Thread to discuss the football itself.
This is not a thread to discuss the hosting of the competition in Quatar.
You can discuss the hosting in the relevant thread.
Poland so blessed. They were awful tonight. Did they have an attempt on goal ?
That’s a sickener, the Saudi goal actually changed nothing for Mexico as one more goal would’ve put them through on GS, but it just knocked the stuffing out of them.
Hope Poland take a heavy beating from the French.
Was anyone else secretly hoping it'd end up with a drawing of lots?
Wouldn't normally praise a guy for going in hard on the goalie but Jimenez showed his bottle at the end there
Not a single shot on target.
Argentina had a dozen.
Another day, a different vibe, this Poland team could find their legs in next game, that's football.
Gutted for Mexico. Stopping the play while Mexico were surging into the box for a ball to the chest was a joke.
Not a prayer. They will be well beaten and go home after the next game.
Poland should probably just sack the manager after that game I think it would be justified.
I don't know what the mess was I just watched 🤣
Poland a shambles. An absolute mess. They'll be destroyed in the next round.
France will destroy Poland and would've done the same to Mexico so it was much of a muchness really.
More nail-biting and not the outcome that I expected.
There go two big "this-always-happens-at-the-World-Cup" moments.
Poland get out of the group for the first time since 1986 and Mexico fail to reach ‘el quinto partido’ again. This tournament ends their run of 7 consecutive World Cups where they crash out at the last 16. The French must be licking their lips.
Stranger things have happened
What happened with Ben White leaving the England squad?
This is the WC, if it was predictable it would be boring
Can only guess based on the statement its a bereavement, but doubt anything more will come out anytime soon
Poland get to the top of one table as lewandowski over takes Messi as the player who has walked the most at this world cup.
9.7k to 9.6
And weirdly Argentina look poor as well.
Why is everyone feeling bad for Mexico - is it because they scored a nice freekick???
They have been just as bad as Poland this tournament. As the poster above said, much of a muchness who got through between Mexico and Poland.
It was a terrible group and I can't wait for all teams involved to be done.
I am happy for Poland to actually get out of a group though but they deserve no further.
There’s going to be at least one upset in those four fixtures, you can be sure of that.
Most likely would be the USA. Very hard to make a case for Australia but I never would’ve expected them to even get out of their group, so who knows?
Normally I’d give Poland a chance against nearly any team, but their right flank was targeted heavily by Argentina with good success so on paper you’d imagine Mbappé should obliterate them. Still, if they do manage to defend well, Lewandowski can always nick a goal at the other end.
Hard to see past England, and the longer that match stays goalless, the more I’d fancy them. They haven’t gone behind in a match yet, but the first time they do, I expect them to lose. Don’t think that’ll be against Senegal, but I’ll eat my hat if they manage to overturn a defective against any decent team, really don’t think they have it in them.
Mexico's manager sacked straight after the game
Portugals Nuno Mendes out of the World Cup with an injury
I was a bit late to the party catching up on that group C madness. Even the highlights were magic. Bit of a travesty that only two teams qualify. Real pity there is no best 3rd place team. And the Saudi’s were great as well. Poland blessed. Their former Pope must have been looking down on them.
No fvckin way should 3/4 teams progress.
There needs to be plenty of jeopardy involved in these groups, and 2/4 is probably OK. It'll get messy and convoluted soon enough, with 40 teams in the American world cup. Messy reducing that down to the last 16.
Fair points. I don’t agree with the expansion of the WC to that amount at all. I had forgotten about that.
Ends up as a ‘primary school sports day’ feel to it ‘everyone one wins’ where qualifying is devalued.
Standard of competition weakened and would get more one sided matches. I just feel those group C teams that did not qualify were in very hard luck.
I suppose I was thinking of the 2020 Euros system where there was ‘best third placed’ teams in the last 16. But the Euros only had 24 teams.
Personally I think any more than 32 in a competition proper, is getting silly.
The expansion will barely even help us qualify too, 16 extra spots but only 3 going to Europe.
He should have been sacked after the 2nd game, he's Argentinean and the conspiracy theorist in me believes he threw the 2nd game against Argentina when it looked like Argentina could be heading out.
Benching your 2 Ajax starters and main goal threat Henry Martin (not even subbing any of them on) in favour of 10 Liga MX players and Lozano was outrageous. He brought them all back in for the last game and Mexico looked much better yesterday. The Mexicans I talked to were going mad about it but it never seemed to get much traction over here.
Poland are a disgrace to international football, always have been with there talent. Mexico vs France is a much better world cup tie. Not any great round of 16 ties yet.
I found a tongue in cheek article (a long read) written by football365. Basically saying we should enjoy these group stages because we won’t have it so good again.
The writer details the history of ‘ off the wall’ World Cup formats.And basically says FIFA are reverting to type finding a way to make a mess of the WC format, as they have done historically. But this time they are doing it to look for more money, under the guise of growing the game globally.
Poland are hardly "a disgrace to international football". They qualified for the competition, have now reached the second stage and are trying their best. I wish Ireland was in a similar situation today.
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