World Cup 2006

[Mulboyne]

Why is there such a discrepancy between the world rankings and the results

The calculation methodology includes the results for non-competitive matches. Sometimes top players are not released by their teams for these games or else the managers experiment wildly (England would play virtually two sets of players in each half). Although there is a "region factor" to account for the differences in playing strength around the world, it isn't significant so the US got seven good results in a year and went up the rankings.

That's not to say that the rankings are necessarily wrong just because the top teams don't do well. There are upsets in any sport. France last time were rated a strong team but went out in the first round. South Korea were rank outsiders and went far.

[Yorik]

Guss Hiddink is a good reason for South Korea and this time Australia's success in the world stage.. He is a genius.

[canman]

I cannot believe how bad the Brazilain referee was during the Germany Sweden game. Of course everyone knew that the Germans would win, for some reason the wolrd cup seems to have become the home team must win or come damn close to it.
But the Germans were just manhandling the Swedes with nary a call. Then there was the deliberate handball that should have resulted in a red card being totally missed. Then the worst booking for the swede defender giving him two yellow cards, thus a red and the gate. It got so bad I stopped watching after the first half. This kind of shoddy refereeing has to stop or it will really hurt FIFA. I have only watched half of the Mexico Argentina game, which is really exciting, but there also seems to be a preference for the Argenines to go through, as again there have been some pretty outrageous calls. I really don't like #18 for Argentina Rodriguez, what an actor, Hollywood sign him up!

[emperor]

Awesome 2nd goal by Argentina
*crossed, chested, clean hit-left foot, top left corner...sweet*

and I spent half the night flirting with a hot Mexican Chiquita:
I was teasing her that Argentina would win and she would spank me and then she would feed me chocolates and then she would spank me again... I must have thing for Latino spankings... mmm'huh ... indeed

[Greji]

Becks stuck a free kick neatly into the left corner from about 30 out for England to beat a suprisingly tough Equador 1-0!

[Tsuru]

Portugal - Holland is officially The Worst Game Ever. The first World Cup game in history where 4 red cards were given, anyone who calls this football (or soccer) is a moron.

Portugal deserved to win this. They played it dirty by evoking fouls and faking injuries, but they still played miles better than we did. Naturally Portugal will lose the game against England

[American Oyaji]

Portugal - Holland is officially The Worst Game Ever. The first World Cup game in history where 4 red cards were given, anyone who calls this football (or soccer) is a moron.

Portugal deserved to win this. They played it dirty by evoking fouls and faking injuries, but they still played miles better than we did. Naturally Portugal will lose the game against England

The playing dirty went both ways. Playacting by a netherland player got deco a red card even though the netherland player threw him down.

[GuyJean]

Becks stuck a free kick neatly into the left corner from about 30 out for England to beat a suprisingly tough Equador 1-0!

Damn.. Was pulling for Ecuador.. Now it's either Australia or Ghana; too many Europeans in the World Cup now.. Including Argentina.

Seems like they have more refs on the sidelines keeping the teams and coaches separated than they do on the 'pitch'..

GJ

[kurohinge1]

The Aussies better be uber-careful tonight . . .

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[Mulboyne]

Play acting by a netherland player got deco a red card even though the netherland player threw him down.

That's not what happened. Deco picked up the ball and was booked for timewasting. The Dutch player was manhandled him when he tried to get the ball and could have got a booking himself but the first offence was by Deco. He'd only got a yellow moments earlier so it was pretty silly - especially since FIFA directed referees to crack down on that and the Russian clearly wasn't shy about using cards.

It was compelling viewing but I didn't see much football. Obviously, the referee had lost control of the game but the players have to look to their own conduct too. It will be interesting to see if FIFA follow up on Figo's headbutt.

[nullpointer]

Trademark Beckham. A set piece does not get any better than this. Reminds one of Platini. Nice to see that he can still "Bend it like Beckham"

[Blah Pete]

The Netherlands - Portugal game reminded me of the old joke
I went to a fight and a hockey game broke out.

Poor display by both sides. Anyone catch the shot of two red carded Dutch and one Portugal player sitting next to each other on some steps watching what was left of the game?

I wish Mexico would have knocked off the Argies. From the kickoff they kept the Argies from their game. Too difficult to keep up the intensity through 90+ though.
Anyone see the Argentina player over in the Mexico technical area trying to talk to Mexico coach LaVolpe (from Argentina, on Argentina 70's WC championship team) while he is trying to give instructions to his player? Haven't seen that before.

