From your keyboard to God's ears. And hopefully He hears our prayers for Pelé and his family as well. GO SAN JOSE EARTHQUAKES!!! GO USA!!! VAI BRASIL!!! -G
Personally, I would like to see ENG win, but France and Brazil look very hard to beat, based on yesterday and today. I think it's going to come down to who has the best GK.
England or France vs Brazil or Netherlands. Should be a few good games ahead (after today's sadly lopsided ones)
why not watch BRAvFRA? - - - - - edit - - - - altho to be sure, i am no fan of Neymar, especially after watching his docu.
Brazil is scheduled to face Croatia in the Quarter-finals on Friday at 7:00am PST. GO SAN JOSE EARTHQUAKES!!! GO USA!!! VAI BRASIL!!! -G
Croatia is really good at grinding out results in the World Cup - they've got a lot of experience doing it. Hopefully Brazil can score early and often and put it out of reach for Croatia like what they did to Korea today.
Croatia isn't new blood though - they were runners up last time. The most 'new blood' final we can have at this point would be Brazil vs one of Switzerland, Morroco, or Portugal. Everyone else whose left has played in the final more recently.
In 2018 I rooted for Croatia because I thought they were the underdogs. Sure they were using some dark arts to grind out results but why not - they are underdogs and they're just doing what they have to do to stick it to the better rated teams. This year I see them doing the same things and I don't find it nearly as fun to watch any more. I will root for Brazil playing the beautiful game over Croatia playing the dark arts all day. Yes, I know, Neymar is known as a flopper (or the flopper), but he's backed off of that at least a little bit now.
Playing in the final is not the same as winning it. Brazil has five World Cup titles. Barely more than a handful of teams (on only two continents) have ever won a World Cup, and none as many as Brazil. Croatia is newer blood than Brazil. Japan much newer still, which is why it's a shame they couldn't have advanced instead of Croatia after what was a tie game. I'm rooting for the Netherlands at this point.
I would have rooted for Japan if they got through. Great team and I like the way they play. If Brazil can't win it then Messi all the way!! (in fact I would love to see Messi win the Cup, but I don't expect it to happen).
I wouldn't mind seeing Messi win the World Cup just to shut up the CR7 fans and those still pining for Maradona (Mr. Cheaty McCheaterson).
Croatia's population is less than 4 million people, it's amazing that they can produce the quality of players that they do and are able to compete against countries with a much larger population and a strong soccer culture.
Dinamo Zagreb is what the Quakes should aspire to be. They have an amazing academy structure and produce fantastic professional players through youth development. The Bay Area has almost double the population of Croatia.