About six years ago Mercia and I were at a resort in the Dominican Republic on vacation. One day at lunch, Mercia was wearing a Brazil team jersey. In line next to us was an Englishman with a tee shirt that said “Football: We Invented Yet.” He was eying her shirt so Mercia pointed to the five stars about the Brazilian Football Confederation crest and said “We perfected it.” He nodded grimly.
Two nations with all the burden of tradition in the sport, but one with one major success forty-four years ago and another with five World Cup wins (three since England’s win), eight wins in their continental championship (including four of the last five) and three Confederations Cup wins, including the last two.
I feel for English football fans, I really do. Simon Kuper and Stefan Szymanski explored the issue well in their book Soccernomics, but it might be a good time to lower one’s expectations.
Yes it was a terrible call, but that’s not why England lost.
As an Arsenal fan, I took great pleasure in knowing that Ashley Cole had a bad game.
I wonder if England fans wish Ryan Giggs was 5 to 10 years younger and had been born in London.
Remember what I said about Mesut Oezil; that he was someone to watch?
I honestly don’t know if Germany just had great counterattacks or England’s defense was just that bad. I think it was a little of both.
England had the sort of balance in their attack in this World Cup that no team should want: one goal by a forward, one by a midfielder and one by a defender.
Manuel Neuer’s punt to Miroslav Klose that resulted in Germany’s first goal was the first assist by a goalkeeper in the World Cup since 1966.
Before the Argentine team gets too cocky, they should consider a few facts:
- They defeated teams that had a net plus 1 goal differential in the games that they played against teams other than Argentina.
- They defeated teams that had scored a total of 14 goals in ten games, including today’s game.
- Three goals were scored and while Tevez’s second goal was stunning, his first was the result of a blown call and Higuaín’s goal resulted from one of the most embarrassing giveaway’s I’ve ever seen.
Ian Darke: with every game I thank God it’s you, Martin Tyler and others doing the play-by-play and not the horrible Tommy Smyth, but for God’s sake the man’s name is pronounced Ig y EEN, not Ig WAYNE and not Ig WAN. Also, every Hispanic man I have ever known with the name Javier pronounces it Ha vee air, not Ha vee a. They’re not French, okay?
Javier Aguirre: a taller keeper might have gotten a hand on Tevez’s screamer. Might have, perhaps, but there was absolutely no way the 5’9″ Oscar Perez was going to touch it.
Anyone impressed with Sergio Romero, Argentina’s goalkeeper? Not me.
I think England would be happy to have a forward who hadn’t yet scored if he could do what Leo Messi does.
I’m so glad that Argentina v Germany is going to be on Saturday.
Diego had better hope that Walter Samuel gets well soon because, Gabriel Heinze, who was brilliant today, can’t do it all by himself.
eric
the axiom is “speed kills” and my eyes tell me that England lacks speed.
eric
BGinCHI
David James was also terrible. He made one good save and the rest of the shots were by him before he could straighten out his cornrows. It’s not his fault they lost, but everything England did looked like it was just sub-par.
Lampard finally had a game where he struck the ball well, kept it on frame mostly, but no one else got shots. Very poor organization and no creativity. I actually thought Milner was the offensive bright spot going wide then he was taken off.
And would anyone like to defend Emile Hesky? When he walks onto the pitch it’s like waving the white flag. England needs to get younger and get a new plan; this one is not working.
The good news is that the US at least shows signs of life: we get more striker play and a healthy center back and we’re in business. And Clark as the kind of midfielder who doesn’t stay strong on the ball is no longer allowed.
amorphous
You know what pronunciation bugs the shit out of me? When Americans pronounce Angela Merkel’s first name “Ahn Hay La” as if she were Spanish. She’s German, dammit, and it’s “Ahn Geh La.”
BruceFromOhio
That’s some serious history, pronounce it however the hell you like.
Watch the other goalies take note …
Comrade Coffin
I was counting the number of ways that Darke was butching Higuain’s name.. “Ig-WHY-EEN” .. three syllables. It’s not that hard!
Montysano
I’m a fair weather soccer fan, but yeah… the second goal was spectacular. To my amateur’s eye, however, Gyan’s goal yesterday is the one that’s stuck with me.
CJ
My Miro crush rolls on. Germany v Argentina will be fun, hopefully no penalties this time around.
Wordsmith
Disclaimer: In no way a sports aficionado. Upon hearing that Germany trounced England it popped into my head that it would be Germany vs Brazil for the big kahuna.
cmorenc
Germany v Argentina is likely to be one of the handful of most awesome games ever, not merely this World Cup! And there are more probable great matchups coming down the pike before it’s over! IMHO there isn’t any near-prohibitive favorite to win it all this time.
