World Cup 2018 #4 - Football's coming for to carry me home

[BlodwynPig]

I would actually stick a couple of quid on Blazhe Ilijoski first goalscorer, the former Bangkok Glass and Kelantan FA star has been banging them in recently.

Who you fancy for the DAC 1904 Dunajska Streda vs Dinamo Tbilisi game though?

Well Streda have Erick Davis, fresh from the World Cup for Panama - don't know if he's playing though. But I reckon Dinamo Tbilisi 2-0, Kiteishvili with a brace (he's got 4 in his last 6 games).

[Depressed Beyond Tables]

I don't know, Martinez seemed pretty fucking determined to bag it for his boys.

No doubt, as time goes by the achievement will grow in stature, but just imagine the likes of Hazard and De Bruyne looking at Martinez bigging up the 3rd place like it's the moonlanding.

[EOLAN]

Of course in Ireland; the 3rd place play-off studio analysis is hosted by our comedy/impressionist team of Aprés Match. Been a bit hit and miss in their segments but this is usually quite good and still probably a bit more in depth analysis than your Ian Wrights and Danny Murphys, Clive.

[Z]

As a kid I cared a good bit about historicity of the 3rd place.
Croatia beating Holland capped off what was (at the time to me) a very impressive showing from a country I never heard of before. Eusebio bringing Portugal to third place sounds like more of an achievement than than just being the top scorer.


In this case I'd assume the narrative should be around how England finished 4th in 1990. There's a chance to be the most successful English team in a very big chunk of the populations lifetimes.

[Squink]

I've supported England throughout, but Lukaku pipping Kane to the Golden Boot right at the death would be fucking funny.

[im barry bethel]

As a kid I cared a good bit about historicity of the 3rd place.
Croatia beating Holland capped off what was (at the time to me) a very impressive showing from a country I never heard of before. Eusebio bringing Portugal to third place sounds like more of an achievement than than just being the top scorer.

For Sweden or Croatia or Turkey then I can see it as a serious thing for them marking their overachievement, but for the likes of Germany or Brazil or Holland with a serious intent on winning the tournament it's the last place you'd wanna be. Even the Olympic boxing doesn't bother with a bronze bout they just give both semi finalist a medal.

[DrGreggles]

Even the Olympic boxing doesn't bother with a bronze bout they just give both semi finalist a medal.

That's because of 10 day rule, which prevents a boxer fighting again within 10 days of losing a fight by KO/TKO.

[Squink]

Does the third-place game go to extra time and penalties in the event of a draw? Or do they just say "fuck it" at that point?

[Captain Z]

Hey hey, I'm back from my camping trip! So, did it come home?

[Deanjam]

Hey hey, I'm back from my camping trip! So, did it come home?

[BlodwynPig]

Hey hey, I'm back from my camping trip! So, did it come home?

Da.

[finnquark]

Of course in Ireland; the 3rd place play-off studio analysis is hosted by our comedy/impressionist team of Aprés Match. Been a bit hit and miss in their segments but this is usually quite good and still probably a bit more in depth analysis than your Ian Wrights and Danny Murphys, Clive.

I kind of wish it was just Cooper and Cooke. Sometimes feel Murphy is a weak performer. This years ones have been more miss than hit for me, though I'll still try to find the 3rd place stuff online. I enjoyed trawling through loads in one go when they suddenly appeared on youtube the other day. Its suffering I think from Bill going, Giles going and the replacements not being as interesting, although actually having said that I really like Cooper's Daragh.

[imitationleather]

For Sweden or Croatia or Turkey then I can see it as a serious thing for them marking their overachievement, but for the likes of Germany or Brazil or Holland with a serious intent on winning the tournament it's the last place you'd wanna be. Even the Olympic boxing doesn't bother with a bronze bout they just give both semi finalist a medal.

Bilic made pretty much the same point on ITV, didn't he? That coming 3rd was absolutely huge for Croatia in 1998 and a source of great pride for both the players and the nation as a whole. The country only being about three years old at that point did help, but I guess it shows that the bronze medal can be a great prize for teams that go on an unexpectedly brilliant run, but are unlikely to dislodge the true elites racking up an embarrassing number of stars above the badge on their shirts.

Given our performances in World Cups over the decades, and our general level in the football pecking-order, the play-off really should have a similar stature here too, but it won't. It's going to get as much as interest as an England friendly game. I think all the fan parks will be boarded up on Saturday. No shots of people around the country wasting extremely expensive beer. The World Cup is over.

It's weird, I too feel a bit like the World Cup has ended. England's totally selfish and attention-seeking run has completely taken over the actual tournament. Usually by now in the competition their failure to beat countries I am only vaguely aware of the existence of is but a distant memory, but now World Cup 2018 is going to be The One England Should Have Won (even though we definitely would have got spanked in the final).

Anyway, I am setting fire to my Daily Star Gareth Southgate waistcoat later. France v Croatia should be tasty, and I'm very much looking forward to it. Finally the tournament begins!