Well, I think this WC will be remembered for being ruined by the referees. I hope FIFA is happy with their directives.

One more thing. I hope the Aussies kick ass tonight. Their is nothing better than seeing Italy loose and the conspiracy theories fly. Maybe this WC with the level of refereeing they may have a legitimate complaint. The Aussies seem to draw all the problem refs every game.

[kamome]

The Netherlands - Portugal game reminded me of the old joke
I went to a fight and a hockey game broke out...


Well, I think this WC will be remembered for being ruined by the referees. I hope FIFA is happy with their directives.

The FIFA prez himself was unhappy with the officiating:

9-man Portugal team Staggers Past Holland

Even FIFA president Sepp Blatter was unimpressed with how the game was handled.
"The refereeing wasn't up to the level of the teams," Blatter told Portugal TV on Sunday night. "Today certainly wasn't a fair-play day."

[kamome]

It probably will never happen, but wouldn't it be cool to see Australia vs. England in the final? With all of the Aussie and British FG's on this board, it would make for some fun conversation!

Final Four predictions, anyone? Without knowing much about the individual teams and going strictly by gut feeling, mine are: England, Brazil, Germany, Italy.

[nullpointer]

Final Four predictions, anyone? Without knowing much about the individual teams and going strictly by gut feeling, mine are: England, Brazil, Germany, Italy.

My predictions match yours except that I think that Argentina may pull through instead of Germany. Argentina has been very fluid with their passes and plays. It's like some of the players have eyes in the back of their heads. Germany, on the other hand, though good at defense rely largely on Klose to make a play to score a goal. If Klose does not fire for germany, then Argentina may well make short work of them.

[dimwit]

All the people I have seen who are impressed by Argentina seem to only remember the 6-0 pounding of Serbia, one of the weakest clubs in the tournament. In the rest of their games they haven't played that impressively.

[dimwit]

Well, I think this WC will be remembered for being ruined by the referees. I hope FIFA is happy with their directives.

In the England the referee missed at least two Ecuador hand balls in the penalty area and he seemed to be reluctant to call anything that might be decisive.

[Oradea]

Referees always get a hard time at international competitions, I'm not trying to defend them, merely attract the conversation back to the quality of the football being played. (It is pretty difficult tho, as they are intermingled for ever)

England have progressed to the QF, no big surprise there, everyone expected them to. They also managed to get there by being exceedingly dull, boring and lacking a clinical edge up front. But, they got there.

How much further will they get?
Portugals team is relatively young, and doesn't have the experince of the England team. Portugal are also struggling to get the ball in the net. It's probably gonna be a 1-0 to England job, but can anyone realistically see them getting past Brazil? Even the worst possible team that Brazil could field?

On the other hand, Germany recovered from a dodgy defending performance in their first game, to stroll through to the QF. Succeeding where England failed to beat the Swedes.

Germany could win the thing out of spite, but it probably wouldn't be deserved. Argentina were impressive in the 6-0 match, but so is anyteam that wins 6-0.

The dark horses are Spain, look at them go. .....They are playing football, and having a laugh, no real expectations on those boys so they can afford to relax and play.....cant see them winning it though, there time is not this time.

The italians, I'm afraid to say, they have a pretty solid defence, second to that only of england. However, their formation seems a bit dodgy, only one up front, the mighty italy?
QF is as best as they can hope for.....

Can't see past Brazil.....

Anyway, I'm looking forward to the 2010 world cup, where thi might might Scotland will make a comeback, and sweep the world off its feet. Wherever the jules rimez trophy is headed this year, in 4 years time it will be in Scotland

[maninjapan]

The thing that annoys me, well nto annoys but does sometimes disappoint me, is that its always the same few teams that go through to the quarters, I would love it if Ghana and Australia got through but lets be honest, no real chance of that happening.

so south america vs europe final then again?

