Roiling football blather

mos dan

mos dan

fact music
baboon2004 said:
Can Dissensus offer up a collective prayer for Hungary to be victorious? Evoke the spirits of Puskas and Kocsis et al?
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i just went to hungary for the week to play for the england writers team against the hungarian writers team.. we got a very well-earned 1-1 draw. all of the hungarian writers we were drinking with after the game were great, they have little to no confidence in their (real) national side though. we all talked a lot about puskas, inevitably - and there was a literary 'match' in the evening after the game, called 6-3 reloaded, with patrick neate and a couple of others representing our side.. i'm not sure who won. anyway i will certainly be repping hungary today.

sorry if this has already been covered while i've been away, but why the hell is the england game not on any kind of tv... apparently you have to pay a fiver to *stream* it?? fuck that a thousand times over. working on my laptop in front of germany russia i think
 
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baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
mos dan said:
i just went to hungary for the week to play for the england writers team against the hungarian writers team.. we got a very well-earned 1-1 draw. all of the hungarian writers we were drinking with after the game were great, they have little to no confidence in their (real) national side though. we all talked a lot about puskas, inevitably - and there was a literary 'match' in the evening after the game, called 6-3 reloaded, with patrick neate and a couple of others representing our side.. i'm not sure who won. anyway i will certainly be repping hungary today.
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hungarian people are brilliant. as long as you don't talk about race.

Edit; i have genuine affection for the country, but fuck you get a raw deal if you're roma...and from a country that itself feels persecuted from all sides by slavs and others, that's kinda a big failing in the empathy stakes.
 
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don_quixote

Trent End
bosnia are assured of a play-off place. no turkey :( :(

so definitely in the play-offs now are:
russia
bosnia

looks like ukraine, france and republic of ireland will join them.
 
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don_quixote

Trent End
denmark qualify, serbia qualify, greece look to have made the play-offs, france in play-offs.

northern ireland are pretty much out and so are the czech rep after slovenia beat slovakia in bratislava. slovenia just need to beat san marino to either secure a play-off spot or auto qualification.

portugal look dead-on for a play-off spot now because results have gone their way.

so uefa qualifiers looks almost certainly to be:
denmark
switzerland
slovakia
germany
spain
england
serbia
italy
holland

with play-offs between
portugal*
greece
slovenia
russia*
bosnia
ukraine*
france*
ireland

starred teams likely to be seeded. depends how the seeding is organised.

so world cup potential seeding (assume euro seeds win play-offs, which is far from guaranteed, assume argentina are not seeded/fail to qualify, which is certainly a possibility - all european sides listed have done better at previous two world cups than argentina - however they would possibly seed argentina to make pot c easier to work out):
pot A:
south africa
brazil
england
spain
germany
italy
france
portugal

pot B:
ghana
paraguay
cote d'ivoire
cameroon/gabon
tunisia/nigeria/mozambique/kenya
algeria/egypt
2 from chile/ecuador/argentina/uruguay/venezuela/colombia

special pot in pot B: south american/north american play-off (drawn so that they cannot face someone from their own federation in the group stage)

pot C:
holland
denmark
switzerland
slovakia
serbia
russia
ukraine

pot D:
north korea
south korea
japan
australia
3 from usa, mexico, honduras, costa rica
bahrain/new zealand

so group of death for england:
england
argentina
holland
mexico

hahaha
 
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don_quixote

Trent End
portugal just went 2-0 up. i think it's all over for hungary. and most likely sweden too. from pole position for a play-off to also-rans in 6 hours...
 
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don_quixote

Trent End
it's come to my attention that argentina would be seeded ahead of portugal who would be seeded ahead of holland - portugal ahead of holland is very marginal and latest fifa rankings could play a big part in the tiebreaker there
 
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don_quixote

Trent End
HUGE GAMES WATCH

1)
uruguay vs argentina - winner takes all. if ecuador beat chile it's win or bust for these two. argentina need a draw to qualify. best ecuador can manage is the play-offs.

2)
egypt vs algeria - winner takes all. if it's a draw algeria go through.

3)
mozambique vs tunisia - tunisia need a win to assure themselves of qualification, but mozambique have only lost once at home in this qualifying campaign - to botswana 15 months ago (including games against cote d'ivore, nigeria and kenya)

4)
el salvador vs honduras - a win in el salvador and honduras could qualify for a world cup for the first time since 1982, assuming costa rica lose in the us.

5)
poland vs slovakia - slovakia looked to have it all sealed last month. then a loss to slovenia at home put that on the ropes. slovenia have san marino away and hence slovakia will need a win against the poles to secure their first qualification as an independent nation.
 