(Due to some of the cities selected dropping out as they can no longer afford to build an entire stadium to host one game, aren't seven(!) games being played at Wembley in Euro 2020? It makes a bit of a mockery of their "We're giving it to the entire continent!" bullshit, and also means that the "It's Coming Home" brigade will be out in full force.)

[George Oscar Bluth II]

Yeah Wembley has three group games, a round of 16 game, both semis and the final. It is coming home.

Also as a quirk, they've paired Wembley with Hampden for the group round, so the same group will be played across both stadiums. Also hosting teams that qualify are guaranteed to play at least two games at their own stadium, so if England and Scotland both qualify they'll definitely be in the group together.

Extremely spicy.

Not watching the 3rd place game. What a load of pointless arse it is.

[imitationleather]

Yeah Wembley has three group games, a round of 16 game, both semis and the final. It is coming home.

Also as a quirk, they've paired Wembley with Hampden for the group round, so the same group will be played across both stadiums. Also hosting teams that qualify are guaranteed to play at least two games at their own stadium, so if England and Scotland both qualify they'll definitely be in the group together.

Extremely spicy.

Not watching the 3rd place game. What a load of pointless arse it is.

You kind of get the impression that UEFA detest England so much that they will never again award them a tournament to host, but they know full well it's the country that the highest ticket prices can be charged in, along with requiring the lowest amount of infrastructure investment, and so will just engineer for half the Euros to be played there from now on.

My eyebrow raised so high it knocked into that car Elon Musk sent into orbit when FIFA suggested that Britain bid for 2030. Yeah, lads. Just so you can have a good old laugh at us while awarding it to whichever dictatorship is in vogue that week instead. No, ta.

[EOLAN]

Happy memories of the FA telling all British media to hush up about potential FIFA Corruption as it would disrupt the bid. And that all those dignitaries would be so turned by having a little dinner with the awesome Prince William and David Beckham.

Then they lose and it's all the FA crying and whining about how corrupt the FIFA process and officialdom were.

Of course the Irish thought getting Liam Neeson to do some promo videos for the IRB (not the Irish Republican Brotherhood), would guarantee us votes. Oh and we have some Celtic heritage with Wales and Scotland so they will definitely vote for us even though we aren't offering to share any games with them.

[George Oscar Bluth II]

These are the Euro 2020 pairings:

Group A: Rome (Italy) and Baku (Azerbaijan)
    Group B: Saint Petersburg (Russia) and Copenhagen (Denmark)
    Group C: Amsterdam (Netherlands) and Bucharest (Romania)
    Group D: London (England) and Glasgow (Scotland)
    Group E: Bilbao (Spain) and Dublin (Republic of Ireland)
    Group F: Munich (Germany) and Budapest (Hungary)

Amazing that one team is going to have to fly from Rome after their first game to Azerbaijan for their second, and then back to Rome for their third. Great work, UEFA. Well done. At least Wembley/Hampden makes some sort of sense.

Incidentally, assuming England qualify and then win their group, their round of 16 game would be in Dublin.

Gaze upon the folly of Euro 2020 here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UEFA_Euro_2020

Happy memories of the FA telling all British media to hush up about potential FIFA Corruption as it would disrupt the bid. And that all those dignitaries would be so turned by having a little dinner with the awesome Prince William and David Beckham.

Then they lose and it's all the FA crying and whining about how corrupt the FIFA process and officialdom were.

It was genuinely shaming. The FA knew about the corruption, and were just shit at doing it.

[George Oscar Bluth II]

https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/soccer/international/ken-early-it-s-coming-home-derailed-england-s-dream-1.3563163

I think this is a really good piece but I'd take issue with the assertion that "it's coming home" morphed into a genuine belief.

And the "easy side of the draw" stuff rankling with Sweden and Croatia...I get that but didn't they think they were on the easy side of the draw too? Once Russia put Spain out there was only one World Cup winner on that half of the draw and it was England. Surely every other team was licking their lips too?

Or were all the other teams solemnly pretending that Switzerland or Russia were exactly as dangerous as Brazil and Belgium?

[mikeyg27]

Gaze upon the folly of Euro 2020 here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UEFA_Euro_2020

The only other group pairing that kind of makes sense there is Munch & Budapest. Otherwise it's an awful lot of ridiculous travel for a lot of teams.

Something I realised when looking this all up earlier this week: we have to play Croatia twice more this year in that Euro Nations League thingy.

[asids]

The great thing about the UEFA Nations League is that the set of worst ranked teams, who are in League D, are guaranteed one place at Euro 2020. This means one of Georgia, Latvia, Macedonia, Kazakhstan etc will be at Euro 2020. What moron at UEFA thought that was a good way to arrange things?

Still, for Scotland it's probably our best chance to actually qualify for a tournament. We're in League C and have got to top a group with Albania and Israel then win a couple of play-off games against Serbia, Greece, Slovenia etc to qualify. I look forward to our relegation to League D.

[buttgammon]

The Nations League draw really has thrown up some draws that will bring back bad memories. Wales, Ireland and Denmark are in one group; of course, Ireland knocked Wales out in qualifying for the World Cup, and subsequently went on to lose to Denmark in the play-offs.

