Yeah but what's wrong with supporting your own teams too? Some people are too ashamed to go for their own national teams and only jump on the Brazilian bandwagon when they beat certain national team(same goes for clubs). If Argentina loses to Germany or Brazil my friend will side with that team just to piss me off... I hate that the most. Nothing wrong with appreciating the soccer from South America or any other continent but doing it to accommodate a certain personal rivalry is shameful.
Saludos de Beausejour. Nah, that's not the issue. He just claims to be Brazilian (or half-Brazilian): just think it's funny. I have no problem with people supporting teams from other countries: that's totally fine and don't see anything wrong with it. I like a couple of non-Chilean teams myself. But, anyway... Now that we got that cleared up, any predictions for the semis? Both matchups seem pretty even.
Don't mean to brag (well, I do), but I got all the semifinalists right. Actually, they were the logical choices. All four quarters were as close as they could be, but I think at the end we ended up with the best four teams. For a neutral fan, I think those are the teams they'd want to see. For the final I have Boca vs Corinthians. But both semis are going to be very close, just like the quarters.
This international break might change everything, Boca might get a player back and so might La U. Morante is almost recovered, the Emelec centerback was the star signing in the summer, but has missed every match due to injury, worst case scenario he can help us defend the home title, whilst we rest Rojas for Boca. Also La U looses a lot of players for international duty a few days prior to the semis... PERU: Ruidiaz, CHILE: Junior, Osvaldo, Rojas, Diaz, Aranguiz, Mena ARGENTINA: Rodriquez. Having said that, I recon most of them will be benched in their international duties, so it's not as bad as it looks. I heard Boca also have a couple of international players, will they start for Argentina? It will be close, and tight matches at these stages are decided by good defence. In this scenario Boca and Corinthians run with the advantage as they have proven to have the most solid defence of the tournament, so I have them as favourites. But both Santos and La U are adept at finding the net one way or another so it would be foolish to rule them out, specially if they can score on the away matches. I think we will have a pretty definitive picture after the first legs. If La U fail to score in la Bombonera, things will get dicy, worse if we also lose, in which case Boca will have a feet in the final because unlike our previous opponents Boca can then come to Santiago and wait till we mess up. They have the experience to hold a lead for as long as they want. Scoring away will be crucial, I trust we can do it though, if Union Española could, so can we. Whatever happens, we must not come back from Argentina empty handed...
I can't wait for the semis, for sure we'll have very exciting games. Off: Hooray! This is my first post in here.
Even as a Fla fan, I think Fluminense is a lot better than Boca. Flu was missing both Fred and Deco for both leg, which was HUGE. Vasco outplayed Corinthians in both games, and that was without their best player, Dedé.
cut it out.. other than the Diego Souza break away, Vasco was fairly average. it was a 50-50 game, with Corinthians pushing the envelope a little bit more even when we dont have a decent striker.
You guys did a lot of noise here in Rio when the Flu and Vasco were eliminated. I've heard loads of fireworks, it was as if the Flamengo had won some title. lol
If I'm not mistaken, Boca doesn't have any players on the NT. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong though, bosteros..
I'm not sure any definitive selection for the qualifiers has been published has one? Clemente was at the World Cup in South Africa but I can't recall if he's been called up since. He's been in rockin' form for some time now and has been arguably as good if not more consistent than Pablo Zabaleta. I wouldn't expect him to get a call though with the type of coach Sabella is you just never know. Mouche is pretty much an outside shot mainly because it's the one area we are spoiled at plus he still has a lot of decision making things to work on. Two players I know Sabella has been keeping an eye on lately is Juan Sanchez Mino who I think is a very talented young player but nowhere near ready for the NT. The other was Insaurralde who has really started maturing and coming in to his own as a central defender. Considering our other options in the position plus the fact that Boca has been very very hard to score on for the past year gives his possibility a solid argument. The only Boca player that I think should for sure get called up and start is Agustin Orion. He is in such a groove for so long now and continues to get a bit better each match that he should be at the least competing for the #1. I've been watching him weekly for over a year straight now and not one of our keepers is playing on his level.
He's probably one of the better refs in Chile, but that doesn't say much. He has been unable to avoid controversy. My opinion is that he performs better internationally.
Plus they probably will not start, and at any rate Argentina only has one eliminatoria match this time around. They do play amistosos including Brazil, but it's not the same intensity as eliminatorias. On the other hand, Boca is still trying to win the Clausura and the Copa Argentina so they have a pretty busy calendar.
Horrible. Has a reputation for being able to ref games well, but too often flops on the big ones. In the Superclasicos, for instance, i think he's been the star of the last 4 he's reffed, with like a dozen red cards, invented penalties, missed calls etc... plus he seems to have a bias against a particular team. imo, he's not a good ref at all
Actually I stand corrected. It looks like Clemente Rodriguez will start against Ecuador, at least according to the media reports.