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Last edited:
unification said:
The use of VAR to ‘correct’ errors is so inconsistent.

A lot will be made of this comeback but it’s really about Argentina turning it on at the right time and Egypt running out of steam at the wrong time. The comeback looked on as soon as the first went in.
Click to expand...

This is about right. Really sorry for Egypt but they ran out of petrol against a quality team.
 
holdsteady said:
I fancy this one to go to penalties, seems to have been a while since we had a shoot out. Don’t know why but the Swiss seeem like they would be good at penalties, now I have said that they probably have a terrible record.
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Yep - just about the worst of any country in the world; played 6, won 1.

Their 2006 loss to Ukraine when they missed all their penalties was legendarily bad!
 
I'm wondering if I'll enjoy this more if, in my head, I view this as OUFC v S*****n. The colours close enough if I squint.
 
That ref who sent off that Paraguay player for covering his mouth has been sampled in to a techno track.

 
tonyw said:
Yep - just about the worst of any country in the world; played 6, won 1.

Their 2006 loss to Ukraine when they missed all their penalties was legendarily bad!
Click to expand...

See, I had a feeling they would be good 😂. How can people who make high quality watches and clocks be s**t at penalties, it’s a pertinent, transferable skill.
 
Turns out the Swiss might not be great at penalties but the Colombians are worse.

England v Argentina blockbuster, exciting semi with England winning, Spain v France in massively dull one with Spain winning and England to get revenge for the Euros on Spain in the final.

It’s coming home.
 
I wasn't expecting much from that shootout since it was between the two sides england have actually managed to beat on penalties, but that was poor
 
Didn't see the Argentina - Egypt game live.....had to take my daughter to something, and figured this one wouldn't be much of a game so was one I could safely miss. Whoops!

But just watched the highlights back and Egypt were well and truly screwed.
I don't think the challenge on Salah at the end was a penalty (I think it was a dive) but the Egypt disallowed goal was total BS. That's not how they've been refereeing the tournament at all......at least it wasn't until there was a risk of Messi and Argentina getting knocked out early.

Of course it's absolutely possible that if that goal had been allowed (as it should have been) then Egypt would have gone into their shell right then and there, wouldn't have scored again three minutes later and we would have ended up with the same result.....but it's the latest in a very long line of pro-Argentina refereeing decisions that we've seen from FIFA since Messi hit the back half of his career.

Hell, the Balogun challenge was nowhere near as bad as the Messi challenge against Algeria (Balogun had no idea where his opponent was when he trod on his ankle, Messi was making a really bad attempt at a tackle when he did).....but one gets a VAR review, red card and causes a diplomatic incident; the other doesn't even get looked at.

It's an almost Scottish attitude I have towards the tournament now. In order of who I want to win, it's 1) England, and 2) Anyone else but Argentina.
If France end up playing them in the final (because England/Norway get three goals disallowed and two men sent off by VAR in the semi) then I'm going to be eating baguettes and camembert pre-game and loudly singing the Marseillaise.
 
tonyw said:
Didn't see the Argentina - Egypt game live.....had to take my daughter to something, and figured this one wouldn't be much of a game so was one I could safely miss. Whoops!

But just watched the highlights back and Egypt were well and truly screwed.
I don't think the challenge on Salah at the end was a penalty (I think it was a dive) but the Egypt disallowed goal was total BS. That's not how they've been refereeing the tournament at all......at least it wasn't until there was a risk of Messi and Argentina getting knocked out early.

Of course it's absolutely possible that if that goal had been allowed (as it should have been) then Egypt would have gone into their shell right then and there, wouldn't have scored again three minutes later and we would have ended up with the same result.....but it's the latest in a very long line of pro-Argentina refereeing decisions that we've seen from FIFA since Messi hit the back half of his career.

Hell, the Balogun challenge was nowhere near as bad as the Messi challenge against Algeria (Balogun had no idea where his opponent was when he trod on his ankle, Messi was making a really bad attempt at a tackle when he did).....but one gets a VAR review, red card and causes a diplomatic incident; the other doesn't even get looked at.

