Respect your opinion but I think alot of it still stems from expectations. Maybe you expected Spain to win some games 3-nil or 4-nil so they disappointed you and that's why you put them 7th. I don't see how else you could rate them that low. Even the Switzerland match they totally dominated. You say Spain "couldn't hit the target to save their lives" yet stats show they had about 3 times more shots on target than Germany had against Serbia. Considering you call Germany's loss against Serbia "domination" shows you are clearly not using the same measuring stick to rate Spain and Germany.
Are you sure about that? Spain vs Switzerland ESP Shots: 25 ESP Shots on Target: 7 (though apparently ESPN credited only 5) Germany vs Serbia GER Shots: 15 GER Shots on Target: 4 Keep in mind that the way the Spain-Switzerland game panned out was not only the way Spain wanted to play, but also the way Switzerland wanted to play. They are better as a countering, sit back team, and are more than willing to take on that number of shots. Not sure if I mentioned another stat for consideration in this thread or not, but Spain was ranked 20th of 32 in the tournament in SOG%, with roughly 35% of their shots being on target despite having 25% more shots than anyone else in the competition (the other elite tier teams were all in the 45-55% range) Spain was a team all tournament that was more than willing to hoard loads of possession and do nothing with it. I've said it 5 times on the boards in various places that passing sequences such as Xavi-Iniesta-Xavi-Ramos-Casillas-Capedevila-Puyol-Capdevila-Xavi might look beautiful, but they are a net result of ZERO attacking play. Essentially since these moves are typically made near/behind the halfway line at midfield. They just sat on the ball and tried to carve out a chance or two. Against teams like Honduras and Chile, they could. Against teams like Switzerland and Germany (for whatever reason on the part of the Germans -- a grave error and the undoing of their Cup) they were allowed to advance forward. But look at the final. Holland was never coming out and chasing those passing plays. The goal (in theory) is to stretch teams with those moves so that the midfield and defense is out of position. That basically never happened in the final, and had Holland stayed on 11 men, you could have played a 3 hour match and Spain wouldn't have put the ball in the net. Spain's also the side that dodged the biggest bullet, credit to Casillas. If Paraguay had converted their PK, I don't think there was any coming back for the Spanish. They were too nervy and unsettled throughout the tournament to forge a comeback -- as much was very evident against the Swiss. Are there some expectations there? Sure. But part of it is that to me, after watching Spain play 6 times in this tournament (listened to the Portugal match on the radio, so I'll have to watch this later)... they're not as good as everyone thinks they are for me. I never once felt like I was watching a great team play, nor was I ever impressed by them -- I just felt like I was watching an average team who managed to keep winning.
Amen! Not being a sore loser, but Spain plays boring football that has consistently put me to sleep. Keeping possession is great, but at the end of the day I am not just watching a bunch of guys passing the ball around.
Spain at times in the tournament looked less attack-minded than Paraguay-New Zealand as a match did. I'd much rather watch a team like Switzerland play what some people call "anti-football" but in reality should be called "defense-first football." If you don't like defense and counter attack, fine. But to call Spain the beautiful team that has shamed anti-football in the World Cup 2010, you would be very inaccurate in my opinion.
Well, I wouldn't go that far. Switzerland's strategy was basically pray that your opponents miss 10-20 good scoring chances and then try to score both times we cross midfield. Before WC 2010 I was wondering how Switzerland could have lost at home to Luxembourg in qualifying. I'm no longer confused about that result.
