fan.
For reasons lost in the vast, dark confines of space, I’m a Bulls, Cubs and Bears fan. This means I am a. Used to suffering enough that I don’t even ask for anesthetics at the dentist clinic anymore and b. willing to give a futbol team a go even if they don’t achieve much in the next years.
Thanks ddtibbs, I’ll know get to finding out how to watch their games.
ineffablebob: I guess I’ll be seeing your team on the pitch then, when they play my dear Columbus Crew turbina amarilla futbol machine!
Edit:
Rumors are James Rodriguez is heading for Real Madrid-. I’m a bit torn about this. On the one hand, it can give him the exposure he probably deserves as a world star. On the other, clubs like Real or Barca can make or really break players. And I’m not sure where he fits, unless they get rid of maybe Isco and Khedira (both very good players). If he can do for Ronaldo what Di Maria does, however, it should be quite an espectáculo to see this team play.
There’s the Chicago Fire, too, if you wanted to continue the Chicago theme. Both Eastern Conference, though, so you wouldn’t really be able to pick both them and Columbus.
