2014 World Cup Qualification Thread

June 3 & 7, 2011

Montserrat v Belize
Anguilla v Dominican Republic
US Virgin Islands v British Virgin Islands
Aruba v St. Luca
Bahamas v Turks & Caicos Islands

goooooooo US Virgin Islands

awesome

and not before time i add

In Case You Missed It, the 2014 World Cup Just Started

it's the road to rio baby

about ricardo teixeira, president of cbf (brazilian confederation of football)

It's live now. It's happening here: http://www.fifa.com/worldcup/preliminarydraw/draw.html

Seems somewhat complicated.

i sure hope this grouping occurs

England
France
Ireland
Scotland
Faroe Islands
Wales

Japan will undoubtedly be looking to fly the flag for freedom in the face of a group containing Uzbekistan, Syria and N Korea.

Damn. T&T will play Mexico and Costa Rica if i'm reading this right.

Yep. Don't fuck with Sepp, right.

yay fatnaldo

Oh christ. Germany

yeah that'll be painful

lol france

England finally get San Marino again - should be ok after the first minute

Decent group otherwise. Brian Kerr reunion should be a laugh

Croatia, Serbia, Belgium, Scotland, Macedonia, Wales
Italy, Denmark, Czech Rep, Bulgaria, Armenia, Malta
Germany, Sweden, Ireland, Austria, Faroes, Kazakhstan
Netherlands, Turkey, Hungary, Romania, Estonia, Andorra
Norway, Slovenia, Switzerland, Albania, Cyprus, Iceland
Portugal, Russia, Israel, N Ireland, Azerbaijan, Luxembourg
Greece, Slovakia, Bosnia, Lithuania, Latvia, Lichtenstein
England, Montenegro, Ukraine, Poland, Moldova, San Marino
Spain, France, Belarus, Georgia, Finland

Greece are going to stay top seeds forever, the draws they get

Greece, Slovakia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Lithuania, Latvia, Lichtenstein

before that gets to Liechtenstein it looks like a plausible Pot 4.

*Obligatory "we're fucked" post*

However, we're better than Wales, so that's a thing.

Actually looking at the rest of the groups ours is pretty shit

ah we could've been fuckeder, i think that means this is a cause for celebration.

would def rather England had to play France

well at least until that generation of superstar Belgians blossoms. xp

Croatia - not as strong as usual atm
Serbia - always the possibilty of crowd trouble & consequent 3-0 win
Belgium - haven't clicked yet
Macedonia - might catch them on an offday
Wales - genuinely are total rubbish

Should be a walk-through for Holland. Bit annoyed at this outcome tbh, would rather have drawn Belgium or France for some good cracking games.

Spain vs France and vice versa is the best one here though, will defo watch if I get the chance!

Lots of positive thinking in the office this morning like "thing is, these are all teams who can take points off each other" until The Cloud of Doom (me) chimed in with "these are all teams who can take points off Scotland."

I'm getting to the point where all draws for all competitions bore the arse off me - the constant reinforcement of seedings/rankings makes the whole thing a boring charade. We should get rid of the concept of seeding altogether - I'm all for a free open draw where anyone can play anyone.

"Fat France Lamps: I want to go to 2014, I hear we all get a free McDonald's for taking part."

Bloody autocorrect.

Seeding in this one was particularly weird. Greece top seeds? And don't get me started on Norway, I have NEVER seen a good Norway team, even the team that gubbed us 4-0 (probably their record international score) were crap. Thing that strikes me is just how many mediocre teams there are in Europe, seedings 3-4 are pretty much interchangeable (I mean, for example, are Hungary really better than Scotland?)

yes

Hungary are shite though surely? Oh... OK...

seedings 3-4 are pretty much interchangeable

Totally. Bump France up to top seeds, drop Norway and Greece back down, and pot 2 downwards is mostly just a tedious mass until you get to the minnows. Even when they do qualify, very few of these sides are ever going to improve a tournament. The 24-team Euros are going to be pretty dire.

I don't understand the Norway thing at all.

Greece and their relatively recent trophy and churningly consistent antifootball I can understand but why are Norway in there again? Even over teams like Russia or Switzerland or whoever.

even the team that gubbed us 4-0 (probably their record international score) were crap

Yeah, but we had a pair of Caldwells at the back (until one got sent off).

We are never going to stop our slide down the world rankings ever, are we?

No idea, they must be above France in the FIFA rankings somehow. Scotland matched them in 2010 qualifying though.

Ha, the 0-4 apart.

recent results v Scotland is probably the ninth tiebreaker

They have bored us to death on quite a few occasions I must admit

We should get rid of the concept of seeding altogether

Don't know about that but it needs to be loosened up a bit in some way. I hate these unwieldy 6 team groups, I'd rather have 4 team groups then a series of play offs.

I hate the seedings thing too, but I bet if they abandoned it we'd be the cannon fodder in a Spain/England/Germany/Holland/France Group of Death. Chances of getting a group featuring us, Wales, Norn Iron, Faroes, San Marino and Malta quite remote (and we'd still contrive not to qualify out of it, tbh).

how are montenegro a second seed? just cos they're like, great players and stuff? they've never qualified for anything and finished below ireland last time around...

were they given a shared ranking points with serbia or something?

Pretty sure it's because they're doing well in Euro 2012 qualifying, they are joint top of their group with England, one of the world's most feared footballing nations

It's based solely on the current FIFA rankings, which must be incredibly short term because Mexico have dropped from 9th to 20th in one go when all that's happened is they sent the youth team along to the copa america.

I've always figured the rankings are calculated using something similar to this method
http://media.avclub.com/images/articles/article/55943/SPimage11_jpg_300x1000_q85.jpg

it's just a form guide guys.

qualifying could get even duller once the EC goes 24 teams, tho this does let in more 'average' sides and/or plucky underdogs as well as decreasing the chances of the top seeds not making it.

it may be that due to increased G14/similar pressure, the top sides all just qualify automatically (playing just friendlies over the two years) and only the shitter sides battle it out for 12 places.

'Plucky underdogs' though - Greece have put me off those forever.

24 team Euros can only be rotten. Half of all countries qualifying means the only drama is which half-dozen not-quite-competent-not-quite-minnows miss out; then at the finals proper it'll be the ghastly 16-teams-through-from-24 first round.

yeah every g14 team will turn into brazil and never win anything again basically

Cut it back to 8 teams, straight knock-out over a single weekend in one city - that'd be a tournament worth watching imo.

Also loads more mediocre teams for England to churn out a turgid 0-0 draw with.

once the EC goes 24 teams

Insanity

qualifying could get even duller once the EC goes 24 teams

24 team Euros can only be rotten

f u all, i want to see ireland in a summer tournament and since the game is loaded in favour of the big teams then it'll be a lot easier when EC has 24 teams. plus we overachieve at major tournaments.

sadly tho they'll probably start a separate qualification group for the 24-team euros with japan, qatar, n/south korea, where all four teams qualify automatically, whereas ireland etc will have to win their group without conceding a goal and using the same 11 players throughout to qualify above a top seeded team.

a 24 team EC is so bizarre, I can still hardly believe it. (i mean, ok Ireland in the finals, but no more lolz for England missing it hmm, TS)

also

Greece, Slovakia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Lithuania, Latvia, Liechtenstein

i see opportunities for my favourite minnows to qualify... well at least promote to the next level 'drawing pot'

(on the other hand, star player Mario Frick might have retired by then, surely)

:( http://www.hexagonalblog.com/2011/08/bahamas-withdraws-wc-2014-qualifying.html

Thailand ✓
Saudi Arabia ✓

socceroos are half way to rio dude rio!!

Such a joke the differences in qualifying difficulty. Fuck Fifa.

From reading the papers i'm under the impression that most of Ireland lives in Australia or Canada at this point so surely we should be allowed to qualify from one of their groups?

tbf this is the first major round of Asian qualifying, we have to play at least one or two decent teams (Hello Japan, South Korea) in the second round

yeah but even then it's just a jolly kickabout knowing that all three of you will qualify anyway, no?

wld like to see one of the second tier euro countries make a qualifying swing through central america

just for lolz natch

Most European teams are either mediocre else downright shit

no idea how wales managed to cock up crusing through the group

oh hang on that's euro 2012.

