World Cup 2022 Group B sub-forum

Yeah, I can confirm this. I also visit r/soccer and other soccer subreddits periodically, but it serves a very different purpose to BigSoccer. I come to BigSoccer for detailed, thoughtful analysis and intellectual discourse on the game, I go to Reddit to see the memes after Arsenal loses to Burnley.

 

Does anyone has additional

Iran vs England

World cup ticket for sale?

 

The problem is the players, not Southgate.

Too many of them believe that they're superstars simply because they were bought for ridiculous fees by big-name EPL clubs, when in reality they're pretty average.

And too many of them think they're good because of how England did at recent tournaments, while ignoring the role luck played (winning the PK shootout in the R16 at WC18 and getting to play six out of seven games at Euro2021 at Wembley).

 

Why can't it be both?

I'm under no illusions about England's chances and the areas where they are weaker. I think we'll get out of the group but can easily see us going out in the quarters.

I don't think the current team are pretty average though. I don't think they are world class either. They are a solid unit who can trouble most teams on their day but can also flop badly, so not unlike many other national sides.

Southgate will go back to his preferred defensive set-up which can stifle the team going forwards. The interesting thing about this WC is, injuries aside, he will be looking at a group of players, probably at peak fitness, and with a run of games to assess form where they aren't all running out of gas. It may make those last couple of places that are up for grabs more interesting.

Luck plays a part in every tournament. Whoever wins in Qatar will probably do so with their share of luck.

 

I warned/predicted about the exacerbation of this exodus during WC2018 when mods were being too conservative in terms of not allowing banter and giving too many yellow cards and bans. At that time people had already started slowly migrating to other places like reddit, so bigsoccer should have allowed banter that would have in turn offered a competitive advantage over reddit due to making it more fun to post and exchange banter within this community. Though to a smaller extent another reason is that most members here grew up and relatively have less of an appetite for banter posts in the first place. I personally dislike how in the past 5 years or so internet forums have been dying and being replaced by reddit, because on internet forums like this one there is a sense of community and one knows many of the members who post and it allows for both better banter and better analysis, but on reddit there are 10s of thousands of posters and messages are all over the place and threads last 1 day if at all, though I barely have time to post on sites these years anyways.

 

Oh Cmon, suggesting the English national team only has 'pretty average' players is ridiculous! There is a reason why top clubs are paying high prices for English players, or are we to believe that world class professional football clubs with over 100 years experience don't know what they're doing?! France probably has the 'best' squad of players in the world right now. If England fail in the World Cup (and lets be honest here every team except one usually does!) then the reason WON'T be because of a lack of world class players!

 

Actually, yes....there's a lot of evidence that many "world class professional football clubs" have no clue what they're doing. Look at post-Fergie Man United. Look at post-Wegner Arsenal. Look at the mess that is Barcelona. Look at the mess that is PSG. Look at your club, Chelsea, who decided the best use of it's funds was to buy Raheem Sterling, another attacker, despite already having spent 200 million pounds on attacking players over the past few years and have huge holes on defense. Look at my club, Newcastle, which was horribly run for many years under Mike Ashley. In my book, the only three "big" clubs that are being run reasonably competently right now are Liverpool, Man City, and Bayern Munich.

The EPL has the largest television rights and therefore the most money to throw around, but it's quite telling that while the big clubs from other countries are always trying to buy good young players from places like Spain, France, Germany, & Holland, nobody is trying to buy young English players (or any English players, for that matter).

Having a high price tag in the transfer market does not necessarily mean that you're a great player. It just means that you get a lot of hype, which in most cases the player fails to live up to. I've lost count of the number of young England players in recent years who were supposed to be the next Messi, and who instead have turned out to be pretty ordinary.

 

You think Arsenal don't know what they're doing!! Really! What do you expect them to do? Tell City we'll have Haaland and Foden thanks and job is done!?
You don't think foreign clubs would buy Kane, Foden, Bellingham etc if they could! Don't be ridiculous! Madrid are trying to lure Bellingham and James from the EPL as we speak, they'd have them in a shot if they could, its just they can't get their dirty paws on em! You have no idea.

 

It's pretty clear to anyone watching that Arsenal, Man United, and Chelsea have no coherent strategy right now other than to throw money at their perceived problems by overpaying for players they don't actually need.

Your team, Chelsea, has thrown ridiculous amounts of money at Haavertz, Werner, Pulisic, Lukaku, and now Sterling over the past three years, despite having no idea how to use them together to form a functional attack. Meanwhile you've lost 3/4 of your back line from last season and signed only one defender....

But generally speaking, the bigger issue is that EPL teams overpay for players, and those players look at their wages/transfer fees and end up with inflated egos. You've got a lot of young players getting paid way too much way too soon, based solely on "promise", not actual performance.

 

Is this some kind of a joke? Manchester City don't 'throw money at players' then? And I suppose Manchester United didn't 'throw money at players', PSG anyone? Oh and Madrid and Barcelona have been 'throwing money at players' for the last 70 years or so!

 

I would have responded earlier, I just saw this!

....name-searching myself, because I'm an egomaniac

Ali Daei won this argument for you in ways I never could.

England is really, really good this year. I think they're going to look past you, just like we did in 1998. They're (A LOT) more talented than we were in 1998, but I wouldn't be surprised if you stole a point.

I love Wales. I don't rate them.

I think game three is for second place in the group, and I've learned my damned lesson on predicting US-Iran games. May the best team win, and I'll cheer on the winner in future rounds.

 

Likewise! Hope you're doing well!

....actually now watch Wales beat the US 4-0, because I've learned nothing

 

Its a bit natural to overrate the England NT when the EPL is so strong. The last time the EPL was the best league in the world was around 2004-8 and that was also when the England NT was highly overrated.

I say its natural because obviously there are going to be a lot of English players in the English league. And because its the best league, those players are going to get a lot of attention as their teams tend to go far in European competitions. But at the end of the day, its largely the foreign players leading these big clubs with the exception of Kane at Spurs.

Also, I think having home advantage in the Euros didn't help with keeping expectations in check for 2022.

 

The English youth team has just won the European Champioship, its senior team in the last two tournaments have been World cup Semi-finalists and European Championship finalists! There aren't many national teams with better record over the last 5 years or so? It makes me laugh when people 'claim' that England are 'overrated' while refusing to acknowledge the fact that they've been 'rather good' over the last 5-10 years! You say only Kane, what about James? You know the fella Real Madrid are desperate to get their hands on? What about Bellingham? You know the fella Real Madrid are desperate to get their hands on? And I suppose that Foden, Sterling or Grealish had nothing to do with Manchester City's success? Talk about hypocritical!

 

i resold my extra USA v Iran ticket in the Fifa resale portal, it was gone within 2 hours... I just hope if they sit the person buying it next to me, they are not going to be an Iran fan??? heck even if they were it would be a fine lesson in leave the politics at home and enjoy the sporting event... but it is last game of the group with advancing to next round surely up in the air for both teams...

 

The big game on this group is wales v USA. If either team gets a win then I’m sure they will join England in getting out of the group. I’d make wales slight favourites. You really cannot underestimate what Bale does in a Wales shirt. Not only to improve his own team but to win matches.

 

https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/s...ntract-lead-iran-world-cup-report-2022-09-06/

Wow.
Though CQ knows a lot about Team Melli, I think this is not a smart move given the amount of time left prior to Iran's first game at the World Cup.
Things have changed a lot since 2018.

 

Called it:

https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/afc-teams-at-the-world-cup.2121382/page-2#post-40625010

I am happy this happened. He can't be worse than Dragan. Many of our players already know him and are used to his tactics, so while it is a disadvantage that he will barely have any time and while our relatively attacking style under Dragan was easier on the eyes, I still fancy our chances in this group more with CQ as opposed to Dragan.

I can now make my predictions:

Iran 0-1 England
Iran 0-0 Wales
Iran 1-1 USA

With CQ, unless something strange happens, the England game is virtually guaranteed to be a 0-1 loss, so it will all come down to Wales. If Bale scores a free kick or produces magic or something unusual happens, Wales might win. I really hope we go into the USA game with 1 point as opposed to 0 points, as that will likely make for a juicy encounter with the US as the final game.

Btw, does anyone know if this is a record, or a tie for a record, of leading the team same into in a world cup for 3 world cups?

 

Out of the top of my head we had Löw for Germany and Tabarez for Uruguay coaching in all editions from 2010 to 2018.

 

Would you be happy with an exit with just two points? I think Iran will get something between 1-4 points.
I can rule out that they lose all three but I still have a hard time seeing them advancing. I think Iran's best shot at a victory is the Wales game.

 

Helmut Schoen did 4 in a row for Germany in 1966, 1970, 1974, 1978

 

Yeah, I believe he was Germany's all-time longest serving manager.