Who will win World Cup Soccer in Russia?

[kactus]

What a goal by Croatia!!!!

 

GOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL

[capricorn]

36 minutes ago, OftenWrong said:

What an ugly little trophy. 

Yeah, it looks like an autopsy was done on it.

[OftenWrong]

1 minute ago, kactus said:

What a goal by Croatia!!!!

 

GOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL

Awesome kick, with his left leg.

[OftenWrong]

Just now, capricorn said:

Yeah, it looks like an autopsy was done on it.

Or a golden penis.

[OftenWrong]

Interesting comment on the penalty kick... "For Presidents and Prime Ministers, these moments are of prime importance..."

[OftenWrong]

Somebody call that guy's Mom!

[kactus]

One own goal one penalty...

On the other hand a superb kick by Croatia. I like Croatia coming back...

[CITIZEN_2015]

It is a stupid call on penalty. That was not a penalty as the Croatian player did not hand ball deliberately and he was in a natural position accidently hitting the ball, In fact the ball missed the Franch player and hit his hand not other way round. Shocking decision and shocking that they assign such an weak referee for such an important match, the world cup final. I hope Croatia cab score back and win the game,because this would be the only fair result with an unfair referee. I will support Croatia in second half.

[-TSS-]

Even Finland is a bigger country than Croatia but Finland will never even qualify for the World Cup when as Croatia are in the final.

[OftenWrong]

2 minutes ago, CITIZEN_2015 said:

It is a stupid call on penalty. That was not a penalty as the Croatian player did not hand ball deliberately and he was in a natural position accidently hitting the ball, In fact the ball missed the Franch player and hit his hand not other way round. Shocking decision and shocking that they assign such an weak referee for such an important match, the world cup final. I hope Croatia cab score back and win the game,because this would be the only fair result with an unfair referee. I will support Croatia in second half.

How do we know his intention? See this is where I have issue with this sport- rules should be rules, regardless of the intention.

[kactus]

10 minutes ago, OftenWrong said:

How do we know his intention? See this is where I have issue with this sport- rules should be rules, regardless of the intention.

It is quite a subjective rule in this regard. However, for a referee that didn’t notice it was a penalty and had to look at VAR several times to convince himself perhaps he shouldn’t have awarded the penalty IMO. 

[bush_cheney2004]

 

[OftenWrong]

Floodgates open now!

[CITIZEN_2015]

41 minutes ago, OftenWrong said:

How do we know his intention? See this is where I have issue with this sport- rules should be rules, regardless of the intention.

The ball missed the French player and hit his hand accidently. He did not move his hand to hit the ball. The replays clearly show that it was an accidental hit not an intentional handball to change the path of the ball. It was a kick by his foot that changed the path of the ball Regardless it appears French are winning but a wrong call resulting in a goal always destroys the moral of the victim in this case the Croatioans. It is sad.

Edited July 15, 2018 by CITIZEN_2015

[Altai]

Africa National Team with mostly Muslim players won the cup.

[OftenWrong]

1 hour ago, CITIZEN_2015 said:

The ball missed the French player and hit his hand accidently. He did not move his hand to hit the ball. The replays clearly show that it was an accidental hit not an intentional handball to change the path of the ball. It was a kick by his foot that changed the path of the ball Regardless it appears French are winning but a wrong call resulting in a goal always destroys the moral of the victim in this case the Croatioans. It is sad.

The replay I saw showed his arm in vertical motion, rising up to meet the ball just as it comes. Accident perhaps, but that is up to one's interpretation.
If I were a professional player I would make all my errors look like they were unintentional, to take advantage of these "soft" rules.

Edited July 15, 2018 by OftenWrong
removed extra comma

[SpankyMcFarland]

11 hours ago, -TSS- said:

If Yugoslavia were still a single team they would be really good on paper but they would need Tito as their manager to stop the players from killing each other.

The amazing thing about them was how little they achieved. They had skills like the current Croatia team but couldn't get the big results. However, Dzeko and a few Serbs would be a really nice addition to nearly any squad. 