[Trojan_Jockey]

https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/soccer/international/ken-early-it-s-coming-home-derailed-england-s-dream-1.3563163

I think this is a really good piece but I'd take issue with the assertion that "it's coming home" morphed into a genuine belief.

And the "easy side of the draw" stuff rankling with Sweden and Croatia...I get that but didn't they think they were on the easy side of the draw too? Once Russia put Spain out there was only one World Cup winner on that half of the draw and it was England. Surely every other team was licking their lips too?

Or were all the other teams solemnly pretending that Switzerland or Russia were exactly as dangerous as Brazil and Belgium?

I'd kind of agree with most of that article. The "Its coming home" chants may have started as rather self-deprecatory and ironic, but its almost inevitable that when something spreads and becomes popular then the intention changes according to those who use it. If you sing it and look like you want to kick someone's head in, then I presume you aren't singing it in an ironic manner.

[BlodwynPig]

The Nations League draw really has thrown up some draws that will bring back bad memories. Wales, Ireland and Denmark are in one group; of course, Ireland knocked Wales out in qualifying for the World Cup, and subsequently went on to lose to Denmark in the play-offs.

The Nations League can fuck off and Euro 2020 is basically Love Actually in football form. Ugh

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

I like the idea of a Europe-wide tournament. It's novel and hopefully a nice reminder we should be mates with Europeans.

I am sure the fixtures may be poorly designed for logistics but that doesn't mean it was a bad concept.

[BlodwynPig]

I like the idea of a Europe-wide tournament. It's novel and hopefully a nice reminder we should be mates with Europeans.

I am sure the fixtures may be poorly designed for logistics but that doesn't mean it was a bad concept.

7 games at Wembley, still the imperialists.

[buttgammon]

The Nations League can fuck off and Euro 2020 is basically Love Actually in football form. Ugh

I wonder if the prospect of places at the Euros will actually make people care about it? I suspect not.

[Head Gardener]

[George Oscar Bluth II]

Nations League is actually great. I mean, the format is baffling and convoluted and it's plain weird that they're guaranteeing a place at the Euros for teams that they acknowledge are the worst in the continent and it's hard to imagine anyone really caring about winning the thing but...

It's great that the one massive flaw in international football is being addressed. Namely, that the big countries play massive games over the course of a month every two years, and then play endless, dreary qualifying games against Kazakhstan and the like where teams either roll over for hollow feeling 8-0 wins or play the most frustrating football possible in limiting England or Germany or France to 2-0 wins. It's as if Liverpool spent most of their time playing Tranmere and Marine FC before maybe having a crack at Manchester United in the summer, if the draw falls that way.

So the nations league is going to give us some genuinely interesting fixtures over this autumn, ones which won't make you curse the very existence of international football when it interrupts the Premier League. England v Croatia and Spain and Germany, France and the Netherlands in the same group...that sort of thing.

For England, at least, it'll be good practice at playing the top tier teams. Something we showed we can't really do on Wednesday.

I like the idea of a Europe-wide tournament. It's novel and hopefully a nice reminder we should be mates with Europeans.

I am sure the fixtures may be poorly designed for logistics but that doesn't mean it was a bad concept.

Yeah they should have tried to make it two stadiums in the same country/city hosting a group. So you could have had Wembley and the Emirates or Hampden and Murrayfield. It would have been cool!

[BlodwynPig]

Nations League is actually great. I mean, the format is baffling and convoluted and it's plain weird that they're guaranteeing a place at the Euros for teams that they acknowledge are the worst in the continent and it's hard to imagine anyone really caring about winning the thing but...

It's great that the one massive flaw in international football is being addressed. Namely, that the big countries play massive games over the course of a month every two years, and then play endless, dreary qualifying games against Kazakhstan and the like where teams either roll over for hollow feeling 8-0 wins or play the most frustrating football possible in limiting England or Germany or France to 2-0 wins. It's as if Liverpool spent most of their time playing Tranmere and Marine FC before maybe having a crack at Manchester United in the summer, if the draw falls that way.

So the nations league is going to give us some genuinely interesting fixtures over this autumn, ones which won't make you curse the very existence of international football when it interrupts the Premier League. England v Croatia and Spain and Germany, France and the Netherlands in the same group...that sort of thing.

For England, at least, it'll be good practice at playing the top tier teams. Something we showed we can't really do on Wednesday.

Yeah they should have tried to make it two stadiums in the same country/city hosting a group. So you could have had Wembley and the Emirates or Hampden and Murrayfield. It would have been cool!

what a load of nonsense

Tranmere 2 - 3 Liverpool, a matter of days ago.

Big teams should be able to become little teams and vice-versa. Or do you just want Galacticos FC to dominate forever?

[George Oscar Bluth II]

Big teams should be able to become little teams and vice-versa. Or do you just want Galacticos FC to dominate forever?

The Nations League has promotion/relegation.

It might even make the "lesser" footballing nations better, with more match practice against teams of their level so they won't have to play ten men behind the ball defensive football all the time to avoid humiliations. It's good all round, honestly.