That wasn't their entire strategy. Their strategy was the same as it was in 2006 when they qualified for the Last 16 and didn't concede a single goal. Their time streak of 0 goals allowed at World Cups (already a record) would still be going if not for a bogus red card shown to Behrami, and they would have qualified for the last 16 too. The point of the entire discussion was that Spain didn't have 10-20 good scoring chances. They had maybe 4. Look at the match again, everything from 70-90 for example was Xabi Alonso bolting long shots from 30-35 yards. Those are definitely not good scoring chances even with elite tier players. A team like Spain should be working and driving into the final third to carve out better opportunities than hit and hope, which as the statistics show is often what Spain relied upon in the tournament. The strategy of the Swiss is very sound for the technical ability of their team. They have strong, capable, VERY TALL defenders that do not mind conceding corners as a means of defense. They aim to force teams to tee off from 25+ yards constantly because the team is strong and organized enough to prevent constant forays into the box. The midfield is rather underrated, especially in work rate and defensive capabilities. Inler really is as much a DM as he is a playmaker, and Gelson Fernandes was oddly employed on the wing despite being a DM too. Barnetta is more an MC type for me... so the problem for Hitzfeld was in setting up the forward players. I would agree with others who say that Nkufo was a horrible play up top, doubly so given that Derdiyok/Frei are a taylor-made 1-2 punch of strikers. Derdiyok also comes back enough to basically give you a 4-5-1 when you need it and a 4-4-2 going forward. His hold up play was some of the best in the tournament, bar Heskey vs the USA, and his determination and desire to help out in midfield as a striker is to be commended. He was as much of the reason for the Swiss beating Spain as anyone on the park, defense included. An idea formation for the Swiss might honestly have been the 4-2-2-2 that Bob Bradley employed, ESPECIALLY since the Spanish were in no hurry to use the width of the pitch. As mentioned above even when Navas came on and gave the Swiss fits (the only 10 minutes of the match Spain looked truly dangerous), they stopped going to him after awhile and reverted to hit and hope football. Either that or they needed to play Hakan Yakin (which I think was necessary too). Ideal Swiss Lineup (sans Senderos once hurt, who otherwise was in for Von Bergen): ------------Frei----------------------- -------------------Derdiyok------------ Yakin---------------------------------- ---------Inler---------Behrami/Barnetta** ---------------Fernandes-------------- --------------------------------------- Zeigler---Grichting--VonBergen--Lichtsteiner ----------------Benaglio---------------- ** If it's Behrami he stays wide and creates from the Wing. If it's Barnetta he cuts inside and acts as a playmaking AMC.
It was a debatable red card but not a bogus one. Switzerland only played 2 good halves of football this World Cup including a poor match against Honduras which they should've lost. So not sure they really deserved a R16 place.
The Swiss looked poor against Honduras because they had to change their style. They're not a team built to bag 2 goals if required and, especially missing Behrami they had to come way out of their element to try and do it. A lot of people expected the Swiss to struggle in that match as a result of that fact having entered it needing a win, due to their nature as a countering team. And as we saw in the World Cup, changing style to deal with the opposition makes you look a lot worse than you really are (Germany, anyone?)
This is another one of those lists that is so subjective in nature, that it's impossible for a group of people from diverse footballing backgrounds to agree. We all look for different things and one man's great performance is another man's fluke. Here's my 32. Agree or disagree as you will 1. Germany (With a little more experience, I think they would have won it) 2. Uruguay (For punching above their weight) 3. Spain (Deserved winners, but still lacking that special "something") 4. Holland (Would have finished higher if not for their behaviour in the final) 5. Argentina (Entertaining, but distracted by the Maradona circus) 6. Brazil (Next time lads, try playing like Brazilians) 7. Mexico 8. USA (showed tremendous pride, desire and never-say-die . Bravo, gentlemen) 9. Chile 10. New Zealand (Again, punched above their weight and showed tremendous guts) 11. Paraguay 12. Portugal (let themselves down by relying on prima donnas) 13. Denmark (they were a better team than their results suggested) 14. South Korea 15. Slovakia 16. Japan 17. Ivory Coast 18. Australia (Came back well after their mauling by Germany) 19. Switzerland 20. South Africa (should learn from this experience and come back better next time) 21. England (Disappointing.. very... very... disappointing... The players should be ashamed of themselves.... but they won't be) 22. Serbia 23. Ghana (Vastly overrated and rode the wave of African sympathy at least one round too far, in my opinion) 24. Slovenia 25. Greece 26. Italy (26th flatters them, but hell... this is ITALY we're talking about, here..!!) 27. Algeria 28. Cameroon 29. Nigeria 30. Honduras 31. North Korea 32. France
Nope, they were just very average/below the entire tournament. They were handed a gift against Serbia in the form of Lukovic's incredibly weak 2nd yellow which led to the positional shift defensively that even put Vidic in a spot to handball. They were outplayed badly by Australia only to have a Torsten Frings-like handball called this time on Kewell w/ the subsequent direct red. They were completely flat against Germany. A more fair group stage record for them would have been 0-2-1 or 0-1-2 based on their performances. Unfortunately their strikers finally decided to show up in the US match (not a surprise since our defense is by far our weakest link), and were promptly silenced/ushered back into futility in the match against Uruguay, only to have the ref try to gift them a semifinal. Take a look at the free kick that set up the Suarez situation. It was easily the weakest call of the entire match. What in the official's right mind would possess him to make such a call in the 119th minute? Utter stupidity. Fortunately, surely it was karma which stepped in and denied Gyan, since it would have been the most undeserved semifinal appearance in World Cup history.
Considering Ghana picked-up 4 points against the #1, #2 and #8 teams on your list, Ghana's ranking makes little or no sense. Yeah, except they still managed a draw against Uruguay with or without that "poor" call, so I don't see your point. Besides, a FK from 25 yards away or whatever is hardly being "gifted" the match. If anything you should be giving props to Ghana for creating a great scoring chance from a distant FK.
It's absolutely the opportune time to get a free kick in such a position, not for anything that Ghana specifically did. Everyone is totally out of gas, so you just swing it in and hope something happens, which it did. I will admit that their level of play increased in the knockout stages (or at least in the 1st half vs the US and then to hang on against a vastly superior Uruguay squad). But I was not impressed with them at all in the group stage, thought they reverted to form in the 2nd half against the USA, and were mediocre at best against Uruguay in what frankly was Uruguay's worst/flattest game of the tournament in which they were trying to win (the 0-0 with France is not included because I feel they were playing for a draw)
It's funny how everyone seemed to have their worst match of the tournament against Ghana. Germany, Uruguay, USA....
Don't see how you've got that as I've already stated that Germany's worst match was against Spain, and I also never said it was the USA's worst match, I just said our defense was poor so it's no surprise that Ghana's subpar strikers finally learned how to finish.
Rather than speculating why don't you tell whether or not the penalties that they get in the group stage were fair or not. In my book, a handball in the penalty box gives a penalty. Referees have to follow the rules not their bias. (Go to watch the Germany-Serbia game to see that Vidic doesn't need to be out of position to be in a spot for a handball, ironically during this match Serbia did benefit from a red card which led them to win the game). They were flat against Germany ? Well they were lucky to lose only 1-0 I guess ? Tell that to Australia, England and Argentina ! Their strikers ushered back into futility ? (coming from an American, that's surprising! How many goals did U.S. forwards score during this tournament ?) Bar their opening game, this was the only match where the duo Suárez-Forlán couldn't score in the run of play for Uruguay!It was a tense game where both teams had to rely to odd goals in order to score! In fact Ghana did allow only one goal in the run of play during the whole tournament, Mesut Oezil's 30 yards shot against germany, all the other goals came from FK: Australia (keeper blunder),Uruguay or penalty :U.S.A. Should we say that every strikers who played against them were useless then? The match report tell us otherwise.
I'm not speculating, I saw the match. Kewell's "handball" for me was a chest play, in fact there was another instance in the tournament where someone cleared the ball off the line EXACTLY like Kewell did, and what do you know? That player had the same positioning of Kewell, and the ball hit almost exactly the same spot. No penalty, because the ref clearly understood that such is the positioning needed to play a ball at an angle away from you and away from goal with your upper chest. And hey, you're conveniently forgetting the 2-footed tackle that should have seen Lee Addy sent off instead of cautioned in the Australia match. I've also made no mention of the Germany-Serbia red. I was talking about the out of position, stupid high arm throw in the Ghana match that led to their PK. If the defender Lukovic were not sent off for a non-foul (a minor coming together while going for a goal kick that happens 20 times a match if it happens once and most times isn't even whistled for a FK), Vidic would not have been in the spot of the box he was because the defense would have been shifted over entirely, letting him make a comfortable play. A match report from the 3rd place game tells you nothing about the quality comparison of Uruguay and Ghana. Germany made a host of changes in that match and the 3rd place game is always played with a nonchalant attitude compared to the matches for meaningful advancement in the competition. Additionally, Australia didn't even play strikers at the beginning of the tournament (using essentially a 4-6-0), the US strikers were pretty poor -- Altidore provided more of a Heskey-style physical role a large amount of his minutes and it showed in his 0 goal count for the tournament. One of Uruguay's strikers hit a blinder of a free kick, so he wasn't controlled. Suarez also had a glorious chance at the back post that could have been finished. Both looked dangerous in the game despite not scoring in open play, and Forlan still scored despite that. Finally, if you'd notice, I haven't ranked the US all that high for a number of reasons -- poor defense and poor striking amongst them. I've placed them 13th, so I think I'm more than a realist about their performance in this tournament.
It was a stupid play by Vidic and a clear penalty. Goodness knows what you are complaining over. Being slightly out of position is no excuse for making a play that dumb.
I' m sorry but saying that Kewell handball was a chest play is ridiculous! This was a clear handball. Even those fans who watched the game through Green & Gold tinted spectacles didn't dispute the penalty, many of them seemed to challenge the send-off but definitely not the penalty. Kewell raised his arm, and without it, the ball was entering the net. Not awarding a penalty on this foul would have been a (big) refeereing mistake. By the way, I don't understand why you keep mentioning Vidic (who made a silly handball against Germany which led to a missed penalty ), it was Kuzmanovic who made the handball against Ghana, Vidic positioning has nothing to do with that. . I, indeed, made a mistake in the GHA-URU linking. But a match report from a QF match between those two teams does. Your assertion with Uruguay being vastly superior on that match are nowhere to be seen on that report!
There were plenty of green and gold eyes who thought it wasn't a handball as it didn't meet the deliberate definition, just as there were a similar number who thought it was. Of course, the vast majority of those of us watching through Green and Gold eyes also knew that a handball wouldn't have been called in similar circumstances if it was a Brazil or Germany in that position. Most accepted (at least those with a knowledge of the laws) that once a handball call was made the red card followed automatically.
In fact wasn't when Lahm did almost exactly the same thing, funnily enough against Ghana, in their next match but no call was made. Most Green and Gold supporters would agree that it should have been a penalty in both cases - but a red card is unduly harsh - although by the letter of the law correct. If the Lahm call had've happened it would have been the inexperienced Germany down to 10 men, with their captain sent off, and a Ghana penalty to come - could well have meant that Ghana and Australia finished top 2 and Germany would have been out in the group stages with Serbia.
I have to laugh when i see most people giving England a position of 12-16th. before the tournement I said they would be rubbish and they were way worse than that. Having played appalingly they are above South Korea, Ghana, Nigeria etc. goodness knows what position they would have got if they had beaten someone even half decent. I really must get some of these rose tinted spectacles that the rest of the world have for England. They were awful and debateable whether they were better than in 2006. When Capello makes endless mistakes and Rooney does not show any interest at all then there are problems. On results and performances I would not put them much above France.
I brought this up in my own forum (Korea) but the real problem with England hasnt anything to do with Capello...its the factions that the EPL has caused within the NT. Nothing new that Im bringing up and its been discussed thoroughly. That team will never be a "Team" because nobody likes eachother. When Pool players, Chelsea player and United players are having their lunch separately you know you have problems.
If what you saying is correct then of course it does not help but I am sure Real madrid and Barcelona players were not originally on each others christmas card lists so that is down to a manager, part of his £6m worth to sort out. Apart from that he was very much to blame. 1.) To go into a tournement not knowing which your 1st, 2dnd 3rd choice keeper is ridiculous. Everyone i spoke to before the tournement felt Hart should be given the chance and I still think that is correct. 2.) His strength is keeping a tight discipline which is ideal for this bunch in small doses over a season but for a 4-5 week get together is too much. 3.) I don't think tactically he is great and rarely seems to have a plan B. His bringing on of Emile Heskey against Germany was an even worse decision than Taylor bringing Lienker off against Sweden in 1992. 4.) Why was Crouch allowed to play so little? He has always been effective and a regular goalscorer. The Midfield were shite in the first two games and it took 70 minutes againt Slovenia to finally bring Joe Cole on. 5.) Capello's excuse for never playing Owen was that he was so often not fit which I can understand but then he takes a never fit Ledley King to the World Cup. Ironically the only time Heskey has been any value to the England team has been with Owen and yet he always wants Heskey without Owen. Overall Capello was as bad as the players if not Glen Johnson and Gareth Barry who were appalling.