General Football/Soccer Talk

Surprised no one said anything about the World Cup Draw.

A: South Africa, Mexico, Uruguay, France
B: Argentina, Nigeria, South Korea, Greece
C: England, USA, Algeria, Slovenia
D: Germany, Australia, Serbia, Ghana
E: Netherlands, Denmark, Japan, Cameroon
F: Italy, Paraguay, New Zealand, Slovakia
G: Brazil, North Korea, Ivory Coast, Portugal
H: Spain, Switzerland, Honduras, Chile[/b]

I thought about posting but frankly I seemed to be the only person interested.

I am reasonably happy with New Zealand's draw. Granted I would've preferred Group B or C but we have a chance to get a result or two, most likely against Slovakia. We are highly unlikely to advance unless we can pull out a win in opening game against Slovakia & steal a draw against Paraguay & hope other results go our way.

Group G is clearly the toughest group. Imagine how tough that would've been if it was Australia instead of North Korea And the prize for scraping to the 2nd spot is a 2nd Round matchup with Spain I'm hoping Ivory Coast & Portugal advance from that group but I know Brazil obviously will advance.

Very early random predictions:

POOL STAGES FINAL STANDINGS
A: France, Mexico, South Africa, Uruguay
B: Argentina, Nigeria, Greece, South Korea
C: England, USA, Slovenia, Algeria
D: Ghana, Germany, Australia, Serbia
E: Netherlands, Denmark, Cameroon, Japan
F: Paraguay, Italy, Slovakia, New Zealand
G: Ivory Coast, Brazil, Portugal, North Korea
H: Spain, Chile, Switzerland, Honduras

2ND ROUND
France defeat Nigeria
Germany defeat England (penalty shootout)
Netherlands defeat Italy
Ivory Coast defeat Chile

Argentina defeat Mexico
Ghana defeat USA
Paraguay defeat Denmark
Spain defeat Brazil

QUARTER FINALS
Germany defeat France
Netherlands defeat Ivory Coast

Ghana defeat Argentina
Spain defeats Paraguay

SEMI FINALS
Netherlands defeat Germany
Spain defeat Ghana

FINAL
Netherlands defeat Spain


If Brazil can win their Group then they could advance far. As always, it's all crap-shoot at this point.

I wouldn't say Group G is the toughest group. Brazil is not performing at the same level as when they won it in 2002 and where every country was scared of them, likewise with Portugal under-performing, especially in the qualifiers where they were very very very lucky to make it and could've not qualified very easily because of their shit results. Imo, Group D is the hardest, we all know Germany, Ghana has become a quality side as of lately and can easily beat the best in the world with their quick-attacking style of play. Serbia was very impressive in the qualifiers and hopefully it won't turn out like in 2006 where we had the best defense in the world during qualifiers (conceded only 5 goals) then when it came to the actual WC, struck by injuries, get 6 goals put through us in 1 game. But now it looks like we will have a fully-fit first choice squad and all the best players will be there so I don't know how you put Australia to finish infront of them and Serbia last.

I actually agree alot with Jae's predicitions, don't know about Brazil winning it, but we'll just have to wait and see lol.

did someone see the horrific injury of Aaron Ramsey.That was awful,i started to cry when i saw this.As a big fan of Arsenal i pray for him to have good and fast recovering.Aaron is one of the biggest prospects in today's football.

Click to watch the injury

Video deleted I saw the game live and I could only 1 second of it. English channels only show the first seconds because the images were brutal. And this thing to Ramsey happened exactly 2 years and a couple of days after Eduardo's and they were very similar.

Shocking injury.

I haven't seen it because I can't watch people getting hurt like that, but it is a terrible shame that injuries like that still occur in the game.

As a Liverpool fan I find it especially saddening because of what happened to Djibril Cisse, twice.

A couple games ago Mascherano and Kyrgiakos were lucky to escape the Everton match with their legs still attached.

First Pienaar's studs up tackle on Mascherano, which he only got a yellow card for, could have easily broken his leg.

Then there was Fellaini lunging off the ground and landing with all his weight on Kyrgiakos's ankle, which left him needing stitches.
How the referee gave Kyrgiakos a red card for that and not Fellaini was totally amazing to say the least. Kyrgiakos did go in 2 footed and probably deserved to walk, but you couldn't punish him without punishing Fellaini as well.
Good news though is that Fellaini got injured in the process and is out for 6 months Karma.

Barcelona reign finally ends with Inter winning 3-2 in the global score... playing against Bayern Munich in the Bernabeu final.

And Fulham-Atletico de Madrid in the Europa League final. Thoughts?

IIINNNNNTTEERRRRRR it's about fucking time.

Atletico by 3 over Fulham. Pretty awesome effort from them though, they literally have no one on that team. Their best players are like Konchesky, Hangeland and Zamora

I lol'ed when Mourinho ran across the field celebrating and Valdes tried to "tackle" him. It was so fucking classless that Barcelona turned on the sprinklers as Inter were celebrating Total bitch move.

Oh BTW, Colo Colo beat U. de Chile again. If Jona was here he would be crying

Jona's been crying since you left him.

The Champions League final starts in about 20 minutes. To be fair, I'm not as much interested this year as I don't really like either team. I'll watch it anyway.

This. IS. AWESOME. GET READY FOR THE WORLD CUP:

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A few big money moves: Angel Di Maria to Real Madrid for €25m. David Silva to Man City for €30-35m. David Villa to Barcelona for €40m.

Manchester City are the new Chelsea. Endlessly buying players in the same positions but upgrading each time. Kinda ruins the careers of the younger guys but eventually they'll build a pretty sweet team.

It's really terrible to think that someone with unlimited money can just come in and buy players for over inflated prices and win trophies.
It ruins the history of the league.
Plus the fact that they keep buying forwards even though they have Tevez, Adebayor, Bellamy, Santa Cruz, Caicedo, Bojinov, Jo and Robinho.
Maybe Mancini can spend the money wisely instead of wasting it like they wasted £17.5m on Santa Cruz and £23m on Lescott.

Shame about Silva. I always wanted him to come to Liverpool.

Stoch to Fenerbahçe. At Miroslav Stoch's transfer, Galatasaray worked hard... When saying "Stoch is at Galatasaray", Fenerbahçe signed our Slovakian Miroslav.

Man City have also signed Yaya Toure from Barcelona for around £27.5m.

Seems Mancini is buying the right types of players. Boateng, Silva and now Toure. None are strikers

Great...
Besiktas signed Quaresma, Hilbert and Bernd Schuster as head coach.
Fenerbahce signed Caner Erkin from CSKA Moscow. He lastly played at Galatasaray SK.

Besiktas is chatting with Real Madrid for Guti, with the request of Schuster...
Galatasaray signs Lorik Cana from Sunderland...

Nobody cares about the Turkish League, we all know that's where washed up Aussie soccer players go

Arsenal got Chamakh and Koscielny, that's what is important

Not until they get a decent keeper it isn't.

Olympiakos signed Ibagaza and Rommendhal(it was he or Camoranesi,both of them agreed with Olympiakos,but Rommendahl was chosen) these 2 last days.
Rumors say we are after Trezeguet,Ilan(near a deal) and a great name at the left flank

New York Red Bulls signs Thierry Henry

Didn't think I'll see the day when Henry plays on the same team as an Estonian player, but there it is.

Manchester City signed David Silva for $30 millions.