Group H
Teamv · d · e
Pld	Pts
 England	0	0
 Montenegro	0	0
 Ukraine	0	0
 Poland	0	0
 Moldova	0	0
 San Marino	0	0

fancy saudi arabia to smash it

here is my idea for how to improve (but admittedly also confuse the fuck out of everybody - GOOD) euro qualifying.

turn it into a knockout cup (2 leg ties until the 'final') but if you lose in the 1st round you play another losing team in the next round (randomly drawn a month or so in advance - not enough prep time? suck it up like the clubs do) and so on until you've played 10 or maybe 12 games (with some opportunity for a couple of teams to jump back into the 'winners' knockout to even up the numbers if need be).

at the same time everyone gets 3 points for a win and 1 for a draw so there is a leaderboard comprised of all teams. after 10-12 games the top 13 (wc) or 22/23 (ec) teams with the most points qualify for the tournament and the team that wins the knockout final gets a trophy and to lord it for at least 6 months until the resulting tournament.

the point of the knockout cup is to enable more games between the top ranked sides with more at stake (fuck a friendly every 2 years vs spain etc.) but the first round could be seeded as the minnows need to face the top ranked teams still to help them develop. some drawbacks may be teams having to play each other twice in a v short space of time (but again happens at club level so why not) and the prospect of a couple of teams qualifying without having to face a higher-ranked side but that often happens to the top seeds anyway which is dumber than anything outlined above imo.

just open up the groups imo.

FIFA has kicked Myanmar out of qualifying for the 2018 World Cup as punishment for crowd violence at a 2014 qualifier in July.

Fans threw stones and water bottles onto the field during Myanamar's game against Oman on July 28, forcing the referee to abandon the match.

Oman was leading 2-0 at the time and was awarded the victory by that score. Oman, which also won the first leg 2-0, advanced to the next round of Asian qualifying on 4-0 aggregate.

argentina vs chile, fuck yeah.

in an hour. sanchez is injured, as is medel, chile haven't won in a good while and were poked out of the copa america by the fucking vino tinto of venezuela of all people so i'm not expecting anything. two attacking sides who will want the ball though. and always nice for the neutral to see pipita, messi and di maria doing their thing.

oh, got the time wrong, quarter past. argentina 1-0 up already. shiiiiiiiit.

higuain.

2-0, messi.

Here's a quick update from Asia:

Australia 3 Oman 0

Japan 8 Tajikistan 0

there are no easy games at international level mind

A slip up by the Tajik boys, they'll bounce back.

really enjoying Mexico-Brazil, from yesterday ... only a friendly but an intense one, and all Brazil are going to get the next 3 years.

excellent: Marcelo, Lucas Leiva, Gio dos Santos. Pablo Barrera man of match.

R10 played 80'+ after 90' 3-4 days ago, his fitness was outstanding. Scored one beautiful FK, could have had a hat-trick of them. Otherwise redundant because of lack of off-the-ball movement from FWs. I think nakh will win his bet.

i just can't face into wc quals, i'm so demoralised by internationals this past two years

There's some good stuff being played when Ireland's not involved!

Marcelo has now gone and scored an excellent winner, hugs Menezes, feud over I hope b/c Andre Santos is so inferior.

i'm certain that andre santos is, in fact, a player of ze highest quality

Venezuela beating Argentina with a goal from bilbao's amorebieta (1 club goal in his career) was pretty funny.

http://espn.go.com/sports/soccer/news/_/id/7130785/fox-sports-wins-bid-espn-nbc-televise-world-cup-2018-22

UGH

can't wait for them to port the NFL footballbots to soccer players

Fox has been a leader in international soccer coverage in the States since the late 90's.

yes yes bringing us such luminaries as christopher sullivan and max bretos

they did give wynalda a job so enh

The loss of ESPN3 instant streaming is going to suck.

trap out

i honestly can't be arsed

LOL

i was expecting a boring as fuck scoreless draw

this cunt mcgeady, never should he play, never

Interesting that 23 / 25 of the Kazakh squad are home-based these days.

Trap out, obvs.

"caveman football" haha

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinrich_Schmidtgal

heartwarming story by the looks of it

a lot of the Kazakh team dont have that Asiatic look that most Kazakhs have

Only about 60% of people there are ethnic Kazakh iirc.

Westwood; who the fuck is this dude
O'Shea, nutmegged eusebio back in 1972
O'Dea, some ex celtic hack
St Ledger, sean st ledger
Ward; comes from the mick mccarthy school of waste cunts with monosyllabic names who get called wardy or whatever
Cox, game like a whole fucking skip full of pheasants
Whelan, this guy is supposed to be hard apparently
McCarthy, professional footballer
McGeady; haters gonna hate
Keane, time was
Walters actually rate this dude as a kind of pocket heskey, got actual power which gives him the edge over 'doyler'

higher than the % cunts on our team that're ethnic footballers

lol?

ok definite lol

Doyler the difference maker

yeah i was actually about to post that if nakh thinks that doyle is one of ireland's problems and mcgeady is one of the positives then he is not watching enough ireland.

if ever a victory proved the case for sacking a cunt

mcgeady could be in a free kick training sessino for ninety minutes and wouldn't put in a ball as useful as doyle's cross for the penalty. he is useless, absolutely fucking wasteful

england line up looks more like a 4-5-1 to me then a 4-3-3. I guess OX will maybe venture frwdish but not so sure who else will. why do i care anyway? trying to decide btw belgian waffle and king louie vg 2nd reign tonight.

i watched a game in the euros so too much rly

mcgeady has never done much for ireland but he is a proper player

sick of all of these cunts like doyle who have no talent just heart, the legions of lower epl higher champo ppl who represent the aspirations of irish fitba right now

to play rudimentary football successfully u need power and speed and most of them dont even have that

never in doubt. trap goin' ham.

doyle has much more talent than you're given him credit for, mcgeady much less. that's all i got for you. mcgeady doesn't beat a man, that's a myth. he's not pacy, he leaves the ball behind him, his touch isn't consistent, his end product isn't existent. doyle's a finisher, a player who wins aerial ball, a player who brings in those around him, his overall game destroys a do-nothing cunt like mcgeady, who believes every bit of hype he ever heard about himself and ignores every valid criticism

doyle's a finisher who averages 7 goals a season despite being first choice for almost all that time and having no serious injuries

McGeady is a fucking master at putting the ball in the keepers hands from set pieces. He's remarkably consistent in that sense

in the epl that is, in the champo he is great xp

BRADY GOIN IN HARD ON YOUNG UPSTART

brady's got no argument

Sadlier's making his play for the big time in the RTE studio

brady's defence of trap- ' the players just need to tell trap how to play'

getting narky with sadlier, sadlier is, of course, otm- as usual tbh

SACK THE PANEL

brady- trap deserves credit for every point we ever earned under him

this shit like we're comparing him with nul points. such a transparent argument, so sick that the opposition to getting rid of trap is that ireland can achieve nothing without him.

The guy who's paying Trap's wages, is anybody taking this direct to that dude?

cunt won't pay his taxes but lumbers us with trap

brady would need to be set down sharpish, wish sadlier would go for it

mcgeady is not gd iniesta, he isn't even pablo hernandez but he is a kind of a football player

so is james mccarthy, so now keane and duff are done, two of ireland's only technical players are basically scottish in football education terms

doyle or whoever look good in a 'system' that asks for nothing more than heart and the ability to play in three rigid banks

so many of these irish players are fucking shit

my argument isn't that we need players with heart and no ability

my argument is that you're flat wrong in your assessment of the players in question

mcclean long doyle mccarthy

everyone knows this^ everyone.

i have less and less idea what constitutes nakchivan's rarefied idea of a "football player"

interviewer has more courage than billo, giles. more honest than brady.

xp yeah if doyle and long are 'game lads' then i'm all for it

we achieve the result

away game, first game, i am happy

interviewer asks the big question

he's taking it very well tbf, no tantrums- squarely answering

doyle is a shit player who plays in an irish team that suits him

would love to see mcgeady in the epl,

brady is a cunt

mcgeady in the epl would be a joke, found out

tell you what tho, at least it's being discussed. wish dunphy were there tonight to slap brady down

Giles less vocal but still a bit cuntish

basically i would like to see ireland developing proper footballers instead of these fucking chancers who turn up every year and reading or wolves or whatever

trap is the manager irish football as an entity wants and deserves

'heart' is like the minimum to ask of players, and the irish ones benefit from the comparison wrt the england full of distinterested superstars

mcgeady starts in a team that's better than at least 50% of the epl so enough of the 'found out'

and whilst he has done fuck all for ireland, he is playing totally against type in that team, and i wouldn't expect kenwyne jones to do much at swansea either

right in the service of empiricism i am watching

Aiden McGeady 2011-2012 All Skills/Goals/Assists

& will let u know when he does one of those things

you see what you've driven him to?

trap is the manager irish football as an entity wants and deserves

wtf

'heart' is like the minimum to ask of players, and the irish ones benefit from the comparison wrt the england full of distinterested superstars

idk man you're the one bringing it back to 'game lads' and 'heart' and idk what but everyone i talk to wants some fucking passing, some fucking organisation, some end product, and if we can't have tiki-taka we'll fuckingn settle for our better players played in a familiar and productive system. keane isn't any good, long would be more use. mcgeady isn't much good, mcclean would be more use. walters isn't much good, doyle would be more use. i mean i'm actually all for utilitarianism. this fuckin shite talk of 'mcgeady is a fuckin brilliant player youse know nothing' is really just consistently evading the point that he does nothing good for ireland under trap because his crossing is shit and there is absolutely nothing going on anywhere else to prevent opposition managers double marking him.

but let's be 100% clear on it- mcgeady is fucking shit.

pandemic otm

enjoy that youtube btw, if you want a highlights reel player you've found one

BOOM

lol deems i am trying to invoke mcgeady as an archetype of the ordinarily or adequately skilled attacking player that ireland needs to produce more of

mcclean is a better player, right

i rate walters above doyle cuz he can actually physically overpower defenders rather than just hassle them as doyle does

if u want to play shit football u need players like him, i honestly would rather ireland played like stoke and just fucking kicked the shit out teams and physically battered them than this sort of lightweight nuisance team

Walters performed exactly that role for most of the first half. Didn't work out too well

i dream of the day ireland can produce a marlon harewood

Never a penalty.

first half hour of holland-turkey has been fantastic. a right old tear up.

dutch defence absolutely hopeless.

one nil up thx to rvp replicating his winner vs Southampton.

both teams pressing v high up the pitch. insane amount of turnovers and chances. could end up anything.

feel like i should apologise to someone for lazily watching this england game

pretty second for lampard tho

oh ok fuck this keeper lets a defoe punt dribble in

holland turkey it is

1-0 Belgium, their run to the final starts here

RIP Stevie G

if you ask me it's a damn shame you pronounce strootman like stoat and not strudel

what happened to gerrard?

kefeen st'roatman

just been a bit shit and went off at half time. He'll be back xpost

Altintop actually does mean Goldentop?! Well, goldenball anyway.

i blatantly knew that

that holland break was so lol

robben with the easiest cutback for a goal but obviously being a cunt tries to lift it over the keeper who gets fingers onto it, bouncing it off the head of an onrushing and confused rvp to safety

sneijder turns around and walks off shaking his head

sneijder turns around and walks off shaking his head repeat to infinity

cor did you see that sneijder crossfield ball just then

i know!!

is bast dost not even the bench

seriously they just need a big cunt to bundle one in most of the time

is luuk de jong a big?

England not even trying to try here. Oh, a goal. Lol at Walcott and cleverly desperately trying to shift responsibility for the shot onto someone else. Pussies

Was actually quite a nice goal that, but still. Pussies

going by the name (and not any evidence whatsoever) i'm guessing luuk de jong is a mere tall rather than a big

gotta have the bundling gene in yr dna

here's big ron vlaar though

i never heard about narsingh joining psv btw

£3.5m?????????????????????????????????????????????

Think vlaar might be my fav villa player this season. I dunno how much that says about the squad

sweet finish

Sweet. Excellent game this has been.

narsingh goes to the bench, checks ilx, pops in a beaut

project a.l.f. off to a winning start

luuk de jong not a big more of a goalscorer iirc

what abt that dude van wolfswinkel

both de jong and wolfswinkel look tall but pretty skinny

sporting lisbon?

xp

thats the one

yes i was thinking same thing mizzell

van wolfy is a poacher

The co-commentator in the Wales game is so bitter about the refereeing. I'd applaud the partisanship, but feel like it should manifest itself in passion rather than depression.

haha turned over for the last 5 mins and was taken aback by the co-commentator. did the ref murder his entire extended family or smthg?

ya it was a decent game but it's not just nostalgia telling me any one of kluivert, maakay, van hooijdonk, hasselbaink would have scored four after an hour

did kluivert acvtually manage 4 once in a game vs yugoslavia at a euros?

Wales-Belge ref was fairly garbage and deserved a shoeing really even a one-eyed one

Vertonghen's goal was peachy

still have nightmares about Kluivert in that play-off game. Should have gone to Utd tbf

seriously they just need a big cunt to bundle one in most of the time

― r|t|c,

THIS IS ALL I'M SAYING

iirc in the game kluivert scored four in, for one of the goals he took about the best first touch i've ever seen

McClean, an unused substitute, wrote: "Delighted as a fan we got the win. Personal level #fuming #fuckinjoke #embarrassing." The Sunderland winger later deleted the tweet.

Trapattoni brought Doyle and Shane Long off the bench but did not call upon McClean, who has been outstanding for Sunderland this term - a move that has clearly enraged the 23-year-old.

Tweeting from his official account @JMcC-23, the winger said: "Delighted as a fan we got the the win.. Personal level #fuming #f****njoke #embarrassing." The tweet was later deleted.

Trapattoni is aware of McClean's rant and could fine the former Derry City man for his actions, or even kick the player out of the Republic's squad for their friendly against Oman at Craven Cottage on Tuesday - a game in which he probably would have started.

ha xp

a game in which he probably would have started.

i'm calling for this shit to be struck from the record, like any cunt can predict what the old fart troll will do next

lol who the fuck decided to play ali al habsi + 10 dudes nobody has heard of

Oh Man

mcclean is ireland's best or second best player atm so yeah

he's a game lad yeah, i agree

the idea is that gameness is a multiplier and you can't multiply 0, #0

game lad X football player = ?

gameness x talent = a contract for sparktak moscow

...and at least five minutes of youtube highlights

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QT5GTf5_CzA

this is actually worth a watch, far from the sort of showoffy trickster he was espoused to be at celtic, he now seems to want to shift the defender and cross it relatively early (all the assists are at the end of the clip)

he plays very close to the touchline but does lack that lil bit of extra acceleration, and even though he has nice footwork (see 5:37) he isn't great at getting into the box

i remember watching zoran tosic on his few outings for manchester united and thought the same thing, very neat in possesion but was usually matched for pace by fullbacks and ended up cutting backward -- he is also now doing well for CSKA

i think given the number of epl/liga/etc players who we rep for even though they are crap for their countries, it's worth giving a little bit of consideration to an irish player doing reasonably well for one of russia's best teams

also shows a few embarassing fuckups like nutmegging defender and then falling over

you

you have to get halfway into his highlights reel for some nice footwork

?

i tell you now, trying and failing with sub-dinho moves for 89 mins 58 secs is all i remember of the lad, not the 5.37 magic that convinced cska to splash out

spartak, deems

worth making a note of these things if ever you win an all expenses paid holiday to a moscow housing estate

he's not even almost as good as eg steve guppy, a fucking winger, was guppy- he was quick, he could pull a trick, he could cross

mcgeady hasn't consistently done any of these things

yr continued repping is v confusing and vv unmerited

xp first time mcgeady's sent anyone the wrong way since he left scotland

read a Tosic interview this week where he implied that he kind of forced his way out of Utd. Was a tad rueful. I admire your commitment to your aesthetic principles dude but you haven't had to suffer McGeady to the extent we have

idk if this is 'aesthetic principles', he is basically a slightly neater version of stewart downing pre 0 goals 0 assists phase

slighter, not neater, without the crossing and goals of pre lfc downing

must check up on Adem Ljajic one of these days...

bet Downing has some great youtubes tbf

ljajic is a real talent but he's a prick and a waster by the looks of it, thought it was shoddy treatment by united when they didn't sign him after that phot-op, but i guess ferguson sussed him

i always thought that was a Bebe style money laundering exercise

manchester's next top model

if Bebe went on loan to a mid-level Premier League team he would score AT LEAST two goals (one deflected)

i guess deems we can disagree about the merits of our raggedy bredrin in moscow but an irish player playing in a champions league team in an unfamiliar league deserves recognition

i worry about the sort of players ireland is developing right now (their best young players are from ulster or scotland), and the sense that reading and wolves is about the level irish players can expect

the technical level of some of the squad players is atrocious, and though you could swap allen for hoolahan or whatever, there are problems beyond trap, the great senile flak carrier for all irish football's iniquities

allen mcshane

we do hate the FAI too you know

how much do fai control youth development

lookit, the prods just get the technique (or maybe the work ethic to develop it)

this is why they develop the trades, and the golfers, and now the tricky wingers. they have been convinced since planter times of the benefits of the excursion into enemy territory, also as landowners they maybe had the time and resources to chase down avenues unavailable to the downtrodden peasant masses, hence an inbred proclivity towards the showy lollipop

catholics know their lot is to remain wary against invasion (hence two banks of four), to keep a general level of low-level skill married with strength of numbers and the odd guerilla ambush

it's the history of the country, idk what more i can say

that is more of a problem than whichever nudnik is appointed by that prick delaney to run the senior side xp

tim pat coogan's life of charlton

conor cruise o'brien's 'memories of italia 90'

an file rafteirí's 'trap amach'

idk deems this diaspora thing is great, you don't have to go to church, if yr lucky nobody in yr family goes to church, you begin to accept that protestants in their own way are people too, and apostasy is improving them too

don't let some fat german ecb cunts run u down

the fat german cunt i'm worried about most is schweini tbph

i'd like to see a protestant vs catholic world xi game btw, if ratzinger had a trick up his sleeve like lil aiden then he would be signing the contract right now

all the best players are catholics (poverty, dictatorships etc)

game called off in the seventeenth minute at 0-4 when gretar steinsson bloodaxes his way through a field of technopygmies to restore lutheran pride

protestants are ppl too, i know this- they are vv different, they seem v worried about cutlery and shit, idk, but i do think that the question is there to be asked, as you say- why as a footballing nation do we outsource (dodgy word, suggests an 'outside' in the 32 counties) the skill functions these days. when did we stop producing the whelans, the brady's, the giles, we had a keane and a duff only not so long ago. we've certainly not replaced the flair in the team since, and those boys peaked ten years ago.

it's definitely true that we have a poorer standard of technical player in the national team, but idk most of the flair available to us as a pool just isn't getting the same love that nogood cunts like whelan and andrews are getting regardless of performance. i don;t think it could be claimed that trap is nurturing and type of environment for expansive football. ah shure lookit we've done all this. the players aren't there for us to throw away a mcgeady, but the players aren't that bad that we couldn't drop the cunt for sustained fecklessness.

cunts are playing rugby probably

not even flair really, it's basically any facet of football other than workrate, ireland's best players = mcgrath and keane and right now there's as much chance of finding an irish pablo aimar as a replacement for either of those dudes

fuck, that's gotta be a thing right?

and our technical dudes are hurling

and the really violent cunts are gaa men

solved

Clint!

take it to the politics thread

haha. Wrong Clint.

question: who is the British Isles' Pablo Aimar?

joe cole probably

maybe we should ask the man himself?

Konfounded's Kultural Korner

Jamaica and USA tied at 1. Jamaica looks pretty good.

Jamaica looking better as the game goes on. They deserve the lead.

mcgeady is unbelievebly sloppy, he has no consistency - and i don't mean week-on-week consistency. even in his best games for ireland, his good moments have been punctuated with these really, really silly and basic mistakes. i'll cut him slack, in that he was, in his younger days, a no-end-product player, and he as at least blossomed into an intermittently dangerous player, but for whatever reason, i don't think he seems to be able to eliminate these underhit/overhit short passes from his game. tho i'd agree with darragh - i certainly would never want to banish him entirely.

yeah, a laughable disgrace tonight anyway. im instinctively always delighted when ireland win (why, i even cheered when we got the winner against san marino under staunton!) but i do acknowledge that irish football would be better as a whole if we'd lost (as i think thats what it would have taken for the manager to be sacked) and we could have the proper overhaul we need.

on a positive note, i think westwood is a reasonably good goalkeeper!

yeah i'd agree with all that, tho obv it's expressed a little too reasonably for my liking

westwood made a couple of very solid saves, and one great one (tho iirc it was offside anyway)

Brian Kerr's role with de yoots really comes into its own in the context of the above discussion.

I would say sports like rugby are booming in comparison to football, tho I'm totally guessing.

You look at Leinster and their massive success tho, they are changing the way rugby is perceived, loads of north Dublin support now.

The lack of success in football is disastrous, a good euros could have reignited the love for it in Ireland. The way trapp plays puts people off it too.

A big reason Leinster are hoovering up fans is that they put teams to the sword playing an incredibly stylish brand of the sport.

There is no point to having Trap now, we're not qualifying from this group, it's beyond us, and he'll leave us in a state.

The lack of success in football is disastrous, a good euros could have reignited the love for it in Ireland. The way trapp plays puts people off it too.

i don't know about the first part of this, though? we have success, as much as we could ask for under any coach playing any brand of football- a collection of limited (but not *bad*) players selected from a fairly small pool. our world ranking is undoubtedly favourably skewed but is nonetheless probably an overperformance.

we lost a playoff against france (shades of complexity even in this small point- french are an underperforming but huge talent, we lost ~unfairly~, what have you) which would have been acceptable result under almost any manager. we qualified for the european championships and very few coaches would have garnished the tournament with a win given the group we landed.

i'm not even playing devil's advocate here, just acknowledging the alternative view's legitimate arguments.

but the latter part is key- his performance in terms of the results is good, the methods by which he achieves this are, imo, damaging the appetite for and the long-term future of irish football, and his handling of players is, under any light, laughable and, again imo, a sackable offence in itself given the aforementioned shallow talent pool.

and again and again it comes back to the question, which is very rarely put to trap's supporters and an answer forced- why is it always a given that this irish squad cannot play better football without compromising the results achieved? the entrenchment of this view isn't challenged nearly often enough. for big money and for the havoc he wreaks, i think you could find many better alternatives.

Brian Kerr's role with de yoots really comes into its own in the context of the above discussion.

yeah, very good point.

yeah i agree getting to the euros definitely constitutes getting results, i mean more a failure in terms of when we got there, a failure to capture the public's imagination. we've never been lovely to watch but we used to have a real go at teams, particularly at home.

and again and again it comes back to the question, which is very rarely put to trap's supporters and an answer forced- why is it always a given that this irish squad cannot play better football without compromising the results achieved? the entrenchment of this view isn't challenged nearly often enough. for big money and for the havoc he wreaks, i think you could find many better alternatives.

i'd love to see o'neill in the irish job. not pretty football but he is the perfect figure to gel that team together and you just know he'd have us frightening the life out of sides far better than us.

mccarthy back
redknapp
rafa

kerr back in development portfolio

hmmm. not sure i'm in love with any of these options but out of em it's definitely mmc.

hopefully chris hughton gets sacked unfairly again and we can get some of that young native modern manager action that wales enjoyed for what seemed a decent spell there

left out anyone currently in a role tbh but o'neill would be a good fit. his football isn't as bad as the critics paint (and nothing like as negative as trap's- WINGERS FFS). You'd have to say that villa fans might have issues, tho. But through wycombe, leicester, celtic and notwithstanding the fan grumblings i'd say he's brought a lot of what we're missing to teams he's managed with no small success

eh left out 'at villa' there (notwithstanding fan grumblings)

betcha most villa fans wouldn't really mind a return to the days of hovering around euro qualification places.

i may be surrounded by aberrations from the norm, tbh

scotland are looking quite good but in an inevitable-loss-after-89th-minute-goal kind of way.

posts very much in national character

that was scotland looking quite good?

It wasn't but these aren't good players, it's hard to imagine the team playing significantly better. The Irish don't know how lucky they are. Serbia were also poor - while they can at least do the basics of holding the ball &c, they should be worried that that was a fairly even game. I imagine Croatia & Belgium not slightly bothered, seeing that.

On the plus side I got to walk on the main road for a bit afterwards, which I always enjoy. And I've just been through Cathkin Park, which is completely fabulous.

wrong selection, too late to make telling subs, charlie adam is pish.

eh when i was watching they were making chances and not having much trouble defensively even though there were lots of misplaced passes and instances of charlie adam being charlie adam. that's scotland looking quite good for me.

http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/62767000/jpg/_62767475_levein.jpg

didn't see all of the second half tbh, first half miller seemed pretty isolated. didn't realise steven fletcher had fallen out with levein after that czech republic match. does maloney not figure much? like the look of him whenever i see wigan.

He always is isolated for Scotland. It must be such an unrewarding role to play. He's not a Shevchenko, who could take the ball on and threaten goal himself, and there's never anybody coming up in support - the role is basically trying to force defenders to give away throw-ins.

The all-round lack of movement is the killer though. Moves devolve into a hoof or being crowded out after about three passes, because nobody's making any space and nobody's good enough to use the ball without it.

i remember at the end of the failed euro 2008 qualifiers i had the idea that the scotland team in the coming years could potentially be pretty strong, but i can't remember the details of this idea. what was i thinking??

also were those reactions lenses levein had on the go or actual sunglasses?

reading 'lenses levein' as i clicked 'submit post' while listening to larry levan made me think i had typoed terribly.

2 l8 to make some terrible 'stand on the word the word of gordon smith' quip that about four people in the world would get.

could a better manager get more out of this lot than levein? i mean obv you'd think a better manager might, ya know, do a better job, but how good/bad is this current crop of players? what i'm trying to say is king kenny for scotland.

'reaction lenses', is that what those are called? Those are the worst shit ever

Teamed with dark suit, drab complexion and *really bright tie* is next-level grotesque though. Reservoir Dogs was treading a really fine line in retrospect.

I've heard 'kenny for scotland' today, yes. I dunno, like the Irish boys you'd like them to have a go I guess, but there's no real reason to think that'd be any better. In fact, I've a sneaky thought that 'having a go' is actually what they're doing.

CAN rather than WC qualification, I think, but look at this ridiculous goal by Papiss Cissé vs Ivory Coast:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEEnr6vHdLM

left lens was player data, stats etc., right lens was in-play markets

i offer no empirical evidence but i feel that there are a bunch of international teams whose players are basically lower level epl / championship standard and who make a much better job of everything. though even in those cases there's usually one talismanic superstar to be working things around. (why has scotland been so bad at producing ANY really world class players over the last... 30 years when seemingly everywhere else has one?)

Incroyable! Headers-from-outside-the-box are a special thing.

I think you can tell he's going to do something special watching him run as the pass is struck. What an amazing athlete.

Normal speed https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoROplTdMBo

wow

that is just beautiful

I think a better manager than Levein would dispense with Miller as a lone striker. This 'he's a target man/lone striker' needs to stop. This non-Levein person would involve Steven Fletcher and Kris Commons. Would stop the tactic of 'set piece - gie it to Charlie Adam'. That Serbian team were looking beatable with a panicky defence, taking so long to involve a guy who likes to run at people and put a strike force on was unforgiveable.

hi ailsa

i kinda have serbia down as an ok team in my head. prob ireland/scotland level. am i very incorrect here?

wee john spencer once flicked in a header from 20 yards as part of a hat trick for us against barnsley iirc

No, I'd have Serbia as about Scotland/Ireland level, i.e. eminently doable at home - didn't see anything to frighten us (or anyone else), really. I don't even think Scotland are really at the Scotland-level standard that they actually are, if that makes sense, though Levein is doing his level best to keep them there. I worry that he thinks Charlie Adam is the missing talismanic messiah that we don't have (would love that guy to be Shaun Maloney, but that's never going to happen), and that's where it's all going wrong.

Basically, I think I'm just saying what Merdeyeux just said up there.

darren fletcher/maloney/steven fletcher is a very good spine isn't it. just channel the ball through the middle and you're sorted.

I dunno, how good is S.Fletcher really? Maloney's been doing okay but I can't forget his McGeady years. Darren Fletcher, we may never see him again - at any rate, international duty will be the first thing to be ditched if he's under physical strain (and rightly so)

yeah suppose darren fletcher may consider retiring from internationals won't he.

i'd take steven fletcher over falcao. well, maybe not. i do like him though.

how good is jordan rhodes? hardly seen him play but his goalscoring record's ridiculous.

He's better than Kenny Miller.

Is David Goodwillie broken or just crap again?

Saying that, Craig Levein isn't picking Kris Commons, so current form evidently not a factor in his selection process, right enough, so, yeah, I dunno.

goodwillie quit football, moved to blackburn

Is he not on loan at Crystal Palace (like that's better...)

Who does Jordan Rhodes play for?

signed by Blackburn for 8m(!) this season

Do Blackburn just exist to ruin (Scottish) footballers?

maloney is a leon britton deal isnt it, put him in any other situation and he's good for nowt

What a finish by Defoe and Cleverley.

trap out! these are the guys kept out by mcgeady, keane and whelan?? fuck off

Oh Scotland have scored. Not watching but I imagine it would've been drowned out by 'Chelsea Dagger' - the Hampden experience is pretty miserable if Saturday is anything to go by, you get cajoled and shouted at constantly.

coleman out

The first goal of the Coleman era and that's his reward?!

nah, ireland concede with the rb nowhere in sight

mcgeady comes into an u-23 development side and drastically disimproves possession, passing % and shape. Out out out you sheepheaded cunt

how is brady is he playing

He's looked vg one tidy volleyed goal two setpiece assists

Good running at his man too. Good stuff from meyler coleman long and doyle all night.

i liked the look of meyler way back when

done well to come back from two cruciate ruptures

draw with Luxembourg. Top stuff, NI.

Missed the game, chuffed to hear Brady did well though

trap out obviously

Luxembourg are ranked 106th in the world by FIFA, NI are 129th so that probably counts as a plucky draw. xps

so much positivity and joy from the "golden summer of sport" cunts right now.

can't wait til Trap destroys this lad's career
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NlhBcVKPIIA&

chris coleman: kinda lol but novi sad

pulis is welsh btw

otm

the Hampden experience is pretty miserable if Saturday is anything to go by, you get cajoled and shouted at constantly.

Aye, I've ranted about this every time I've had the misfortune to go to that dump. The guy's a total fucking bawbag. Like, Scottish Cup Final day, everyone's stoked, everyone's actually watching the thing, and this clown's giving it "the second half's about to kick off, and Celtic are winning, but who do we think will win? Will it be Celtic? [waits for cheer which never materialises], will it be Motherwell? [ditto], let's make some noise for the scottish cup finalists Celtic [pointless pause again] and Motherwell [and again]", all in best holiday rep/wedding DJ mode. The only noise is people going "gonnae take the mic off that fud?". And then he plays Ready To Go by Republica and that sodding Reef song.

I hate getting to cup finals because of him. I found him on twitter once, and resisted the urge to spend every waking hour making him as miserable as he makes me.

It's so fucking loud it's like being in a club, we could barely hold a conversation when he was doing his thing. He had a headset on at halftime and was on the pitch curating a beat-the-keeper competition. I mean fair play to anyone who can maintain that level of fake enthusiasm, it's very tiring work, but it was like watching kids' TV.

And it can't do anything but diminish the ambience either - "Let's Hear The Hampden Roar!" [mid-volume white noise] "And one more time for the Hampden roar!" [noise like a bronchial patient exhaling]. You feel the experienced professionals on the other side will somehow be able to cope.

Still unbeaten, though.

sounds like you guys are saying it's like nearly every american arena/stadium experience

It's horrible. Enjoyment of a sporting event* shouldn't need to be artificially enhanced by anything, let alone some kind of sub-Mallett "entertainer". Yes, I hate fun, what of it?

* yes, I am using the word enjoyment in connection with Scottish football. This may be dulling my argument somewhat.

'Yes, I hate fun, what of it?' obv new board etc

btw I am not saying I like it, tho I do miss the flamethrowers they used to drag out for Fire pre-games

Enjoyment of a sporting event* shouldn't need to be artificially enhanced by anything

Carling, Tennants, Budweiser etc etc

haha, last night's good performance was, indeed, actually an indictment of trap - as we won it doing things we would never, ever do (and still won't do) in a competitive game. long, coleman, meyler, brady won't start against germany. doyle probably will.

That's not artificial (assuming you're referring to consumption of their product as opposed to their sponsorship), it's practically mandatory for surviving an afternoon at Hampden, tbh.

it was a real tease of a performance, WD, cruel of him imo

xp

that was the zing i had in mind but i figured it was better coming from a Scot

true about trap, however those kids will be around long after he's taken the spurs job.

trap / jol / benitez dream team???

feel like trap would need some height up front, and benitez has worked with crouchy before.

oy, we sold crouch

http://d29ci68ykuu27r.cloudfront.net/product/Look-Inside/large/3379336_01.jpg

much like the england first xi, when you see it just written out like that it seems so simple

The Republic of Ireland team to play Germany on Friday: Westwood; Coleman, O'Dea, O'Shea, Ward; McCarthy, Andrews, Fahey, McGeady; Cox, Walters.

How different is that to the team in the last qualifier?

I can't believe that the England game is a 90,000 sell out. Unless tickets were like £2 it seems madness.

idk but no long means trap out

Westwood; O'Shea, O'Dea, St Ledger, Ward; Cox, Whelan, McCarthy, McGeady; Keane, Walters

was the last team

Are you guys at home to Germany or away?

at home

xposts. According to The Independent, 8000 tickets were made available for Olympics Games Makers, priced at... £20.12, and there were 22,000 family tickets on sale (1 adult and 2 children for around £50). The rest of the tickets ranged from £10-£40.

at 50 quid my kids would have to have been exceptionally naughty before i threatened to take them

A typically sullen performance and we could see a whole generation lost to the sport

I had to go wiki and see where Darren O'Dea was plying his trade these days and discovered:

a) he's at Toronto FC and
b) so is Torsten Frings!

There's a footballer's name that's going to be floating around my head for days.

ah toronto fc, where the fans wear paper bag masks to matches and the manager threatens to fight them for doing so

lol, off the ball ronaldo runs straight into a defender, bounces off clutching his face and rolls around on the floor. Unfortunately the ref was watching the whole thing and just dismissively waves him to his feet. Russia 1-0 up btw. Good game. Nani looking dangerous/wasteful as is his way.

Ach, I knew this was on early but I hadn't realised it was this early. I'll not see it. Can't believe that a whole continent gets together and this is the only heavyweight match-up.

(with apologies to Ireland, Serbia, San Marino, etc)

San Marino get a name check and Scotland/Wales get an etc.

btw fully expect Postiga to be starting CF for Portugal come Quatar 2022.

That's £20m a year well spent by the Qatar Foundation then; the most footballingest man on earth can't even spell their name right.

HaHa. Even £20m isn't enough to correct my spelling deficiencies.

Sterling, Ince and Zaha all starting for England U21s tonight, could be fun to watch.

Portugal have been camped in the Russian half for 70% of this match and yet FM10 legend Akinfeev has barely had a save to make.

All over. 1-0 to Fab Cap's merry men.

Faroe Islands beating Sweden 1-0, 30 mins left. Sweden have all their big guns on the pitch as well!

that nelson oliveira kid at benfica who has just been loaned to depor should ease out the postiga/almeida generation

Conflicting emotions for Zlatan: glee at crushing minnows' dreams vs disgust at having to bother.

this Serbia-Belgium match looks like it's going to be good.

idk but no long means trap out

― Randy Carol (darraghmac), Thursday, 11 October 2012

seriously, this is so puzzling to me

i can't even make my "i like long-cox upfront" gag anymore without feeling heartsick

Reus carded for diving after being hauled down by O'Shea in the box. Then scores a minute later

Are Romania any good again? I've missed those guys. They're about to effectively eliminate Turkey.

Ireland were actually doing alright up to then. We're fucked now though

last five mins possession

ireland 2 ger 98

.

Reus gets his second from a brilliant counter-attack. Sky's the limit

GET THE FUCK OUT YOU FRAUDULENT OLD CUNT!

zvooks, the long/trap does kinda look like it's a slogan but actually it's just the way my feelings re: walters being picked spilled out onto screen

Only seen the last 15 mins but Germany looking swag. Can't believe that Reus booking.

My God! Sky presenter- "Ireland will be hoping they've shown enough in that half to suggest they can get back into the game"

Eng relying on a penalty to beat San Marino.

there was the 2% possession we had. That was good

Welbeckinho

we are arguing about religion in the most facile and basic terms and getting drunk and ordering a thai and y'know there's worse ways to watch this irish outfit (who haven't been all that bad tonight for as far as i'm actually bothering to throw my eyes at the (mute) tv

Belgium raking Serbia on the break time and again, de Bruyne making it 0-2 just now. They may finally be getting it together.

five nil. This is going to be really bad

I cant watch anymore of this...

this is good to watch, reminds me of a childhood training session the night of an ireland international, at the end of which our coach told us "now i want u to go home and watch the way the opposition play tonight" & everyone laughed.

deems, i agree with the slogan. the idea of picking walters, cox or keane ahead of long has been dumb for, what, two years? likewise coleman, the idea that he couldn't get into the team over that time is just...

wish we'd stop trying to kick 'em tho, now that shit really is embarassing

feel like we're getting closer to actually picking the obviously best side & germany are just way better, tho after this result who knows what trap'll do. thank god lamm was suspended.

my stream of the scotland game has the audio track doubled up and slightly out of sync, i'm waiting for it to turn into 'it's gonna rain'.

agreed! this has not been a bad trap performance and i've enjoyed germany

Belgium walking it in now, 0-3. Heavy rain in Belgrade means the lower half of all the stands is unoccupied, while the top half is full. Looks kinda strange.

the gulf from given to westwood is huge mind u

That was a clear penalty for Wales, no? Bale being slaughtered for it on the guardian's mbm.

can't help admiring ronnie whelan's disgust on rte commentary

Fucking hell Bale!

Well that's a decent goal to go out to

he's only got one setting zvook

Scotland out

there's something touching about the unconstructive disappointment of the ex-player who excelled in his day watching his team now. "why can't u just...be better!"

NOT A RECORD DEFEAT

Robbie Brady tbf

I'm no defender of Levein, but it's a little bit unfair that he's gonna get stick for the combination of 1) a totally fine Scotland goal disallowed; 2) a laughable penalty for Wales; 3) a great goal by Bale that like all such great goals was essentially a fluke and certainly impossible to manage against. Thought Scotland were pretty good for the most part.

the rte coverage has been required viewing and there is more to come.

Bale's goal made slightly more easy by Charlie Adam standing gawping at him from the moment he got the ball.

Anyone can lose a game, even against Wales. But by showing no ambition in the home games, effectively risking it all on tonight, then he deserves pelters no matter how that loss might have come about.

Belgium away on Tuesday, it's not looking good.

I've said it before, but it's Charlie Adam's destiny to become a tartan army hate figure.

This wasn't a must-win game according to Levein. Don't know if he'd looked at the tables at all.

What is his plan then? Where are the points coming from - away wins in Brussels, Zagreb and Belgrade? Basically out already, only a month into the campaign.

USA away to Antigua and Barbuda just kicked off.

Antigua and Barbuda (i/ænˈtiːɡə ænd bɑrˈbjuːdə/; Spanish for "ancient" and "bearded") is a twin-island nation lying between the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. It consists of two major inhabited islands, Antigua and Barbuda, and a number of smaller islands (including Great Bird, Green, Guinea, Long, Maiden and York Islands and further south, the island of Redonda). The permanent population number approximately 81,800 (at the 2011 Census) and the capital and largest port and city is St. John's, on Antigua.

Separated by a few nautical miles, Antigua and Barbuda are in the middle of the Leeward Islands, part of the Lesser Antilles, roughly at 17 degrees north of the Equator. The country is nicknamed "Land of 365 Beaches" due to the many beaches surrounding the islands. Its governance, language, and culture have all been strongly influenced by the British Empire, of which the country was formerly a part.

20 mins Eddie Johnson header 0-1 USA
24 mins great counter-attack A&B - 1-1!

Antigua cunningly set up their (pretty wide) pitch as narrow as possible, US made them get the tape measure out before the game to make sure it was at least the minimum. Working so far.

91 mins Eddie Johnson header off an Alan Gordon cross. Whew.

So cool for Gordon getting his first cap tonight at age 30 along with the game-winning assist. Flash!

agree with the westwood criticism, i'm not saying he's shit but my feeling is that given has single-handedly saved 2 or 3 nils from being 6-0s since the celtic tiger years. tbh given has prob saved about 30/40 billion of bad bank debt just by the integrity of his face.

it was a weird game tonight, worst result in aeons but germany sort of scored at will, mainly via possession rather than actually unlocking us.

generally dire attitude tho, trap has to go immediately.

Good christ what was that USA

wish we'd stop trying to kick 'em tho, now that shit really is embarassing

disagree, we were so demoralised and pathetic we didn't even at any point try to kick our way to 4-1. pathetic tackling all night. not gonna big up shitball but we were truly abject in spirit and every element of minnowball.

xpost super windy in Antigua tonight and narrow pitch, match almost a tossup. Qualifying is ugly anyway.

US looked good at times actually, under the circumstances.

I believe in Klinsmann, what the heck, makes a change trying to be play the ball out of the back and on the ground and etc,but he is a very lucky man tonight. Would have been a lot of pressure on him if it had stayed 1-1.

What is his plan then? Where are the points coming from - away wins in Brussels, Zagreb and Belgrade? Basically out already, only a month into the campaign.

We were out of it four days into the campaign. Levein's a fud.

Well, we're out. I expect Ramsey to dive, he's an Arsenal player after all, but Bale...

Maloney pretty clearly caught his trailing leg I thought, and at full pelt of course that's going to send him over.

Maloney admitted it himself, tbf.

This is as bad as I can remember as a Scotland fan. I had no expectations going into a game against Wales. Wales, ffs.

I only switched over in time for the comeback, but word is it was a decent performance until then? The downside is that I was watching the Belgium game, and they easily beat an okay Serbia. Honestly, they could easily have scored three more - if Scotland leave space or have to chase the game at any point, they will destroy us.

Maloney pretty clearly caught his trailing leg I thought

So he tripped himself up just to make it more convincing. Nice one, Gareth.

Levein's win % now worse than Vogts and Burley.

http://www.101greatgoals.com/gvideos/colombia-2-paraguay-0-full-highlights/

lol insane commentator

(couple of belters from el animal goes without saying of course)

he's gonna go to Chelsea isn't he :(

He is so good. I'm hoping he and Cavani end up in a face-off in the Uefa cup this year, that'd be sweet.

Also lol at the commentary; it sounds like a horse racing track dubbed over the top. And gosh at an entire stadium wearing Colombia's shirt.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKCJWyuTNRA

Has anyone seen much of The Beast's countryman Jackson Martinez? That goal is all I know but hey, I'm sold.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bMlkqorXkaY

Oh yeah, there was this one too.

all these cunts tryin to join facebook's original and best 'trap out!' page can fuck off, the club's doors have closed and if you weren't a member before last night then you're never getting in

not sure you've understood the finer points of building a grassroots movement there d

a connoisseur does not welcome the hordes imo

when u were telling us to get in on the ground floor way back when u shld have specified it was a bungalow

all internet startups originate in the parents' basement, fact

so who is the player Trap is after having a big bust-up with now?

s kelly had a row with tardelli

Also lol at the commentary; it sounds like a horse racing track dubbed over the top.

the reverb on the post-goal commentary is a nice touch. commentator, co-commentator, and dub controller.

Italy v Denmark
Germany v Sweden
Romania v Netherlands
Poland v England
Spain v France

Couldn't find a heavyweight match-up on Friday, only for them to schedule these five simultaneously tomorrow. I'll be watching the death of Scotland myself, but that's some rich pickings for the connoisseur.

lololololololololololololololololololollolololol

loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooool

gtfo 'poland vs england'

Should've been Faroes v Ireland, bloody autocorrect

bloody auto-de-fé by the time the final whistle blows imo

y'know I'm sure that's very clever - I even chuckled a little - but I've never been able to find out what that actually means

sometimes I imagine it as the main Porto-Lisbon highway

i've assumed or not remembered reading it's trial by fire, right?

hmm no, as it turns out it's literally trial by faith

but they do usually burn you at the end so i'mma give myself 2 marks for attempt

Seems like a nasty business - public repentance, then they burn you anyway? So we can expect the full Brazil 82 from Ireland tomorrow, followed by Trap in a wicker man at the final whistle.

(wikipedia seems to count burning in effigy as an execution; good traditional footy punishment imo)

jesus i'd say he'd be great tinder tho, lookin at him

like a pile of dead leaves

where's your god now trapp?

a naked john o'shea cavorting outside his hotel room and banging walls tonight to irish folk music

there never was a world cup, we just needed something to bring him to the island

Would almost be worth all the horrifying football

http://images.supersport.com/Giovanni-Trapattoni-110711-Shouts-R300.jpg

OH GOD OH JESUS CHRIST

hahaha great stuff ronan

Redknapp tho...

I am debating how early I can skip out of work and get to the pub, this is going to be a nightmare of epic proportions tonight and I'm not sure there's enough Guinness in Scotland to get me through it.

something disparate in the english/scottish mentality that i live for nightmares and you guys suffer them

We love it really. Nah, I used to perversely enjoy the glorious failures and the feeling that we were hard done by and nearly there but for [insert injustice/bad miss/rubbish selection of choice], but that's gone and it's now just horrible from start to finish (finish being after two games in this case).

yeah i think it's probly easier to enjoy failure in the expectation of success than failure in the expectation of well you know what i mean

Well, yes, not so easy to enjoy failures (perversely or not) if you fail all the time

The current Ireland remind me horribly of Scotland in the nineties, btw - that kind of joyless effectiveness turning into joyless incompetence, and turning all the kids off the game to boot.

Ouch, poor Ireland!

Redknapp tho...

― Number None, Tuesday, October 16, 2012 12:56 PM (41 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Is this about the Bale is in the same category as Messi and Ronaldo?

He is a footballer tbf.

he's being "linked" with the Ireland job. It's either that or a glorious return for Big Mick apparently

looking forward to Mick getting back in the game

Owen Coyle has more sense I assume?

as long as it's not with wolves, obv

xp to myself

Maybe he's holding out for the Scotland job...

xp to myself

hughton pref, but mick or arry'd do, not sure bout coyle tbh

fuck it just go with mcateer and aldo, have some fun with it.

rafa imo

Elder statesman Ian Paisley Walter Smith

have some fun with it

^ couldn't be more otm

Keane/Dunphy dream team

Some delusional fuds on a forum I frequent are proclaiming Redknapp for Scotland. (also Owen Coyle, which is a wee bit more likely, but it'll be Walter Smith again probably)

surprised billy davies is so low in the betting for that gig

Probably lined up for next The Rangers boss when everyone connected with them finally realises that Ally McCoist is completely shit.

if we're going to give the job to mick or harry we might as well just interview a third person too, anyone really, once they're called tom.

Just put Ireland down to win on my 7 fold accumulator. Too much trust in Trap? This is for me to be able to afford Fifa 13, if it doesnt come off I'm holding all youse Irish ILFors responsible

This has been one shitty day in ILXworld; but I've got a feeling that settling down with this thread and Belgium-Scotland will make everything alright again.

england game prob won't go ahead cos they can't be arsed to close the roof.

this is incredible stuff from ireland, trap in!

wtf happened with the eng u21's today. Mass racism, brawl, danny rose sent off??

yeah, there's some clips on youtube but they're fairly brief

Was JT the overage player?

lol

danny rose looked p distraught

holy shit did you see that touch from andrews!

Saw the very end of the U21s. Basically, as far as I could tell England scored a late breakaway goal as Serbia had pushed up looking for the aggregate equaliser. Danny Rose goes off and celebrates in front of the Serbia fans who retaliate and throw stuff. Rose is escorted off the pitch amid a couple of handbags scuffles by the Serb #11 so people don't throw stuff. He's shown a red card on the way off the pitch, England bench goes nutso, England asst manager visibly held back from assaulting somebody.

jesus christ, impeccable forty yard bicycle hits the post from kieran westwood

Danny Rose makes a monkey gesture as he leaves the pitch. I can only assume that means he thinks he was racially abused.

Not watching the match but have the Faroes really had five shots on target against Ireland's one?

NO

WHERE DID YOU READ THAT WE'RE KILLIN EM

just as you ask that pernicious shit, andrews goes on another mazy run and hits the post with a backheel

Fuck whoever runs this Polish stadium, they've ruined my FIFA-13-by-Wednesday plan. GAH>

Sometimes one shot is enough tbf

full video
http://www.101greatgoals.com/gvideos/connor-wickhams-goal-danny-roses-red-card-brawl-amid-racist-claims-england-u21-v-serbia-u21/

well the Brady experiment is over. Thanks Trap

Marc Wilson you beauty!

i am watching the great british bakeoff now

mustn't grumble but it was deflected

finally get a stream of ger-swe to work and find germany already 2 nil up. Klose x 2.

running riot now

nice f kick by maloney there, good save

the look on keane's face when chiles asked "when does heavy rain become a downpour?" !!!

Montenegro are 1-0 up against Ukraine.

Feel so bad for McGreggor, watching this.

mertesacker, 3-0. sweden getting sonned worse than republic.

that needless koscielny foul on Pedro was hilarious.absolutely raked him.nice save by lloris from cesc's pen.

uh...we want six?

what sthe stats, the young law student look s good for the bakeoff imo

4 - 1 final score

john delaney should have ensured that ireland embarked on a sustained and brutal campaign of colonial expansion in the early years of the 20th century in order to produce the quasi-african conveyer belt of belgium 2010

^ had to put this as a response on facebook to a guy that is insisting that delaney is killing irish football and trap is maximising. i await response

quasi-african conveyer belt

ozil, 4-0.

deems why are u provoking me into facetiousness

i was in a rush and tbf it wasn't measured for ilx standards

Hazard was born in Brazzaville to Congolese mother and father from Burkina Faso.[1]

hmmm, interesting approach from Brady: "you could say that Trappatoni has brought in the young players at exactly the right time"

Scotland need to stop kidding themselves and roll over. Not feeling the 0-0 draw here.

think Scotland are going to nick this

He actually looks like he's going to batter Dunphy now

the prototype for ireland would surely be switzerland, who never got into the old colonialism lark but still have a national team full of the children of kosovar/serbian/turkish/african/italian/etc gasterbeiters

zlatan with the sweet header gets his.

If Scotland nick this I'm burning my sister's tartan scarf in the back garden. Of all the time for this team to develop a backbone / some sort of luck

i have been sitting here watching adrian chiles and gabriel cuntface talking about pitchforks, logistics, how racist those eastern europeans are etc etc, for the second time in about four months after that ukraine/france game in donetsk

4-2 now!

And there it is for belgium

I enjoyed those four minutes

not a bad show altogether, impressed by roy keane's relatively measured disposition in the midst of it all

Villa guy i think (i have commentary off cos craig burley)

That was quite a cross, the Villa lad was hanging there for an age as it homed in

2-0

Fuckin Hell Vinny K!

I will keep updating as they go in

Benteke scores, good shit.

Right, just need Northern Ireland to slip up now and I'm home and dry. C'mon C'Ron.

Germany looking shook atm

brady had his chin resting on dunphy's forehead for a minute there, fuckin intense stuff

4-3!!! Germany caving in!

Portugal are fucking me here. Northern Ireland cant pull this off, surely?

oh man if they blow this from 4 nil up.

fuckin Scotland

once he went after Gilesy things escalated

Kompany Clodoaldo'ing out of defence there, then hits a Hollywood ball into touch

Nordies are winning in Portugal

https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn1/30968_682352279179_118719007_n.jpg

co-commentator claiming it's Scotland's national character, we're either top o' the world or it's an absolute disaster

When your answer to being 2-0 down in must win game is to swap a striker for Kenny fucking Miller you're not even pretending to do your job.

Sweden miss an open goal after a neuer fumble and zlatan lay off

You know how sometimes you perversely want to get stuffed just to get rid of a fucking tool who doesn't know what he's doing? That's us. All the time.

Yes I do know that

FUCK

Sweden just equalised

4-4!!!!!!!!
FUUUUUCK

Germany blow it big style!!!

Kinda deserved cos 3 german players booked for time wasting in last 5 mins.

Booed off

Fucking hell! What a mistake not watching that.

seriously germany just did not have a clue how to close off that game even as they had more possession in the last 15 mins. Tactically inept, but when your bench consists of nothing but attacking midfielders whattcha gonna do?

They are become Arsenal

Mertesacker and Podolski spreading the word

France equalize with the last touch of the game

actual footage from belgium scotland
http://i.imgur.com/51652.gif

lol

Canada gets pwned 5-0 at Honduras, think that's them eliminated. Poor guys.

Oh shit, it isn't over yet... it's just 5-0 in the 48th mninute!

I looked it up expecting a Sweden-style revival. It's 8-1 now.

transandean match up is p decent.Chile looking good,but seeing as they've only beaten arg once in a competitive game in like 50 years im not holding my breath.

Argentina walking it now 2-0 and comfortable. Watching it in a Santiago bar - was feeling bad about only really knowing Sanchez in the Chilean team but the locals seem just about the same as well.

chile really underperforming under borghi. defense has never been strong during recent years but they're woeful now.really decent wee squad that should be doing better.plenty of fairly high profile players isla plays for juve (as does vidal but i assume he's injured,medel for sevilla,mati fernandez for sporting).

The ref's doing something here I've never seen before. At free kicks he measures out the ten yards then sprays a line on the turf with some white paint kind of affair that quickly fades away. Is this a purely S American thing? Seems quite sensible.

yeah, i've only seen it in South American games. It's great obviously

MLS refs have been using the disappearing spray this year and LigaMX has been using it for several years.

It's making me realise quite how many yards defenders steal here. Very strange to see that yawning chasm in front of the free-kick taker.

love the spray

Chile score in extra time. Still 2-1 down. People going slightly nuts here.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/A5YJlGxCQAAULzH.jpg

ugh sorry so hueg

should be bigger

Thankfully I fell asleep during the Scotland game so missed a fair bit of the humiliation. Has Levein chucked it yet?

(answers of the "aye, two years ago" variety welcomed, obv)

What good's it going to do? Unless you appoint someone completely unScottish, it'll just be the same tactics with the same results. This hasn't been a fun team for years. I'd love to give Harry Redknapp a shot, but it's not going to happening.

New manager bounce might stop the slide down the world rankings at least. I dunno, someone somewhere has to be looking at what looks like a half-decent squad on paper (if you gave up on Miller and Adam) and thinking they could get results with them.

I think he's a piss poor man manager, motivator and tactician. I think a better manager could get more out of those players. He's had 3 wins in 12 games with 2 of those wins against Liechtenstein. