: Thu Apr 02, 2009 11:09 am  

Stirlingshire Saint wrote:

Thats right folks.....that side that struggles to sneak past Ukraine with the combined brilliance of Glen Johnson, David James and Peter Crouch out there are going to win the World Cup.

Really.

And the other possibilities are???

France 1-0 Lithuania
Italy 1-1 Rep of Ireland
Bolivia 6-1 Argentina

From last weekend
Ecuador 1-1 Brazil

: Thu Apr 02, 2009 11:26 am  

airliebird9 wrote:

And the other possibilities are???

France 1-0 Lithuania
Italy 1-1 Rep of Ireland
Bolivia 6-1 Argentina

From last weekend
Ecuador 1-1 Brazil

No, no, no. You must have it wrong, only England struggle the rest of them are top footballing nations

: Thu Apr 02, 2009 11:27 am  

airliebird9 wrote:

And the other possibilities are???

France 1-0 Lithuania
Italy 1-1 Rep of Ireland
Bolivia 6-1 Argentina

From last weekend
Ecuador 1-1 Brazil

Did you watch all those games? The scores may be totally misleading.

If we presume they were crap, that's no excuse for England to be crap.

: Thu Apr 02, 2009 11:29 am  

PAUL M wrote:

No, no, no. You must have it wrong, only England struggle the rest of them are top footballing nations

No, no, no.

The problem is that some of those sides strolling through qualification will undoubtedly show up in the World Cup and reach semi finals and more.

England OTOH will do the usual and gracefully bow out in the second round or if we very, very lucky and our decent players actually show up for a change, we may make the quarters.

: Thu Apr 02, 2009 11:43 am  

Billy Banter wrote:

Did you watch all those games? The scores may be totally misleading.

If we presume they were crap, that's no excuse for England to be crap.

Misleading or not, crap or not, it's results that matter and England got one!!

3 more points in the bag, played 5 won 5. No room to grumble


Apart from the African nations (who have only played one qualifier to date) only Spain have a better record than we do so far. We also have 2 other teams apart from ourselves in the top 15 of the FIFA world rankings table in our group.

Being a Liverpool fan and a Hull fan I know all about unattractive, boring styles of play. In the end it doesn't matter as long as the result is right.

: Thu Apr 02, 2009 11:49 am  

Shows you what can be done when there's a decent coach at the helm.

: Thu Apr 02, 2009 11:54 am  

Stirlingshire Saint wrote:

No, no, no.

The problem is that some of those sides strolling through qualification will undoubtedly show up in the World Cup and reach semi finals and more.

England OTOH will do the usual and gracefully bow out in the second round or if we very, very lucky and our decent players actually show up for a change, we may make the quarters.

I do not usually give England any credit, usually because they do not deserve any. But in fairness, we never get the luck of the draw when it comes to knock out stages of big competitions.

We do not generally get knocked out by teams we are expected to beat. It is usually the Germanys and Argentinas of this world. More recently it has been Brazil and Portugal.

Just remember who the Germans played enroute to the World Cup final of 2002...

Group - Rep of Ireland, Cameroon & Saudi Arabia
Last 16 - Paraguay (who admittedly are a decent team now)
Q/F - USA
S/F - South Korea

We are long overdue luck like that

: Thu Apr 02, 2009 11:55 am  

The Penguin wrote:

Shows you what can be done when there's a decent coach at the helm.

Decent coach, but still the same performances. TBH I don't think he's got a lot to work with. Can we insist that Gerrard wears a red shirt regardless?

: Thu Apr 02, 2009 11:58 am  

Is it just me that is totally blind to what various club and national managers have seen in Ashley Cole?

He's got a great engine and is quick, but his actual skill levels are lamentable.

: Thu Apr 02, 2009 12:02 pm  

Andy Gilder wrote:

Is it just me that is totally blind to what various club and national managers have seen in Ashley Cole?

He's got a great engine and is quick, but his actual skill levels are lamentable.

Deserves every penny of his huge salary.

AND gets to sleep with Cheryl. So unfair.