Yeah, my kid was saying during the England match that James would have been a controlling presence for them, when they were so chaotic and nutty in the first half. His view was that James would have kept them in line more.
They’re lucky they had that ref. 8 yellows is a lot (6 for them I think), but I’m still surprised no one was sent off.
-xtien
I kind of figured Cavani’s tournament was over when he immediately signaled for a substitute when he went out of that last game. It wasn’t one of those “Oh, is he really hurt or not?” deals. It was “That guy felt something go in his leg and knows he’s done.”
Thanks so much for running this @marquac!
It brought a little extra energy to every match I watched and really got the forum going on the live thread. Wouldn’t have been a fraction of the posts otherwise.
@triggercut going to have to bring AlphaZero to the table if you want to take a run at me! (Just joking, I was just lucky!)
Damn it. I forgot to turn off The Guardian’s notifications on my phone. They spoiled the result of the 2nd quarterfinal today.
I’m still going to pretend I don’t know what I know when I watch the recording tonight.
Next season, on the BBC.
-xtien
What does that mean?
That’s average viewers. It’s good to see soccer catching on in the US, almost up to 10 fans in Miami now. That’s up 60% from last World Cup!
It’s the percent of single households within that market area watching each match. It doesn’t account for multiple people watching at pubs and bars, etc.
For comparison’s sake, the NFL playoffs this past winter were about double that in a lot of markets. Which actually isn’t a bad number at all for soccer.
So all of the pools have been decided. The winners are:
Pool 1: Dissensus
Pool 2: The Dave Perkins
Pool 3: Seppey
Pool 4: Those Darn Murawskis
Pool 5: Lantz
I’ll be posting updated standings tonight. Sorry for the delay on that.
Thank you for linking that, @Dissensus, I will be using that from now on for sure.
How would folks feel about two points for a group stage win and bumping it to three points for a knockout win in regulation and then splitting the points if it goes to extra-time and penalty kicks?
It feels a bit weird to give 2 points for a group stage win when all the tables you see for the real competition give 3. Better to adjust scoring in the knockout phases.
There are definitely some oddities in the current scoring system.
One example: the third-place match is as valuable in points terms as the final. Indeed a team can get as many points from the semi-final stage onwards by losing in extra time then winning third place as they could by winning both semi-final and final in extra time. Feels a bit wrong, somehow.
Similarly it’s possible for a team to be eliminated in the second round with 3 points while another goes out in the group stages with 6.
I don’t think either of these is really a problem though. They were a known part of the rules at the start of the contest and could be allowed for when predicting how many points a team might get in the tournament.
That said, I’m in favour of more points for later matches (or perhaps points for the round the team reached, if that works out better), if only to make it more likely the groups will still be in contention in the later stages of the tournament.
Not World Cup related, but it sure does feel like the matches come down to this
I think people whose names end in winter sports equipment should automatically get 50 points. That would solve a lot of the scoring problems here.
-xtien
Yeah, plus it would help raise awareness about the noble art of downhill penblade luge racing.
Made up names for high school Spanish do NOT COUNT.
-xtien
I like these new rules and think we should run this competition again. I get to choose new picks, though, and nobody else does. I think that’s fair,
TOMMMMM XTIEN IS CALLING ME MADE UP AGAIN
Well, aren’t you?