It's an almost Scottish attitude I have towards the tournament now. In order of who I want to win, it's 1) England, and 2) Anyone else but Argentina.
If France end up playing them in the final (because England/Norway get three goals disallowed and two men sent off by VAR in the semi) then I'm going to be eating baguettes and camembert pre-game and loudly singing the Marseillaise.
Click to expand...
They don't call them VARgentina for nothing.

They didn't get called back for this one against Austria

I'm with you on the "anyone but" (but I was already like that anyway).
 
Also, good to see the Egyptian Zico not holding back on his post-game interview:

“The referee wasn’t just bad, he was unfair. His bias was obvious. He had it in for us from the start of the game. He doesn’t want us to win. It was a rigged game. Congratulations to Argentina on yet another World Cup title, it seems.”​


:love: Imagine he won't be playing in a FIFA-sanctioned tournament for a while!
 
There's an Indian guy on Reddit who's done a compilation of all the Argentinian challenges that didn't earn a booking today, and it's pretty damning. A couple of them (from Romero in particular) were more orange than yellow cards.

Net result is that despite being a pretty dirty side, none of the Argentina team are a booking away from suspension going into the QF and therefore (red cards aside....yeah, I don't expect one of those either) no Argentinian will be suspended for a game this tournament.

Contrast with England, who have Bellingham, Rice, Guehi and O'Reilly on the yellow card tightrope going into the Norway game.......(or France, with that ridiculous Olise yellow card)
 
tonyw said:
Didn't see the Argentina - Egypt game live.....had to take my daughter to something, and figured this one wouldn't be much of a game so was one I could safely miss. Whoops!

But just watched the highlights back and Egypt were well and truly screwed.
I don't think the challenge on Salah at the end was a penalty (I think it was a dive) but the Egypt disallowed goal was total BS. That's not how they've been refereeing the tournament at all......at least it wasn't until there was a risk of Messi and Argentina getting knocked out early.

Of course it's absolutely possible that if that goal had been allowed (as it should have been) then Egypt would have gone into their shell right then and there, wouldn't have scored again three minutes later and we would have ended up with the same result.....but it's the latest in a very long line of pro-Argentina refereeing decisions that we've seen from FIFA since Messi hit the back half of his career.

Hell, the Balogun challenge was nowhere near as bad as the Messi challenge against Algeria (Balogun had no idea where his opponent was when he trod on his ankle, Messi was making a really bad attempt at a tackle when he did).....but one gets a VAR review, red card and causes a diplomatic incident; the other doesn't even get looked at.

It's an almost Scottish attitude I have towards the tournament now. In order of who I want to win, it's 1) England, and 2) Anyone else but Argentina.
If France end up playing them in the final (because England/Norway get three goals disallowed and two men sent off by VAR in the semi) then I'm going to be eating baguettes and camembert pre-game and loudly singing the Marseillaise.
Click to expand...

I've been saying this since the 2022 World Cup - Messi doesn't question FIFA and therefore he and Argentina get preferential treatment. Like the ICC finding a way to allow India to go deep in their cricket tournaments because it keeps the highest volume of interest up and therefore gives bang-for-buck to advertisers, FIFA have a damn good reason to keep Messi in it. It's entirely commercial.

Which begs the question, what's the point? Is this football or the WWE where results are predetermined?

All that said, my sympathy for Egypt only goes so far. They had that game under control and allowed themselves to panic and collapse under the pressure. They looked tired and the concentration levels went. They failed to deal with deliveries into the box, forgot to stick to their markers and completely let the occasion get to them. After looking at both penalty shouts at the end (Mac Allister on Fathy and Fernandez on Salah), neither were penalties so the on-field ref and VAR got those ones right. It got what should have been Egypt's second completely wrong especially when you compare it to other goals given in the tournament. VAR remains a scourge on football because it is used so inconsistently and that was evident last night.

So on reflection, Egypt have themselves to blame to some extent but can experience a fair degree of injustice too. Forgive the desire to go in al misty-eyed like the media have been on Argentina's comeback. Every Argentina team I've seen in my lifetime - including the average ones from 2002 and 2018 - should be beating Egypt every time. Find themselves 2-0 down to Switzerland and Norway/England with 12 minutes to go and I can't see them clawing that back.