[SpankyMcFarland]

8 hours ago, OftenWrong said:

The replay I saw showed his arm in vertical motion, rising up to meet the ball just as it comes. Accident perhaps, but that is up to one's interpretation.
If I were a professional player I would make all my errors look like they were unintentional, to take advantage of these "soft" rules.

As someone rooting for Croatia I may be a trifled biased but...Perisic was off the ground so his arms naturally rose away from his body and came back towards it. The allegedly offending left arm was moving in exactly the same way as the right arm, thus strengthening the case against a deliberate act. I think VAR was misused here. This was not an obvious handball missed by the ref but an act of uncertain intent, probably innocent. The fact that the whole decision making process took so long points to the doubt involved even in the ref's mind, and in cases where there is reasonable doubt no penalty should be given. The foul on Griezmann that led to the first goal was debatable too. He seemed to be going down before significant contact was made. It was a beautiful free kick, though. Poor old Mandzukic will be replaying that moment in his head for a good while. 

In any case, well played, both teams, and thanks be to God we had six goals this time instead of 90+ minutes of dreary caginess producing one or none. 

Edited July 16, 2018 by SpankyMcFarland

[OftenWrong]

6 minutes ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

He was off the ground so his arms naturally rose away from the body (abduction) and fell back towards it (adduction).

Says you.   

Quote

In any case, well played, both teams, and thanks be to God we had six goals this time instead of 90+ minutes of dreary caginess producing one or none. 

As a non-fan in soccer I thought it was still fairly boring, most of the time. A few of the goals were alright, the others, shit. Generally in this sport the embellishment stunts turn me off. There's a penalty for that sort of crap in the NHL. It seems to me the real draw here is a strong appeal to one's nationalism. There is a high level of emotional attachment to ones country, team and ultimately self, to the point that one even "takes the game home", consequences depending on the outcome. I suspect that English fans are not the only ones who beat their wives after a bad game, repressed masculinity being practically a hallmark of European society. Somehow those aspects of the sport are more interesting to me than the guys kicking the ball around.

[-TSS-]

That heavy rain totally ruined the celebrations for the French. Many of them looked like "can we please just get into the locker-room?"

Edited July 16, 2018 by -TSS-

[SpankyMcFarland]

12 hours ago, OftenWrong said:

Says you.   

As a non-fan in soccer I thought it was still fairly boring, most of the time. A few of the goals were alright, the others, shit. Generally in this sport the embellishment stunts turn me off. There's a penalty for that sort of crap in the NHL. It seems to me the real draw here is a strong appeal to one's nationalism. There is a high level of emotional attachment to ones country, team and ultimately self, to the point that one even "takes the game home", consequences depending on the outcome. I suspect that English fans are not the only ones who beat their wives after a bad game, repressed masculinity being practically a hallmark of European society. Somehow those aspects of the sport are more interesting to me than the guys kicking the ball around.

What I’m saying is very old hat. Moving the arms in this way helps the player get a better jump. The arms have to come back at some point. 

Soccer is the world’s game. It’s completely different from American football which can be more easily compared with rugby, both being more handball than football. 

Regarding improvements, I’d like to see more goals (bigger goal area or fewer players), better timekeeping and stiffer punishments for simulation and embellishment. BTW simulation is not always punished in ice hockey either. 

And wrt to the stuff about Europeans and their masculinity...have you ever shaken hands with a Croatian? It’s a contest. 

 

Edited July 16, 2018 by SpankyMcFarland

[OftenWrong]

49 minutes ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

And wrt to the stuff about Europeans and their masculinity...have you ever shaken hands with a Croatian? It’s a contest. 

Ah, you must mean from "Old Europe".

[-TSS-]

Serbs must be relieved; Croatia lost and Djokovic won Wimbledon.

Had the Croats won the Serbs would have been reminded about it for the next zillion years.

 

[SpankyMcFarland]

1 hour ago, OftenWrong said:

Ah, you must mean from "Old Europe".

Ah, Jaysus. 

[Altai]

On 7/15/2018 at 8:02 PM, Altai said:

Africa National Team with mostly Muslim players won the cup.

France dictatorship illustrates the African players of France team as monkeys.