Argentina v Brazil in the final would be the most intriguing, dynamic matchup, but OTOH it would be great fun to see the Dutch stun Brazil and then go on to finally, finally win a WC after fielding so many high-quality sides who came up achingly just short over the years.
Dr. Squid
You’ve never heard British golf announcers, eh? One such pronounces Miguel Angel Jimenez’ name as ‘Miggle Angle’.
Mark S.
I don’t think Lev Yeshin could have stopped that Tevez goal.
Viva BrisVegas
Soccer, or more properly Association Football, is a type of football not the type of football.
In Brazil, as eleswhere, I believe the game is known as “futbol”, which of course has no actual root meaning in Portuguese.
I know you don’t want any snark here, but soccer fans seem oblivious as to how annoying the presumption claiming the exclusive use of the term “football” actually is.
Some of the other forms of football include:
Rugby Union
Rugby League
Australian Rules Football
Gaelic Football
American Football
Canadian Football
Call it futbol as much as you like, but some thought should be put in before demanding it be called football.
Quaker in a Basement
Argentina vs. Germany?
Tough call for the exiles.
Cacti
Romero definitely looks like a weak link on the Argie side.
But they’re so friggin’ awesome on the offensive end, is it a weak enough link to send them home?
We shall see.
ang
umm, it’s actually ee-gwa-een.
Paula
Well, today was a load of bull. I expected Argentina to move on, but not like this. As for Eng/Ger … the bad blood will continue.
[OT, but my fondest wish right now is to teleport all who complained about Americans being the worst WATBs in intl comp into London and Mexico City wearing the opposing teams’ jerseys. They can report back some actual comparison data.]
Paula
OT: Gawd, someone make Ken Silverstein STFU already.
James
Amen to that. Also, Theo Walcott must be absolutely delighted to have been left out of that mess.
Cacti
@Paula:
When Argentina scored the offsides goal, the ABC color commentator started yapping about the disallowed U.S. goals.
Semper Butthurt!
Kobie
England getting drubbed that badly today would be like Canada getting smoked 10-0 in hockey. After the U.S. got beat, I was pulling for England. Shame they went out the way they did. It wasn’t for a lack of effort, but Germany is REALLY good. And yes, England got dicked, but I don’t think they would have won even if that goal counted with the way Germany played.
Kobie
@Paula:
WATBs?
MikeB
FIFA should be embarrassed at the officiating in this WC and in
the sport in general. It’s an absolute disgrace, and the refusal
of FIFA to improve the situation through technology and/or
additional referees damages the integrity of the game.
Yeah, England was lousy in the tournament and probably would have lost to Germany anyway, but who knows for sure? Maybe coming
from 2 goals down to draw level in a matter of minutes would have
been the momentum shift needed to inspire the Brits and
put a little doubt into the heads of the Germans going into the
locker room at halftime.
What we do know for sure is that the goal was good, and the
officials blew yet another one. Pathetic.
Thlayli
The bizarre thing about the first Argentina goal was it looked like Messi’s shot was going in. If Tevez hadn’t helped it along, there wouldn’t be any problem.
***
This is the Germans we’re talking about. They don’t do “doubt in their heads”.
***
Kuper/Szymanski factoid for the next round: Argentina hasn’t beaten a Western European country in normal time since the 1986 final against West Germany.
SRW1
Breaking news: Contrary to its official stonewalling, FIFA actually is experimenting with novel technologies to eliminate officiating errors at the WC 2010 tournament. And the system FIFA is exploring unequivocally shows that Lampard’s shot was no goal.
Randinho
@Mark S.: Fair enough.
@Viva BrisVegas: In Brazil they spell it futebol and pronounce it fu CHI ball. I think that the intent of his tee shirt was pretty clear.
@ang: You’re right, but at least the way I pronounced it is closer than Ian Darke’s.
SRW1
And now to the more hilarious aspect of the Sunday officiating disaster:
Contrary to general belief, the body that determines the international rules of soccer is not some FIFA committee as such, but the International Football Association Board (IFAB). The board has eight members, four representatives of FIFA, plus — wait for it — one each of the ‘pioneering’ UK associations from England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland.
Rules changes can only be implemented if six of the eight members agree during its annual meeting. The last time the board met, and once again rejected the introduction of technological means, was in March 2010.
Maybe the gentlemen of the ‘pioneering’ associations can get their butts into the 21. century, now that one of these associations has gotten it burned by their own stupidity?
snarkypsice
I don’t see anyone demanding anything – but we’ve called it football in England since we invented it and we’re not about to change the name just because Americans started taking an interest and came up with a different name. Sorry.