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baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
The problem with world cup qualifiers is that they go on for bloody months/years, then some teams are out after one or two half-arsed performances in the finals.

It's brilliant for a team like, say, Honduras, for whom getting there is a huge achievement given the infrequency of their appearances at WC finals, not denying that. But for a second-tier Euro team like Poland, I just never get the feeling they give enough of a shit when they actually get to the finals, and almost accept they're beaten before they start agaionst someone like Italy or Brazil - there's not the same intensity/will to win I associate with the Champs league.

You'd think if you spent two years getting there, you'd care a bit more.

But Uruguay-Argentina is gonna be war! Is there anyone who hasn't played for Argentina for 15 years since they missed 5 penalties in 5 minutes against Ecuador that Diego can drag out as a matchwinner?

having said that, Algeria-Egypt has one hell of a fractious history as a fixture, no?
 
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baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
Anyways, more importantly , the true successor to that legendary Graham Taylor documentary may be upon us - Svennis does Pyongyang.
 
mixed_biscuits

mixed_biscuits

_________________________
baboon2004 said:
But for a second-tier Euro team like Poland, I just never get the feeling they give enough of a shit when they actually get to the finals
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It was massively frustrating in 98 when Romania decided to dye their hair having qualified from the groups - it basically said that they had done 'enough.' Cue a spineless performance and premature exit.
 
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crackerjack

Well-known member
baboon2004 said:
The problem with world cup qualifiers is that they go on for bloody months/years, then some teams are out after one or two half-arsed performances in the finals.

It's brilliant for a team like, say, Honduras, for whom getting there is a huge achievement given the infrequency of their appearances at WC finals, not denying that. But for a second-tier Euro team like Poland, I just never get the feeling they give enough of a shit when they actually get to the finals, and almost accept they're beaten before they start agaionst someone like Italy or Brazil - there's not the same intensity/will to win I associate with the Champs league.

You'd think if you spent two years getting there, you'd care a bit more.

But Uruguay-Argentina is gonna be war! Is there anyone who hasn't played for Argentina for 15 years since they missed 5 penalties in 5 minutes against Ecuador that Diego can drag out as a matchwinner?

having said that, Algeria-Egypt has one hell of a fractious history as a fixture, no?
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I fucking love the qualifiers - you get all the intensity of the World Cup without the excessive surveillance and "think of the children" prudery. All the really mad shit happens in the qualifiers (remember the fake blood?). Wish there was more of them on TV - can we get Don Quixote his own show?
 
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baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
crackerjack said:
I fucking love the qualifiers - you get all the intensity of the World Cup without the excessive surveillance and "think of the children" prudery. All the really mad shit happens in the qualifiers (remember the fake blood?). Wish there was more of them on TV - can we get Don Quixote his own show?
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don't get me wrong - i like them a lot too, especially when they end in extortion or violence, but I just wish the same passion was applied to the Finals themselves, and I think that often it's not. England of course are one of the worst offenders - 2002, 2004 and 2006 exits were some of the weakest, most shoulder-shrugging displays I have ever seen (Rooney aside, but do we need that kind of caring?)
 
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crackerjack

Well-known member
baboon2004 said:
don't get me wrong - i like them a lot too, especially when they end in extortion or violence, but I just wish the same passion was applied to the Finals themselves, and I think that often it's not. England of course are one of the worst offenders - 2002, 2004 and 2006 exits were some of the weakest, most shoulder-shrugging displays I have ever seen (Rooney aside, but do we need that kind of caring?)
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England 2006 were a disgrace. 2002 and 04 they tried, but weren't good or brave enough (that means you Sven).

Talking of WC romance, everyone should read this if they have the time (which I haven't yet). For people my age, Denmark 86 were like the Dutch 74 or Brazil 70, except only about half as good.
 
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baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
crackerjack said:
England 2006 were a disgrace. 2002 and 04 they tried, but weren't good or brave enough (that means you Sven).

Talking of WC romance, everyone should read this if they have the time (which I haven't yet). For people my age, Denmark 86 were like the Dutch 74 or Brazil 70, except only about half as good.
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I've never seen such pathetic defensive tactics as against Brazil in 2002, and...oh there were other games, probably against france and portugal, but they all meld into one these days. That team should've been shot - QF against brazil, and you're happy to wait to swap shirts at the end? And if we'd beaten them, maybe a deserving Turkish team would've won the WC that year.

That Denmark article is great. But yeah, putting them alongside the Dutch is hyperbole. Anyway, Brazil '82 played the most beautiful football I've ever seen, alongside Real 2003 vs Man U
 
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