......following on from Maccy Blue's comment on the BEL/ENG thread.
Player...or team for that matter.
He says Lukaku.
I'm going to say Sterling ...... considering he's had a good season at MC. Had a lot of WC game time too.
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......following on from Maccy Blue's comment on the BEL/ENG thread.
Player...or team for that matter.
He says Lukaku.
I'm going to say Sterling ...... considering he's had a good season at MC. Had a lot of WC game time too.
What is it about sterling people just don't like him I thought he played well and couldn't believe he was taken off against Croatia , the biggest disappointment was definitely ze German's
I like Sterling and obviously he's no DeBruyne but he has different qualities.Quote:
Originally Posted by jamieccfc
My biggest disappointment was probably Neymar, I thought he would come of age in this world cup but he's done his reputation no favours at all.
Made a complete tit of himself this world cup why he left Barca (money is his biggest motivation imo) terrible decisionQuote:
Originally Posted by thehumblegringo
Messi for me. Struggled, albeit in a team that just couldn't get going.
I'm in the 'Sterling was poor' camp. He seemed to be nervous and did not have the required ball control when needed. He also seemed to be too easily pushed off the ball. Rashford was far more influential and direct when he came on.
I think keeping Sterling on was the main mistake Southgate made in the tournament once it became clear that Sterling was ineffectual
I think it's the fact he's a striker/attacking midfielder and he managed 0 goals and 1 assist. That's also taking into account that he had 6 games, of which he played 70/80 mins. I know there are other things like workrate and important passes. He had some good chances in games as well which he generally fluffed.Quote:
Originally Posted by jamieccfc
Spain - I know losing their coach on the eve of the tournament didn’t help but against Russia they were almost boring to watch, as they contInued passing and passing without creating any real chances, and deservedly went out.
Neymar totally embarrassed himself.
He let his team and fans down badly. Players like him are ruining the game.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jamieccfc
I heard a pundit saying that when Neymar moved to PSG, in terms of top competition and high stakes games, he basically banked everything on playing one game, the Madrid one. He wasn't even fit for the second leg.
I know it's fashionable but I would put Neymar in the "most annoying" footballer category for this tournament. He is just one of the most unattractive attractive footballers I've ever seen. Ronaldo is a cock-head and a complete diva, but he at least appears to be 'in love' with the game. I just feel like Neymar sees football as a way to make money, and he probably wouldn't be massively bothered if he just faded away into obscurity. The next season or two will be huge for him. He needs to go to Madrid, as it seems that's the only place he wants to go in europe, and will have to get bags of goals and assists. I think I'd put Bale above him at the moment in terms of his impact on european club football, and that's saying something.
The English front three - Kane, Lingard and Alli.
They became more and more jaded and ineffective as the competition went on.
Sterling is in danger of becoming one of those players who just doesn't turn up at major tournaments. I'm being quite harsh on him there, because, apart from one area of the game, I thought he did pretty well this World Cup, but when you're in a front two and you just can't finish, then you're always going to be under pressure. He was coming off a season when he found scoring easy for his club and I'm sure he would have put away a lot of the easy chances he missed if he'd been playing for Man City, but his appalling scoring record for England has become something which is affecting his game too much.
The only issue I have with what Stavross1927 says about Spain is his use of the word "almost". Spain weren't almost boring against Russia, they were just plain boring. That afternoon, they did the cause of an attractive passing game great harm in a competition where that philosophy came under threat from a version of the game which will, eventually, take it down a route which will do it no good at all - the more sides that go out thinking "let them have the ball", the more the game will become a bore.
However, neither of those two are the biggest let down for me, it has to be Neymar. In 2014 you saw just how important he was to Brazil as soon as he wasn't there for them. This time around though, I thought he was a liability and, whereas he was essential to them in 2014, I feel he was lucky to hold on to his place in Russia because he was uncommitted, pulling out of challenges and his ludicrous attempts to win penalties and free kicks or to get cards shown to opponents meant his team missed out on some important decisions because his amateur dramatics saw him being singled out by the officials - I would have seriously thought of just not passing to him if I had been one of his team mates..
