Italy would still have been a tournament's dark horse, they find ways to survive several rounds with Elite Defense. They are not that good in group stage. Well, GER has one opponent less to have a head ache about.
Nah, we've already made enough fun of the Netherlands. For now. The one team we never beat in World Cups, to be more precise. Gates to title defense have opened a bit more tonight.
No offense to anyone but it’s one thing to have great squads like Netherlands & Chile out of the WC & it’s another thing to have a 4 time world champion not make it. Ventura will probably be lynched, everyone says “but they had the talent” honestly since the 2006 squad, Italy hasn’t produced anything extravagant outside of their defense, truly pathetic. Italian soccer might be dead.
They'll be alright. Just need to make necessary changes, reflect on what went wrong and change certain things. There's still enough talent to have qualified for the WC. It'll be interesting to see who gets appointed as manager next and if the Italian FA go for a manager that can actually demand and get respect, and a manager that isn't cheap to pay for.
Really wish they'd always award the player with a red card (and further fines+suspensions) for that kind of acting, this sh is embarrassing for the sport.
Yeah, I think it should be fines plus a yellow card. Yellow card can be determined via replay while play goes on. Ref informed on the next stoppage via sideline signal. No radioing it in. Signal that to the whole damn stadium on a big digital poster like they do for the substitutions. On another note... how's James fitting in with Bayern?
Was injured for a while, but played pretty good in most of the games he started. He's one of the few creative players we have, feel like we missed that spark and brilliant key passes in recent years. One thing that surprised many Bayern fans is James' work rate, he's extremely aggressive on both ends and always tries to win the ball back. Good to see that there are star players who still have the right approach to the game, guys like Neymar very rarely do the dirty work. Only issue I'm seeing is him relying too much on his left foot, he always has to adjust and can't make the most out of every situation because of this technical deficiency.
France have enough speed to pose problems. And their bench with the Ex Monaco young stars is slightly better IMO. But in a tournament GER is supreme and a top team like Belgium mostly disappoints. We shall see.
Feel like France are slight favourites, Germany can beat them on a good day though. The Mbappe-Griezmann-Martial-Coman-Pogba connection is just nuts on quick counter attacks, we've had severe issues again yesterday. Besides Germany and France, I don't see any true contender, although one should never dismiss the usual suspects (Spain, Brazil).
Still got quick guys like Mendy, Lemar, Ousmane Demb. Not to forget. ALL they need is Tourney Experience! Because of Harry Kane who could go nuts himself I would say England is a second tier team.
England also looking exciting, dominating the youth tournaments atm. Watched their U17 world cup matches, Brewster and Foden seem especially dope. Brewster could make @Jontro a happy LFC fan again, he's currently playing for their U23 squad and has ridiculous touch + ball-iq for that age.
BILD saying Sandro Wagner asked Hoffenheim for permission to join Bayern, would be a hell of a back-up for us. Guy played for Bayern's youth, plus still has a home and family here, so he'd be a perfect fit.