Official Football Thread

Damn, you guys are all cheering for Holland's arch enemies. Add Portugal and the list is complete.
And apart from two members, all people are only cheering for huge nations. What's so exciting about that?

I am cheering for you know who, for Belgium, and for all African countries (for some reason I like the idea of one of these nations beating a big name and getting further than in previous tournaments) or other underdogs.

I think that I would enjoy every random WC match more than any premier league match. The World Cup is magic. The tension is entirely different, and it feels more concentrated, globally, just more powerful. The players play before the whole world, with immense pressure. You could say this happens also in the PL, but (for me at least) that feels very different.
 
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Cashley Cole not called up for World Cup, retires from international football. Baines and Luke Shaw will be English left backs for the World Cup.
 
National teams are the only places where football's economic industry doesn't exist. It's all about passion in there. And World Cup is the main event of football world, no league, Champions League or even European Championships can come close to it. World Cup has this amazing aura that the other competitions just don't have. Only Summer Olympics is comparable in my book.

Night Prowler said:
I'm not expecting much from Belgium anymore.

Benteke's out. Vertonghen had a shitty season. Van Buyten didn't get much playing time, same goes for Toby A. from Atletico Madrid. Kompany won the title, but got injured a lot and made a lot of mistakes.
Fellaini... yeah. Dembele and Chadli also had a bad season in Tottenham. De Bruyne was non-existent for Chelsea and didn't score or assist much for Wolfsburg.
Lukaku had a good season, but they have no backups for him.
Ofc there are bright spots, like two great goalkeepers in Courtois and Mignolet, Hazard brothers and Mirallas had great seasons too.
Click to expand...

National teams are a different animal. There's been so many cases where a player was off-form all season long but put on a show in an international competition. (e.g. Balotelli beat Germany by himself in the Euro Semi Finals after a terrible season with City) Guys like Vertonghen, Kompany, Fellaini, Dembele, De Bruyne all have significant talent that they can overcome off-form in a whole new atmosphere.

There also are Axel Witsel, Dries Mertens, Radja Nainggolan, Steven Defour, Adnan Januzaj, Zakaria Bakkali and Michy Batshuayi (not capped yet, but I'm expecting him to be in after Benteke's injury) playing for them. Quality players.
 
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Cheer for mine! We didn't qualify for the World Cup, but that's unimportant.

Win or lose, there's always booze.
 
1. England
2. Iran
3. Fuck it, Germany. If you all cheer for them, fine, I'll howl with you. No, I can't. I just hate this team too much.
 
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Oh, and it seems like the official logo was plagiarised:

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ENGLAND SQUAD

Goalkeepers

J Hart (Manchester City), B Foster (West Brom), F Forster (Celtic)

Defenders

G Johnson (Liverpool), P Jagielka (Everton), G Cahill (Chelsea), C Smalling (Manchester United), P Jones (Manchester United), L Baines (Everton), L Shaw (Southampton)

Midfielders

S Gerrard (Liverpool, capt), F Lampard (Chelsea), J Henderson (Liverpool), J
Milner (Manchester City), J Wilshere (Arsenal), R Barkley (Everton), A Lallana
(Southampton), R Sterling (Liverpool), A Oxlade-Chamberlain (Arsenal)

Strikers

W Rooney (Manchester United), D Sturridge (Liverpool), D Welbeck (Manchester United), R Lambert (Southampton).

Standby-players

Michael Carrick (Manchester United), Andy Carroll (West Ham United), Tom Cleverley (Manchester United), Jermain Defoe (Toronto FC), Jon Flanagan (Liverpool), John Ruddy (Norwich City), John Stones (Everton)
 
I'd go with Hart - Johnson, Jagielka, Cahill, Baines - Sterling, Gerrard, Wilshere, Lallana - Rooney, Sturridge.
 
Probably the same for me as well, but they'd get torched defensively with that lineup. Gerrard is nowhere near the defender he once was, he's a central midfielder nowadays. They're desperately in need of a quality defensive midfielder.

I wouldn't be surprised if they came out like this:

Hart - Johnson, Jagielka, Cahill, Baines - Milner, Gerrard, Wilshere - Sterling, Sturridge - Rooney
 
Even though Van Gaal hasn't commented on it yet, word has that Oranje will play 5-3-2 instead of the classic 4-3-3.


EDIT:
Look at the amount of Man City and Chelsea players in the squad Ariana posted.

Respectively 2 and 2. 2 players from a champions squad in a f**kin' World Cup team? That's bloody ridiculous and unheard of.
*laughs like "Rod Smallwood" in Sheriff of Huddersfield*
 
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