Giant

Sensational breakaway goal.

Morocco should be called “Europe select of players not born in Morocco”, 10 of their team tonight fall into that category.

Come on France! Silence this whistling, disrespectful bunch of Moroccan supporters. The only game so far where the Qatar riot police have been on patrol.

Now then, Jim, I hope you can appreciate the brilliance of Messi with that goal.

At the risk of being labelled a Messi love-in freak, the man has tormented Croatia this half with some brilliant football.

Herbie, in this post you mention 4 games. I’ve assumed you want results from all 4, but others are just doing semis. How many predicted scores are you after at this stage?

Argentina 2 Croatia 0 France 3 Morocco 0 3rd Place Play-Off Croatia 2 Morocco 1 Final Argentina 2 France 1 (PS assuming usual rule of score at 90 mins)

In the cold light of day, France scored two brilliant goals and England missed a pen. Ref made some terrible decisions but England had the chances to score despite him. If you don’t take your chances, you have only yourself to blame.

A game with everything; goals, fights, pens and drama. Loved it.

A fantastic effort by Croatia. Well done! Brazil only played well in the first half against South Korea. Too many prima donnas.

Croatia 0 Brazil 2 Netherlands 1 Argentina 2 Morocco 0 Portugal 2 England 0 France 1

France 3 Poland 1 England 1 Senegal 1 Japan 1 Croatia 2 Brazil 3 South Korea 0 Morocco 0 Spain 2 Portugal 2 Switzerland 1

Another athletes’ team beaten by a football team today. Football the winner, thank goodness.

Brazilian 1st Division when hardly any S. American footballers played overseas is hardly playing in a pub league with pub team footballers. Ok, he finished his career playing for NY Cosmos, but Pele was equally good with both feet, unlike Maradona and Messi, and he was a brilliant header of the ball. Three World Cup winner’s medals, youngest player ever in a final. The best player ever.

A classic example of a bunch of athletes lacking technique and football nouse versus a football team with players who have both in abundance.

Netherlands 2 USA 0 Argentina 2 Australia 0 France 3 Poland 1 England 1 Senegal 1

Croatia were a class apart from Canada in every department. Take Davies out of the Canadian team and all you have is a bunch of athletes with little technique or skill. Football the winner in that game.

I hope Poland thrash this bunch of diving cheats. Horrible country, female fans not allowed, about to buy Man Utd. Yuck!

England 1 Wales 0

To make Jim happy, Iran will beat the USA to qualify, Wales will beat England, and the USA will beat England. England out because Wales and USA have 4 points each, who goes through decided by goal difference.

England 2 USA 0

That was an impressive performance by any standard, but spare a thought for the Iran players who refused to sing their national anthem in protest at what is going on in their country. They might face some serious repercussions when they get home.

Group A could be decided by who scores most goals against Qatar, the worst team I have ever seen in the WC finals.

I was at the 1994 WC, staying in Los Gatos, California, where the Brazil team was based. I saw three group games in a packed Stanford Stadium, and the Round of 16 game between the USA and Brazil. This game was played on American Independence Day, the atmosphere was unbelievable and the Rover Roy Wegerle was in the US team. I had my Rovers shirt on and was yelling “Weggers” during the warm up. He gave me a wave and all the yanks around me assumed I knew him! Brazil of course won 1 0, but the party on the streets of Los Gatos when I got back was epic. Packed out with Brazilians doing their thing, a truly fantastic day.

I agree completely that Qatar is a WC of a country and should never have been awarded the World Cup, but like it or not the event is almost upon us. I think it would be appropriate for either Argentina or Portugal to win it, so that either of the truly great players of the recent modern era, Ronaldo and Messi, will be crowned a World Cup winner. There have been four such players in my lifetime, the others being Pele and Maradona, who both won it. Footballers of this calibre are on a far higher level of ability than the so called “world class” players who are wrongly described as such. For me, the four players I mention deserve the accolade, World Cup Winner. What a privilege to watch them play football.