Im picking Denmark over Brazil in group D. Although I have no doubts on Brazils ability, its harder for me to accept a once upon a time power house China failing to advance on home soil. It looks to be a pretty competitive group nonetheless.
Of course great play by Germany, but you tent do forget that Germany has a pretty easy group, atleast when it comes to a team like Argentina. I am not saying it wasen´t impressive to score 11 goals, it was, but we have to put this at prespective. Argentina was really easy no defense, i recorded the game and i am seeing it for the second time now, and come on people, the A defenders is as far from the german players as the specators, losing the ball so easy they look like they are scared out of their pants, they are slower both in the head and in the legs, smaller, shorter and prinz have more skill in her little finger than any of the AR. players. This was like a friendly at the most a sunny afternoon at the beach. The real deal comes at the games against England and Japan and ofcourse at the quater and semifinals. I watch the second half against Norway and i must say Norway was the better team in that game, so Germany can do well agains teams like AR, well they have a rude awakening the longer the tourrnament goes on. We have to be realistic here, i think that Germany is going to play the final, but they have no chans this time around against Usa. Why are you americans so scared of Germany? ok they beat you 3-0 in 2003, but the final was a even steven against Sweden, witch Usa beat 3-1, this time around the Usa is the real deal, and there is no team at them moment that are stronger, faster and unbeaten. Relax my fellow earthlings, this is going to be fun Cheer up America. And i guess we will see tomorrow how the Swedes will do at this tournament. I doesn´t look good at the moment with one of the key players coming down with a fever, as we haven´t had enough problems, at least this time around you need not worry about Sweden they wont make it out of the group, i am happy if the manage to beat Nigeria, witch i doubt. Just one thing after another and it doesn´t seem to stop. GL Usa tomorrow against NKorea, you are going to win that one easy
Isn't Argentina South American Champion? With a 21-1 goal record and a 2-0 victory over Brazil? Now they were really horribly today, but they have much improved recently, so they're not as much of a walk in the park as make them out to be.
Here's why the US SHOULD be scared of Germany (if, indeed, they meet): Germany knows how to play offensively, and the US defense has its weak spots. Germany knows how to come back from behind (as evidenced in the friendly 2:2 against Norway). Germany is a tournament team. Having said that, I agree, we must not overvalue this result. But, anyone could see that Germany's attack is varied and dangerous. If they can fix their weak spots, they can easily go to the final. I have no worries about England or Japan.
I was pleased that, despite the lopsided score, the neutral crowd seemed to be having a good time, were interested in the game and voiced support for the underdog side.
Argentina as a South American country was expected to lose against a European team, specially one as strong as Germany. They will do much better against Japan who has more of a South American style. Argentina may also lose against England but by a much smaller score.
Does anyone know if ESPN is rebroadcasting this match? It's supposed to be on right now on ESPN Classic, but they're showing the US Men's match vs Brazil from yeasterday.
Did we watch the same game? They lost it completly they had nothing, how Argentina manage to win over Brazil i have no clue, but the team today hade nothing, no offensiv, no defens nothing. Thats just it, it was a walk in the park for Germany. My point is that you can´t decide how good the germans are from this game, it gives you the wrong picture, thats all, i am not saying that Germany isen´t good. They are make no misstake.
We know what the Australian Mens team did to teams like Cook Islands, American Samoa, and Tonga but that doesnt translate to world cup dominance. The talent gap really starts to show outside the top 5 (actually 4) teams which even Brazil isnt a part of. Now thats not to say teams like Brazil, Denmark, and Japan cant make for upsets. Id also expect a once super power China to re-emerge as a team to beat as hosts.
Boy, i have never seen such a one-sided match for a major tournement in my life, talk about an uncompetitive, meaningless joke of a football match and the commentators on Eurosport said Argentina beat Brazil before they entered the World Cup? If that's the case Brazil should just pack thier bags and go home to avoid the same or even worse result if they face either Germany or USA. By the way Germany really scored 9 goals in that match, Argentina scored two goals (OG) for Germany setting a new record victory in WWC. I'm amazed at the amount of people that are saying Germany will be in the final, win the World Cup after just one match? We haven't seen USA, Sweden, Norway or England yet. This result doesn't prove that Germany are the best team in the tournement, they may have the the best attacking players, but we haven't seen Germany do any defending. The 11-0 result proves nothing when they weren't even put under any serious pressure in the whole match, Argentina only had 7 shots on goal, only 2 on target and Germany only had 4 corners to defend against. Let me say this this World Cup will not be as straight forward predictable as many of you guys say it is. England drew against Germany and USA in the China Cup without a full strenght squad, this time England have all their players fit with 9 UEFA Cup winners in thier squad and at thier best can beat Norway, Sweden and can upset Germany and USA. So don't be surprised to see England in the final with USA and not Germany.