The holders went out in the first round and people are naming semi finalists :facepalm:
The writing was on the wall for Germany though in their results from qualifying onwards - I was surprised to see them fail to get out of the group stage, but never had them down to go too far in the competition.Quote:
Originally Posted by lardy
I'd call that hindsight. Qualifying performance and tournament performance are different. You can't read much into it and I don't recall anyone saying that for the Germans before the world cup started.Quote:
Originally Posted by the other bob wilson
Germany were the biggest let down, easily. They are the masters of tournament football.
Semi finalists have more game time. A player who's consistently poor over 6 games is more of a let-down than one who is bad over 3.Quote:
Originally Posted by lardy
Come to think of it, Boateng, who is meant to be one of the best defenders in the world, was very bad.
All the superstars going home early.
I don't like being the person coming to England's defence, but the thread is biggest let down. Sterling could/should have done a lot better but his runs were normally causing some kind of problem for defenders. This is not me bigging him up, just that he deserves more credit.Quote:
Originally Posted by Divine Wright
Kane is getting the golden boot and he's also been named in this thread! Again, he was poor in the knockouts and there were penalties and flukes, but he's nowhere near biggest letdown.
For team, I'd rank Argentina slightly behind Germany for biggest let down. Player is actually pretty hard.
No, I can't honestly say that Germany did not occur to me as possible winners when I sat down before the tournament and thought of who could actually come out on top - neither did Argentina, but Spain certainly did.Quote:
Originally Posted by lardy
Germany won one game in five going into the World Cup and that was by 2-1 against Saudi Arabia - for whatever reason, they weren't looking like a "typical" Germany team in the run up and, for me, they looked knackered throughout.
The entire African contingent.
All i saw Rashford do was fall over in every challengeQuote:
Originally Posted by Penarth Blues
My biggest disappointment was how the most talented South Americans who have the skill to destroy anyone on the day , who simply revert to fainging injury , conning referees and teaching on looking youngsters how not to play . FIFA should deal with this issue ( it's all laid bare on camera ) before it destroys the game .
:thumbup:Quote:
Originally Posted by Cyclops
I thought Argentina were par for the course, Messi aside they aren't very goodQuote:
Originally Posted by lardy
Team who scrapped through into the competition were lucky to progress to the knock-out stages. More of a surprise that they got so close to France than anything.Quote:
Originally Posted by City123
Germany were a let down, Spain were a let down, Tunisia were a let down (ranked best African team in a tournament where no African team progressed), Brazilian manager was a let down in not tweaking tactics/personal when they had the squad to win the tournament.....
Switzerland as a dark horse for this race? That they couldn't beat Sweden having had such a great unbeaten run going into the tournament and getting a good result against Brazil.
Did he play :shrug:Quote:
Originally Posted by City123
The England system doesn't suit Sterling . Ultimately all the players in their team aren't really the main guys at their club apart from Kane. Sterling has much better players meaning he doesn't have to be such a primary focus.
I'm not sure England have the right players for the formation if it wasn't sterling they wanted Rashford and it's not the role for either.
Germany on reflection got some very good players and even got a reprieve once and still couldn't do itm
Germany were the biggest let down in terms of teams.
Player wise, I'll go with Ozil but he's always a let down every time I see him play for Arsenal.
Biggest letdown was VAR, or more precisely, FIFA's implementation of it.
To be fair, it improved a lot after the groups. Until the final anyway.Quote:
Originally Posted by bobh
Fixed for you 👍Quote:
Originally Posted by Der Kaiser
Aside from the players/countries mentioned I was disappointed in the tv punditry
I was also disappointed by that women (she was behind Putin and handing medals to him) who appeared to pocket one of the winners medals
Saw it in Reddit will try and get the link
Has to be Germany. But special mention has to go out to Spain who were ****ing shit and not in the least bit entertaining.
France's African contingent did OK.Quote:
Originally Posted by Der Kaiser
What would France be like without the Africans? Hmmmm.
Missed all his Man City chums around himQuote:
Originally Posted by Divine Wright
The Croatian Presidents shirt not becoming transparent when it got wet, was mine.