GENERAL World Cup Thread

Plus with England being in the shape they are in this place will be alive (relatively speaking) with all sorts of nonsense as they progress through the tournament.

Shocked he hasn't taken Gibbs White. On form he absolutely should have gone.

They made a good call taking Ivan toney.

That German squad looks dangerous, could be a dark horse

He is the first Norwegian to win the Premier league after all ;)

Except for the Norwegian Henning Berg. :)

Plenty of outrage about the England squad. I'd have picked a different squad, but i think it's clear what Tuchel is doing, whether anyone agrees or not. He wants a club feel to the team, and a set way they play.

Pickford

James Stones Guehi O'Reilly

Anderson Rice Bellingham

Saka Kane Rashford

That's his team. And everyone else is in the squad to fill in like for like when necessary so as not to disrupt his system. In that context, the biggest surprise is taking Madueke over Bowen.

He's not taking MGW and Foden because he doesn't want those type of 10s. I think Eze is closer to the Bellingham/Rogers profile he likes, and can also play on the left.

Tuchel isn't taking the best players. He's taking the best players for his plan.

I forgot one other one where I don't know what hes thinking.

Dan Burn over Lewis Hall.

He can only be preferring Burn because he's desperate for a left footed CB. He could've picked Colwill, but i reckon in his head, Colwill hasn't been in many squads because of the injury.

Hall is an ideal fill-in for O'Reilly if O'Reilly gets injured, or needs to be moved to midfield during a game. Burn can cover CB and LB, but he's a painfully average LB compared to Hall, and you've CBs who can cover Guehi.

So yeah, Burn is a mad one for me. Needless downgrade of a position. I'd have even taken Shaw over Burn.

Yeah anyone who thinks Norway is a one man team hasn't a clue. Same for Portugal who Ronaldo is now far from the best player in the squad.

Sounds weird until you remember Madrid dont actually have that many Spaniards these days. Fernandez and Huijsen woulda been closest to a call up but Cucurella and Laporte aren't exactly downgrades to them.

It's usually Madrid players are the ones causing trouble!

I've never known a WC to be so close and be so little excitement and hype around it.

I have never been as disinterested in a football tournament as this one. It's going to be a stinker.

Go back and you'll find the same type of posts about 2022.

I think it's just the age demographic of us boards.ie users.

This sort of thing had a huge buildup in ones head when we were younger.

Personally I didn't feel that way about 2022 or any of the recent Euros.

#1 is the biggest problem for me. Can't see myself starting to give a sht until the last 16 where as I used be tuned in from the off.

As for #3 I'm used to the World Cup being in sht holes but watching Infantino debase himself in ever more desperate ways has taken its toll on my enthusiasm.

Opening game is also a repeat of the 2010 opener which was a horrendously underwhelming Opening match.

Everyone remembers the finish but the build up was excellent too

It's funny how possession wasn't as much of a thing back then, I remember the Cambiasso goal in 2006 that was claimed as one of the best goals ever scored because there were 20+ passes leading up to it. These days you get a passage of play like that every game but when you look at games as recent as the 2000's you just see how cheap possession was and you wouldn't pass backwards unless you were trying to hold a lead and slow it down. Lots of balls over the top.

But I agree with the general point that there looks to be a hell of a lot of group games without obvious quality. As a kid you'd want to watch every world cup game. But Iran v New Zealand at 2am? Algeria v Jordan at 4am? DR Congo v Uzbekistan at 12:30am?

I value my sleep significantly more these days