Media here ripping Van Gaal's managing of the Netherlands in the semi final for all the reasons already pointed out. LVG as a soccer manager eerily reminds me of an incompetent stock broker i once had many years ago....seemed brilliant at first tripling my account over 3 months of astute trading the market then made incompetent errors in one single day that wiped out all my gains putting my account right back to square one. I fired him the next day. There is absolutely no point in traveling across the desert on the correct route only to shoot yourself in the foot as you approach the water hole. LVG made far too many managerial errors in the semi final game. This team should have been properly organized to beat a weaker Argentina within 120 minutes or even in penalties. Van Gaal's 5-3-2 produced just 3 shots on goal the entire 120 mins. LVG failed to make in game adjustments to try & get the Dutch offensive attack going. Krul should have started and he didn't have his penalty kicker lineup set before the match or even before the penalties began those were just some his biggest blunders to start with. Is Hiddink taking over the NT?
I feel the same. I'm actually more concerned about the pipeline in midfield and up front. Do we have anybody coming through who are likely to be world class like Robben, Sneijder and RvP?
No, not yet. That has to be of some concern. But historically we've always had good players come out of nowhere, so no worries
I hope Argentina can upset the Germans i will be cheering for Argentina!! Meh...some of the German fans are cool...will others can be complete arrogant douche bags!!!!! Remember well the German gloating that went on about being the SUPERIOR TEAM before WC2002 WC2006 WC2010 & before Euro2012 then Brasil Italy & Spain all kicked their asses. As competitively good as Germany usually are every world cup they have only won it once in the last 40 years 24 years ago in 1990. Germany looked mediocre vs Ghana Algeria & the USA they can be beat if Argentina plays solid at the backend and attacks them. Argentina will be the best defensively organized team Germany has faced in the WC they are no Brasil in the backend and if Messi and company up front can muster up a goal or two i like their chances of winning WC2014. When Germany faces an opponent who attacks them they can lose their confidence fast especially if they fall behind and they become very beatable this is the key for Argentina in this matchup. I hope Argentina does not bunker the entire game for penalties and attacks Germany this would make for a very exciting WC2014 final. GO ARGENTINA GO!!!!!
i already have a cousin giving me (good natured) grief about supporting Germany, saying my dad and Opa would be very disappointed. All true but times change and the arrogance and taunting by Argentine fans towards the hosts is annoying. Plus, as I said before, I'm a sore loser ;-P
You should see the attitude of the hosts towards their neighbours then. BS is not representative at all of what´s going on between the fans.
The Argentines live somewhere far away!!! If you don't like arrogance then you shouldn't support the Germans who will come here in numbers and brag. That's far worse.
Sport isn't cheap yes. Esp. with the government cutting subsidies. Even 300-400 euro a year for football, if not more, isn't cheap for everyone.
I'm sure it's not - I'm talking about what I see and read. Plus my brother lived in Sao Paolo for 7 years
I live in the US so not really an issue for me. But I understand, I never would have supported Germany in anything before. I do prefer how they play compared to Argentina also.
I have heard Hockey is much higher even more expensive the higher level the kids play. Doesn't look like these figures take into account gas and meals and out of town hotels etc for tournaments which also adds up bigtime. But for sure the high costs of playing sports is keeping many families from participating. The world economy sucks utilities gasoline & taxes always skyrocketing most middle class families I know are struggling just to pay for the high cost of living never mind adding yearly expenses to put their kids through sports. Tons of plant closings and millions of jobs lost around the world as China has taken over world dominance in manufacturing is another big factor in all of this. Tough times indeed for families to put their kids through sports on a yearly basis plus as I mentioned previously a lot of kids would rather play computer games and fool around on social media these days than train to commit to becoming an elite athlete. It is what it is i guess such is life in 2014.
Maaan, you should see how cocky and confident the Germans are.. Absolutely ridiculous. They'll tell you the game is already won, that Argentina "struggled" against "weak teams", that Messi hasn't done anything, that they are the best, and so on... The 7-1 really got into their heads. They seem to forget that they showed very little in the tournament prior to that, and, regardless of everything, this is still a final! I haven't seen such cocky attitude from any fans yet until this point. I'm really surprised, but for this reason I hope even more that Argentina beats them on Sunday.
Arrogance, "GERAMNY ARE THE SUPERIOR TEAM HERE YAH HUM!", is in their DNA. In reality, as i previously pointed out, the Germans have won 1 World Cup in the last 40 years hardly the superior soccer country some of their more arrogant fans think they are. LETS GO ARGENTINA!!
Funny tweet-story from the great Canadian UFC Champion Georges St-Pierre... Georges St-Pierre @GeorgesStPierre 18h I'm eating ice cream at the market and wondering why lots of people are come up and saying "sucks that… http://instagram.com/p/qQHYJpwsK8/ Someone says the champ looks like Robben lol
http://www.espnfc.us/fifa-world-cup/4/video/1944007/narrow-play-restricts-netherlands says a lot about why we had problems.
Well the game is over but maybe Vlaar's penalty really went in: http://www.theguardian.com/football...enalty-world-cup-semi-final-holland-argentina
Thats been thoroughly debunked (I hope you can read Dutch): http://www.voetbalzone.nl/doc.asp?uid=219178