As for feeling for England fans Randhino, don’t worry about us. We’re used to it. It’s part of our national identity now and it gives us all something to bitch about together ;-)
Leeds man
for God’s sake the man’s name is pronounced Ig y EEN, not Ig WAYNE and not Ig WAN
We’re still awaiting an apology from the Italians for pronouncing Mark Hughes’ name “Yooks”.
Paula
@Cacti:
What does that prove?
Paula
@Kobie:
Whiny Ass Titty Babies. I thought it was part of the lingua franca ’round here.
gogiggs
Yes, Yes, I do.
Except not if it means giving back the ’99 Champions league win by Man U over Bayern. That was the most exciting sporting event I’ve ever seen.
Cacti
@Paula:
That American fans are WATBs.
Still whining about something in a game not involving the US, about a call that had nothing to do with their ultimately being eliminated.
Paula
@Cacti:
You were that commenter weren’t you? I don’t pay attn to who posts what around here but your whine is very familiar.
In any case: SA police added extra security for GER-ENG, Algerian fans in Paris apparently had isolated incidents of rioting after the loss, and now some Mexican fans are slamming the Argentines, and some Argentines are gloating, gloating, gloating — even though last WC, they got beaten by Germany on penalty kicks, and so should probably concentrate on their next match.
Oddly enough, though, I don’t actually feel the need to make stupid generalizing comments about Algerian fans, Mexican fans, etc based on isolated incidents of bad behavior. Because this is the World Cup, passions run high, and calling bs on ref decisions is part of the ritual.
You’re obviously trolling me and so I probably shouldn’t have answered you. But as it happens, I think conceptual dividing lines between teams/fans/hooligan fans/and whole countries are pretty important when discussing a sport that involves high passions and rampant nationalism in a rational way.
Everyone, for ex, hates that Italian national team for various reasons, but the weirdness of anti-Italian slurs being suddenly “OK” in some parts of the soccer fandom is not particularly welcome. On the other hand, I hate the fact that some lefties (none of whom appear to know very much about international soccer teams and the global capitalist industry that sustains them) think that every match played by the USMNT is some kind of proxy war for every grievance the world has against the US and that cheering the US is akin to denying our sins in global politics. (Dave Zirin @ The Nation has a doozy of an article right now exhibiting this kind of nonsensical logic.) Equating a team w/ “nation” also assumes that national teams from Germany, England, France, Spain and Portugal (along w/ the US) should forever be subjected to bad luck and bad calls because history dictates that it’s only fair. But @ the of the day, the sport comes before the international politics.
As for the bad calls: in terms of merely being a soccer spectator in America who wants to avoid the reams and reams of commentary about why the sport truly sucks, it would be great if FIFA didn’t exhibit its worst traits at a time when everyone in America has access to an unprecedented level of coverage.
But you probably don’t care about any of this. Troll on.
giovanni da procida
John Harkes is worse. So much worse. I don’t know if there was a single italian or spanish surname that he and Darke didn’t butcher between the two of them.
The Tyler/McCoist pairing on the other hand, is pure distilled essence of wonderful.
Cacti
Trolling you? Quite the inflated opinion you have of yourself. Yes, I just sit around waiting for your next post. lolz
The height of WATBism is…
When you’re a paid, professional commentator, calling a game between Mexico and Argentina, and you’re still whining about a call that went against the now-eliminated United States in a non-elimination game.
Americans just have this annoying habit of making anything that doesn’t go their way into the worst thing that ever happened in the history of anything anywhere. And if the furriners would just adopt our superior American ways (instant replay, change offsides, or fundamentally alter the game in some way) all would be right with the world, because, Shut Up USA! USA! USA! that’s why. I think there’s a name for it…
Oh yeah, Ugly Americanism.
So in the mean time, how ’bout you and the ABC broadcast team share a box of tissues and get the hell over it. The US lost on their own merits, they’re out of the tournament. Everything that happens from here on out isn’t an analogy for the American Experience.
Paula
@Cacti:
Well, you saw fit to answer me when you could have ignored it so … *shrug*. I’m just here because I have internet chores to do and it’s very easy to click on refresh once in a while and see that Cacti has made yet another response.
In any case, you’ve basically ignored most of my response to, again, repeat your bull about “John Harkes (whom most American soccer fans hate anyway) = All American fans.” I didn’t say jack about whether Americans deserved to win the Ghana game (they didn’t) or any other, and so the fact that you’re bringing it in makes it seem like you’re the one concerned with whether the Americans win or lose.
But it’s OK. Just keep on.