Negative football is coming up for the women now

They are all gonna do Japan's lame hacky sack all game and an occasional long ball pass while the team who actually want to play soccer are tiring themselves out chasing the ball around. Like Spain and Italy these last 2 men's world cups. I think we are already seeing it before this upset. That's why there are so few goals. Teams are playing negative soccer with one lone striker and ten time wasters.

You should probably wait a couple hours before posting after a tough loss.

Bitter, much?

Wait for what? Men have been playing this kind of WC soccer for close to 20 years now, though it's gotten worse in recent years.

Spain a negative football team ? seriously.

You are really accusing teams like Spain (who is basically Barcelona without Messi) as playing negative football?

Do you really enjoy the longball and hopefull crosses? Were you a fan of Norway mens team in the 90's?

Obviously you didn't watch the last WC. Probably ther most negative football I've seen since Argentina back in , what 88 or 86. I forget.

And Germany is in serious danger of not even being in the 2011 Olympics in London.

Right now, two UEFA spots (plus the host - England) advance into the Olympics.

As of now ....
England (Host)
France (WWC Semifinals)..... are both in.

Which means, it comes down to Sweden or Germany for that last spot.
Even if Sweden loses in penalty kicks to Australia, Sweden goes through, because technically a loss in penalty kicks still goes down as a "draw" (which is a better result in the Quarterfinal than Germany's loss to Japan).

Germany better hope and pray that Australia dominates Sweden tomorrow.
If Sweden wins, or even loses in penalty kicks, it's good-bye Germany's chances to be in the Olympics in London.

No, I think you are the one who didn't watch it.

Well they play beautiful attacking football with a lot of ball possession, you can't be more attacking than that.

Wow, someone who hates ball control, possession and strength on the ball. What Japan offered today was not negative soccer, watch some low level Premiership team play against a Man Utd or an Arsenal and you'll see negative soccer.

Now, if you don't like ball possession as practiced by the Spanish men's national team (or Barcelona) or the Japanese today, well, you should probably find another sport to follow because that is the future of the game.

But please do not call this negative soccer, the Japanese certainly came out of the gates trying to win this game. They were not playing not to lose.

Spain 1 - port 0

Spain 1 - Ger 0

Spain 1 - Par 0

Spain 1 - Neth 0

Ya, sounds like attacking football to me.

1-0 victoire ecrasante
The best result for a game.

So you only go by the scorelines and don't actually watch the games? gotcha

Numbers don't lie. Eitiher people don't know what negative football is or they simply didn't watch italy and spain the last 2 WCs.

The thread was about the women's game until some spain fans came in here claiming the sky is green and the ground blue. I used the last two men's champ to compare to negative football being played.

Hahaha. USA players don't have the dribbling skills, and teams like Brasil and France money is to attack. I doubt. Overall team size plays into Japans game. You see the same thing with S Korea esp at the U levels but they are under 5 ft. I guess a great way to run the big girls (more mass) rigid.

Of course, it's not possible that all of Spain's opponents were playing negative football

Back on topic, Japan were well worth their win today - I didn't see anything negative about their play at all (at least most people's definition of negative)

The only negative thing I see is the reaction of the presumed winner's fans

I dunno, if we're talking about trends in the women's game, I think looking at the trends in men's soccer is appropriate.

Ball possession is key in the advanced game of the 21st century. If the OP likes to see pell mell 4-3 wins, well, that's not going to happen anytime soon. Way, way, way too much pressure on coaches and players to not lose. And we are all part of the problem. Already some are calling for Nied to be fired, or assuming she will, and you better believe every coach out there recognizes that pressure. If a coach can drain the life out of the game (which I presume is the OPs contention in starting this thread) and produce a 1-0 victory, he or she is going to go that way.

I just feel sorry for the OP feeling that Spain's march to the WC or Japan's performance today was boring. I found both to be stirring and I consider it to fine examples of the game. But I know somewhat of the OP is talking about. I used to watch much more of the NFL, and I prefer the 3 yards and a cloud of dust than watching the aerial contest the game has come to be today. And I'd rather that baseball didn't have the DH rule and I didn't like the NBA's isolation game of a couple of years ago. The games evolve and hopefully beakermeep will see the game evolve into a product that s/he likes again.

Spain did indeed play negative football at the World Cup in South Africa, not at the Euro 2008 though. Somewhere along the way the whole possession and square pass thing turned into a means to deny the opponent first and play forward about fifth.

The situation in women's football is a lot different however. Quite a few of the top teams, including the US and Germany, are looking to overpower their opponent by physical superiority, not by playing good football. In this context the technical approach of Japan and even more so the North Koreans is the progressive one, although both of them need to focus on less square passing and more penetration.

Hopefully Germany's early exit will lead to a change of attitude there as well, it would only benefit women's football in the long run.

I stopped watching WC soccer after the last 2 world cups, so no it's not a positive thing for WWC. I'm see a LOT more diving and negative football, the two seem to go hand in hand.

So...you would rather see teams with limited technical ability playing long hopeful balls or crosses into the box? Possession soccer is not negative soccer. It just boggles my mind that you think it is. Japan today in no way, shape, or form played negative soccer. Perhaps you should look at the problems that Germany had today instead of putting the blame on the team that beat them.