[canman]

I know a lot of die hards will be against it, but put two refs on the pitch, along with the two linesmen. It did wonders in hockey and the rink is much smaller. I mean come on, I like Figo, but he head butts a guy and only gets a yellow because the ref was looking the other way. I thought for a second I was watching WWE wrestling. Then when the Dutch defender hit Figo, he was gunning for the ball, it was a mistake, not a cardable offence. If you had another referee closer to the action he could have made a better call.
I also agree that Argentina were on their heels most of the game with Mexico and I was hoping the Mexicans could pull off the upset, nothing impressive there. Can't understand why Van Nistlroy wasn't on the pitch, unless he was injured, one of the better strickers on the bench, hmmm.
I wonder if the injury to Christian Ronaldo is more serious than it seemed. If he is out, Portugal will really be in trouble.
But regardless it still is very entertaining, and I am already worried about suffering withdrawl when the WC is over.
I sitll wish stupid NHK would have included the English Sub-channel, would have made it all the more interesting. I love those BBC soccer guys.

[maninjapan]

The thing about ice hockey is that the rules are in black and white whilst in football they have a varying shade of grey.

[Gilligan]

The thing about ice hockey is that the rules are in black and white whilst in football they have a varying shade of grey.

Ever watched the third period of a Stanley Cup playoff game? First thing that comes to my mind is "swallowing the whistle". There's nothing "black and white" about slashing or interference (to name two) except at the extremes.

I think the comparison and comment by canman are right on. Soccer is too fast, the players are too skillful (especially at acting), and the field is too big to have only one ref. More often than not, when the ref's close to the play he makes the right call, but too often he's not close enough. The athletic ability and skill of players today far surpasses that of 50 years ago. It's time for soccer to adapt by adding another ref.

[maninjapan]

Yeah lets get that russian ref and Graham poll to do a game together - i nthat way lots of yelllows and red but no sendings off

[Gilligan]

[quote="maninjapan"]Yeah lets get that russian ref and Graham poll to do a game together - i nthat way lots of yelllows and red but no sendings off ]

Come on MIJ, anyone dumb enough to come up with that pairing deserves what they get -- of course I think you're right, FIFA probably is just the organization to be dumb enough to pair them together.

But seriously, I can't see how anyone can rationally argue against two refs in soccer, so if you have a sincere argument against such a set up I'd honestly be interested in hearing it.

[dimwit]

I have always believed that the low scoring nature of soccer makes it far more susceptable to to poor or corrupt refereeing; one screw up by a ref can mean the only goal of the match. In other professional sports where scoring is more common this is less of a problem.

One potential remedy would the use of video replay however soccer seems especially afraid of adopting it. Here are a couple of interesting article on the subject.

http://news.com.com/2100-1008_3-6084911.html

http://maroon.uchicago.edu/sports/articles/2005/01/28/instant_replay_lets_.php

[maninjapan]

Two refs just wouldnt work - one persons yellow could be anothers persons red! you can't compare 10 on a rink to 22 on a pitch football. SOrry it just doesnt work. If refs ion Rugby Union can get it to work with the same amount of officials as football, why not in football.

Video replay am all for.

[kamome]

If you're rooting for your national team and the game is handed to the opponent by the refs, can there be anything worse? Maybe FIFA is too stubborn or bound by tradition to adapt technology to the game (i.e. the use of instant replay) or adding refs or repositioning them for a better view. Maybe if the major soccer nations like England, Germany, etc. really pushed hard for such changes, FIFA will accomodate.

[Gilligan]

I think that one needs to look no further than the adoption of video replay in the NFL (National Football League for non-North Americans) to understand many of the problems that it creates.

1) An overall decline in the quality of the officiating -- refs generally get worried that their calls are going to be overturned and so stop making tough calls.

2) If there's no good camera angle by which to determine what the call should have been, we're left with the original call (and that brings us back to 1).

3) The use of video replay severely interferes with the flow of the game, and there's no way to avoid that.

4) For practical reasons, the types of calls that can be reviewed needs to be limited -- once you've allowed video replay there will always be pressure to increase this number (see 2 and 3).

5) For perhaps every 5 or so calls that are overturned because the wrong call was made, 1 correct call will be overturned.

IMHO video replay should be eliminated from the NFL because the positive impact of its use when weighed against its negative impact is not enough to warrant its use. To suggest that any other sport (let alone a sport that pretends that there's never a break in the action) should begin using video replay is complete folly.

[Gilligan]

Two refs just wouldnt work - one persons yellow could be anothers persons red!

An interesting argument. You must be reading the arguments that the NHL officials made when they fought against 2 refs.

[maninjapan]

Well football is slightly different than ice hockey
where do you want me to start?

Not going to get into some futile argument at this time of day.

but seeing as you're American and I'm English instantaniously gives me an advantage about knowing more about football than you do.