True England did tie USA and Germany in China, but they also went without their best teams, I do not see England reaching the final. Germany sure they put 11 past Argentina but I am gonna wait until I see them play their next opponents before I look at them being finalists to seriously.
Argentina beat Brazil because a couple of their top players, including Marta, did not play. Marta raises Brazil to a whole other level.
Its not likely to see England play the US in the Final. I predict they meet in the quarters though. England-Japan will be a great game to watch. The only way you see a final is if both take 1st or both take second in their respective groups otherwise they meet in the 1/4s if all goes as I predict.
England is not getting to the final, because England will not finish first in their group. Seriously. Yeah, Marta is so far above most of the rest of the female footballers in terms of ball-skills and dribbling that her league games in the Swedish league are like if Ronaldinho played all of his games against division 3 amateur defenders. She runs circles around them. German and American defenses would most likely be outclassed by her too on a good day.
At first thought, I am inclined to call this a disaster for the women's game, but then there are 31 matches to go and most should be entertaining, compelling affairs and may validate the argument for tournament expansion. Tomorrow is another day and if we have a couple of great games then this will be quickly forgotten.
But they probably won't be. Most of the games have an obvious outcome. Besides, if the worst team loses 11-0, how can you possibly validate an expansion? Which nations would you add? How many nations CAN you currently add that are not extremely bad?
As embarrassing as the result was, it was nontheless enjoyable due to the attacking showcase Germany put on. One thing that scares me about the potential, some would say inevitable, matchup between Germany and the USA is how tactically sophisticated the Germans are offensively. Not only can Prinz beat players singlehandidly with strength and speed (I don't think there's a USA defender who can stay with her), but their forwards are so good at combining together. I don't see that same cohesion in the US attack. Hope Solo will have to be at her absolute best to handle those crosses; they were precise almost every single time. Granted, the US defense will mark a lot tighter than Argentina did. Germany's weakness today, as others have pointed out, the number of turnovers in midfield. They seemed to lack the composure that Wiegmann and Meinert provided in past years.
O please goalieanna, Marta raises Brazil's game to 'a whole new level'? Come on it's not like she'll single handedly win Brazil the World Cup, she's just one player. In the mens game everyone said the 2006 Wolrd Cup was Ronaldinho's for the taking and not only did he not win it but he didn't even score in the entire competition. So don't give me any of that fancy Brazilian touch dazzling poetry load of crap. Marta is clearly overated. Fact. And what happens to overated players? They BOMB just like Ronaldinho. If you want to talk about a player that can talk about players who can take things to whole new level talk about Kelly Smith who inspired Arsenal to the UEFA Cup and domestoc treble. I'm so confident that Smith will be FIFA's Player of the Tournament just read it on FIFA.com. http://www.fifa.com/womenworldcup/news/newsid=592347.html#sun+shines+smith And watch a clip of a genious at work http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFH49wsRjJo&mode=related&search=
The stuff about Brazils male team being wonderfully brilliant attacking machines is BS, yes, because they haven't actually played like that in a major tournament in like 30 years. They win by being effective goalscorers and having a lot of potential game-winners on the team, not by playing superiorly beautifully. As for Marta, in her case it is less exagerrated because she really is THAT much better than most other high class female players, and in the female game the defense is much looser, giving her room to often do pretty much anything she wants. A bunch of goals against inferior English-league teams. Brilliant.
Just looking at it from a historical perspective. At the 1974 World Cup we had results such as Yugoslavia beating Zaire 9-0 and Poland beating Haiti 7-0, yet FIFA still voted to expand to 24 teams in 1982, the decision being made prior to the 1978 World Cup. You could argue that there was a lot more depth in the mens's game then that still probably doesn't exist in the women's. We'll see how this works out, like I said we are just one match into the tournament.
Only good performances by the bottom teams in the tournament - namely New Zealand and Argentina and maybe Nigeria and Ghana - would validate expansion for future years. If #s 13-16 are getting their butts kicked regularly, why should #s 17-24 do any better? Granted, I think 11-0 was a bit of an abberation - it was only 6-1 in 2003 - but we can't keep seeing 6-0, 7-1, etc as a regular scoreline either - we'll see.