Football (Soccer)

[NCP 8]

It was a pisspoor performance. And the yellow for Willems was unjust. FML

[Guest Marney-1]

Watching this now, just realsed Dudek is in goal. \o/

[Indy 350]

As much as I hate Ronaldo as a person, he is an absolutely brilliant athlete and footballer. Did you ever see "Ronaldo: Tested To The Limit"? Think it's on YouTube now. Watch it. Unreal. He does all sorts of stuff like volleying a ball in pitch black after seeing it kicked from 20 yards away for half a second. Insane skillz.

When he heads the ball in pitch black, amazing. I loved that documentary.

[Firm 982]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rd3j5wvRMxo

Looks like a goal to me, if they wasn't offside.
It's about time they brought goal line technology in.

[NCP 8]

They have a guy next to the goal and he checks if the ball crossed the line or not. In this case he should look for another job.

[cuda 939]

Balolatelli

[Firm 982]

Ssshhh.

This should happen everytime Balotelli attempts to speak.

[Pieface 15]

Just a general wonder. Say goal line technology was enforced, is it only on the goal line, or is it like cricket, whereby they look at the build up (e.g. if it was a no ball etc). So would they bring it back for an offside, or there be a different debate on extending goal line technology?

[Firm 982]

So far goal line technology will only be used to help the referea determine whether the football has completly crossed the line.

Hawk-eye technology has already been tested in a couple of matches.

I doubt they'll will be any talk of "extending" goal line technology for a while. The advocates for goal line technology are having a hard enough time just trying to get it implemented in all games.

[Indy 350]

I'm assuming goal-line technology will be just that, for the goal-line only. At least to begin with.

[Firm 982]

Any Semi-final predictions??

Portugal 2-0 Spain

Germany 3-1 Italy

Anbody see this pic?? English fan hanging his cock out for the Italian penaltys. Shame it didn't work.

[Indy 350]

Fucking Spain.

[Handsome B Wonderful 331]

So, either Spain, Germany, or Italy to get yet another major trophy. Proof there is no god.

[Psy 350]

I said before the tournament it would be Spain vs Germany in the final, with the Nazi's winning it. Also thought Holland would get to the semi's though. Epic fail.

[cuda 939]

Hopeful that Pirlo can fuck those frauleins up the ass today.

And about the Portugal vs Spain game, I think this was the game where one could see how much Spain's football is going out of style. It takes a lot of physical capability to keep up the pressure like Portugal did (eventually our pressure went to shit close to the 90 mark), but teams will eventually learn to counter this tiki-taka bullshit.

[Mekstizzle 25]

Portugal faded towards the end of the second half and extra time. They put alot of effort into the game, but Spain couldn't crack them. I agree that Spain like Barcelona are being found out now, although what Chelsea did doesn't count towards that...because that was just a fucking joke and always will be.

Unlucky to lose on penalties, and none of them were particularly awful either. Just the luck of the draw, but Spanish players looked more fresh for the penalties too. Probably hoping for a Germany win as I'm more confident of them beating Spain than Italy, but ideally I'd want Italy to win this tournament.

Can't be fucked for Spain any more, bored of them

[narcolepsy 581]

I called it before the tournament started. Balo was going to mature up and be a key player. Glad to see he has. Rocky start but then throughout he's sorted it out and hasn't been a PR nightmare.

[cuda 939]

Pirlo is so fucking good. Orgasmic.

[Indy 350]

So Italy - Spain final, any predictions?

[Firm 982]

Hmmm. My predictions have been completly wrong thus far.

1-0 to the Italians. I can see this game being rather anti-climatic.

In other news the Al-Hasawi family of Kuwait may be taking over my beloved Nottingham Forest, negotiations ongoing.

[Handsome B Wonderful 331]

Poo

Thankfully, I didn't watch the final. I had better things to do, like sleep.

[Psy 350]

Spain were immense. Dunno how anyone can get bored of watching them. So what if they don't attack and score 8 every game? Neither do England, and England are NOWHERE NEAR to their level. They keep the ball, tire out the opposition and have the talent to pick out a ridiculous pass for a tap in almost whenever they want. Glad they won again and really can't see anyone stopping them in the near future with the young talent they just keep rolling out.

[cuda 939]

Fuck that. Extremely boring game.

I can't stand this football anymore, yes the goal passes and the goals themselves were great, those plays are awesome. But the overall playstyle makes me feel depressed, had to call it quits by the 60' minute mark before I fell asleep.

[DuPz0r 5361]

I agree. The only good parts were the passes to scoring a goal. The second half Italy had a fairly good possession but couldn't get he right passes. Spain are amazing at masking passes and finding long targets, but i still think the game was a bit boring to watch...

[Psy 350]

That's what makes football so interesting though. Teams can play like Stoke (or Chelsea, same thing) and hoof it up the pitch constantly waiting for someone to get a knock down. They can pass it and create openings like Spain/Barca, they can play quick passing, wing-play based football like Real Madrid/Bayern Munich, they can just defend with plenty of men behind the ball and play for free kicks or penalties (like any of Roy Hodgson's teams)... Spain do it a way that is incredibly effective. Portugal matched them for 105 minutes but it's impossible to keep closing people down for longer than that, and that's why Spain absolutely battered them in the second half of extra time. At the end of the day, you'd rather watch your team win 1-0 in every game and win the league than have exciting games that end 4-4...