ABA for the rest of the tournament.
 
So SIX out of the last 8 are European teams.
I know that the Europeans started slowly and some were poor but Switzerland and Norway have probably been the 2 'surprise' teams of the tournament
Traditionally European teams have struggled more with tournaments outside Europe.
In some ways it is a little disappointing that the African/ Asian teams have not improved as much as expected ( and the South American teams have underperformed)
 
Foley said:
So SIX out of the last 8 are European teams.
I know that the Europeans started slowly and some were poor but Switzerland and Norway have probably been the 2 'surprise' teams of the tournament
Traditionally European teams have struggled more with tournaments outside Europe.
In some ways it is a little disappointing that the African/ Asian teams have not improved as much as expected ( and the South American teams have underperformed)
Click to expand...
I don't think Switzerland are really a surprise being in the last 8 if you look at their route to it. They haven't played anyone of note yet.
 
Thank us for knocking the last former Swindon Town player out the tournament last night, shocking that some Oxford fans wanted a Scummer to win.

We now have to beat FIFA and Argentina to get through. Hope we wind the Argies up and get a load of them sent off or injured. HOPP SUISSE.

Switzerland are brilliant, if you disagree you are a racist. Chocolate and clocks indeed...The stupid thing about this Charlie Vs the Chocolate factory joke is that Switzerland's largest export is pharmaceuticals i.e drugs and one of Colombia's is processed chocolate.

England's mountains are small bumbles, your skiers are all rich kids and a yodeler is way cooler than a maypole. Oh and William Tell kicks that Robin Hood twit into the brambles.
 
SwissYellow said:
Thank us for knocking the last former Swindon Town player out the tournament last night, shocking that some Oxford fans wanted a Scummer to win.

We now have to beat FIFA and Argentina to get through. Hope we wind the Argies up and get a load of them sent off or injured. HOPP SUISSE.

Switzerland are brilliant, if you disagree you are a racist. Chocolate and clocks indeed...The stupid thing about this Charlie Vs the Chocolate factory joke is that Switzerland's largest export is pharmaceuticals i.e drugs and one of Colombia's is processed chocolate.

England's mountains are small bumbles, your skiers are all rich kids and a yodeler is way cooler than a maypole. Oh and William Tell kicks that Robin Hood twit into the brambles.
Click to expand...
id argue one of Columbias biggest exports is marching powder? lol
 
unification said:
I've been saying this since the 2022 World Cup - Messi doesn't question FIFA and therefore he and Argentina get preferential treatment. Like the ICC finding a way to allow India to go deep in their cricket tournaments because it keeps the highest volume of interest up and therefore gives bang-for-buck to advertisers, FIFA have a damn good reason to keep Messi in it. It's entirely commercial.

Which begs the question, what's the point? Is this football or the WWE where results are predetermined?

All that said, my sympathy for Egypt only goes so far. They had that game under control and allowed themselves to panic and collapse under the pressure. They looked tired and the concentration levels went. They failed to deal with deliveries into the box, forgot to stick to their markers and completely let the occasion get to them. After looking at both penalty shouts at the end (Mac Allister on Fathy and Fernandez on Salah), neither were penalties so the on-field ref and VAR got those ones right. It got what should have been Egypt's second completely wrong especially when you compare it to other goals given in the tournament. VAR remains a scourge on football because it is used so inconsistently and that was evident last night.

So on reflection, Egypt have themselves to blame to some extent but can experience a fair degree of injustice too. Forgive the desire to go in al misty-eyed like the media have been on Argentina's comeback. Every Argentina team I've seen in my lifetime - including the average ones from 2002 and 2018 - should be beating Egypt every time. Find themselves 2-0 down to Switzerland and Norway/England with 12 minutes to go and I can't see them clawing that back.

ABA for the rest of the tournament.
Click to expand...
well put
 
SwissYellow said:
Chocolate and clocks indeed...The stupid thing about this Charlie Vs the Chocolate factory joke is that Switzerland's largest export is pharmaceuticals i.e drugs and one of Colombia's is processed chocolate.
Click to expand...
How do you know that Charlie wasn't referring to Switzerland and chocolate to Columbia? Huh? Who's the racist now?
 
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