This is why hockey is so much better. If you’re gonna chirp someone, you better be able to drop 'em and go, or else you won’t last too long before getting pounded by a nice clean hit.
I don’t see why penalty kicks are such a disappointment to anyone. After 2 overtimes the winner is going to get lucky anyways- what are the odds it will be a pretty goal.
I thought the headbutt was pretty badass. It’s pretty lame if you can get thrown out of a game for that, I doubt the guy was even hurting.
[quote]Sonny S wrote:
You haters can all fuck off and go cry in your beer…Italia is the world champion
“You are what your record says youy are” - in this case, the record says:
Italia, WORLD CHAMPIONS[/quote]
I see you’re in NY. Are you another front-running American born Italian who roots for Italy because they are a better soccer team than the U.S. or are you legitimately Italian-born?
DB
[quote]holifila wrote:
dollarbill44 wrote:
apayne wrote:
I thought it was fucking great as I had spent the whole game calling all the players faggots for flopping, etc.
Why did you get upset? It would be like watching a hockey game and getting mad that the guys are bumping into each other. Soccer is about acting. The game with the ball and the goals is secondary and is only there to heighten the drama.
I think soccer would be better if they just used a time penalty for fouls instead of cards, like lacrosse or hockey. Flopping would lose a lot of its impact as would the current variability of what constitutes a bookable foul, what is red and what is yellow. You could still have ejections for violent fouls (i.e. “game misconduct”), but you would avoid changing the course of a game and tournament like the red card to Mastreoni in the U.S.-Italy game.
I also think penalty-shot fouls should be reviewable on instant replay. Too often the replays reveal a flop that the ref couldn’t see due to poor angle, etc.
While I’m at it, the offsides rule should be abandoned within 6 yards of the goal once play has entered the 18 yard line.
DB
I don’t disagree with most of the suggestions, but the offsides change would still enable too much ‘camping’ at the goal. It would make for higher scores, but that doesn’t translate to more exciting. A player just sitting around the box is just boring.[/quote]
I disagree. If the ball is inside the 18 yard line, a team is attacking and there will likely be defenders in the area as well, unless its a breakaway, in which case I think a guy should be able to run towards the goal without his teammate first playing him in. The referee would also have the ability to call interference (under my rules) if a player is camping out and getting in the keeper’s way.
If the ball is played back outside of the 18 yard area, the offsides rule would be back in play until it has re-entered the area, also helping to alleviate the camping out issue. I don’t think you’d have a bunch of undefended guys camping out around the goal under this scenario, but I think a guy should be allowed to run to the goal on the goal-line opposite from a guy with the ball 15 yards out, say. I think it would actually open up the playmaking a bit.
But, what do I know, I’m just a stupid American who needs to take frequent commercial breaks.
DB
[quote]nephorm wrote:
If it hadn’t been for that ridiculous off-sides nullification of Italy’s second goal, the game never would’ve gone into overtime.
The right team won.
Forza Italia![/quote]
The rules are clear with regards to off-sides. It’s not ridiculous. He was clearly off-side and the goal was not allowed.
Italy had a strong first half and France had a stronger second half. Shots were strongly in favour of France and they generated more scoring opportunities. They just couldn’t clinch it. Tough break for them.
[quote]BlakeAE wrote:
Headhunter wrote:
This is like being the world champs at watermelon seed spitting. Who gives a rat’s ass?
HH
The entire world outside the United States.
[/quote]
Just ignore him - apparently he never received enough attention as a child and it forever scarred him.
[quote]BlakeAE wrote:
When you run full speed trying to keep a ball dribbling along with you and you lose your footing, and you are exhausted, you will go down pretty easily.[/quote]
Now try it on ice on 1/8 inch blades where guys are allowed to try and knock you off your feet and if you go down easily, you find yourself out of a job.
Agree. I think this is a major factor in the lack of a following in the U.S. for soccer compared to other professional sports.
DB
I think France should accuse Italy of doping.
[quote]dollarbill44 wrote:
Agree. I think this is a major factor in the lack of a following in the U.S. for soccer compared to other professional sports.
DB
[/quote]
Maybe the US team is just too tough for soccer which is why they don’t do so well all the time.
I think he should have head butted him in the nose. That would have ROCKED!
[quote]hockechamp14 wrote:
dollarbill44 wrote:
Agree. I think this is a major factor in the lack of a following in the U.S. for soccer compared to other professional sports.
DB
Maybe the US team is just too tough for soccer which is why they don’t do so well all the time.[/quote]
Haha. If only…
One of the big problems the U.S. team has (imho) is that their most skilled players are too small.
Let’s face it, in the rest of the world, soccer rules. Therefore, everyone who wants to be a pro athlete goes for soccer (basketball is catching up). Of course I’m generalizing. In the U.S. kids want to be football, basketball, hockey, baseball players first, typically. Sure, more kids play soccer than any other sport, but once they get to HS and college, this is no longer the case. The better athletes have typically moved to other sports.
Could you imagine if the U.S. team was made up of guys built like NFL WRs, RBs and Safeties, all running 4.3 second 40s with 40" verticals all with the footskills of Freddy Adu or Claudio Reyna?
Don’t get me wrong, I think the U.S. team has some phenomenal athletes, you have to be to play at that level. But, anyone who says that the best U.S. athletes go to soccer is delusional.
DB
[quote]hockechamp14 wrote:
dollarbill44 wrote:
Agree. I think this is a major factor in the lack of a following in the U.S. for soccer compared to other professional sports.
DB
Maybe the US team is just too tough for soccer which is why they don’t do so well all the time.[/quote]
Haha. If only…
One of the big problems the U.S. team has (imho) is that their most skilled players are too small.
Let’s face it, in the rest of the world, soccer rules. Therefore, everyone who wants to be a pro athlete goes for soccer (basketball is catching up). Of course I’m generalizing. In the U.S. kids want to be football, basketball, hockey, baseball players first, typically. Sure, more kids play soccer than any other sport, but once they get to HS and college, this is no longer the case. The better athletes have typically moved to other sports.
Could you imagine if the U.S. team was made up of guys built like NFL WRs, RBs and Safeties, all running 4.3 second 40s with 40" verticals all with the footskills of Freddy Adu or Claudio Reyna?
Don’t get me wrong, I think the U.S. team has some phenomenal athletes, you have to be to play at that level. But, anyone who says that the best U.S. athletes go to soccer is delusional.
DB
We’re getting off topic. The post was about Zidane, and how his headbutt was fucking badass.
Try to “win” a red card:
[quote]Headhunter wrote:
Yeah, but look what they’re champions of. Pathetic. Don’t get me wrong, Italy is cool. Great vino and the food! Beautiful place too. This is like being the world champs at watermelon seed spitting. Who gives a rat’s ass?
HH[/quote]
I got to agree with you that football is pretty pathetic.
However, it is a little bit more than the World Series! I can’t believe we call our winner World Champions. It shows our lack of knowledge.
[quote]BIGRAGOO wrote:
I think he should have head butted him in the nose. That would have ROCKED![/quote]
Finally, a real man has spoken.
[quote]cap’nsalty wrote:
We’re getting off topic. The post was about Zidane, and how his headbutt was fucking badass.[/quote]
He’s a fuking hero. Imagine, instead of kids running around diving and being pussy, they now have a new leader. Nut people zidane style. He’s an artist and this was his defining moment. I think he is a legend!
And im not actually ‘that’ big of a football fan.
[quote]brads1111 wrote:
I know the rules but we all know contact is accepted. I’m just saying the Italians flop. As was said earlier they’re top athletes. They can run full speed on grass with a ball on their feet and stop on a dime but if you touch them they call? I don’t buy that. The Italians and the Portugues are terrible floppers.
[/quote]
Worst flopper has be Christiano Ronaldo. The guy swan dives whenever he reaches the penalty box.
funny video for you guys:
[quote]oboffill wrote:
funny video for you guys:
That shits histerical.
At first glance, this looks like the mad impulse of an idiot who didn?t know what is at stake. But there are many sides to this head (butt), most of which we will never know.
I have been thinking about this for a while, and here are my thoughts:
First, read this article from the Guardian written in 2004 if you want to know a BIT about the man who is the reason that we are reading and writing in this thread.
Then, try to see it from his point of view. Obviously, I can?t, but I can try.
This may be a case of been there, done that, and got the badge. Am I trivializing the world cup? Fuck, yeah! (Theme music from Team America: World Police in back ground). But the divers, the whiners, the ref insulters, and a host of others have, alas, beaten me to it.
Those of us (and this will include 99.9%) will have not repped our countries, or stood on a podium of ANY kind, can in no way imagine what goes through Zidane?s head during a world cup final.
He is an immigrant?s son, and was raised in a tough neighbourhood. He may have been insulted about his family, his roots, being a terrorist, who knows? He doesn?t speak out about politics or whatever, he plays football. Being an immigrant, or from immigrant roots in France right now is a touchy subject. Does it have anything to do with his head butt? Who knows?
Where the hell am I going with this?
Better get back on track.
Someone very close to me works for a sport federation that is a world leader in their sport. I briefly told her about ?the butt? and she told me that a coach she knows who was involved in a scandal at the Olympics told her that if people knew what kind of circus the Olympics can be, they would be amazed. Read a book or two by Andrew Jennings. I suspect that FIFA is the same. Zinedine would know this seedy shitty side of football. And most likely has no time for it.
He has achieved everything there is to achieve in his game, and had simply had enough of the shit. The whole show, (unfortunately it is a show) and all it entails may have been too much.
He snapped.
We all have at some point.
But what a point!
But in the end it is just a game.
We can?t relate because of the ?importance? of the game… But that is what made him so great. Seeing it as a game and just playing. So we should all relax and get a life, as this forum suggests.
Well, he headbutted Materazzi.
That’s a bad foul and bad play and anyone would have rolled around because that’s the way football is.
He was red carded for it.
End of story.
Football is not Hockey, is not American Football, is not Rugby, is not Baseball, is not basketball…
Football is the most popular sport in the world. America is not the world (and thank fuck for that). If you can’t accept it, then just watch some other sport with different rules that you find more interesting.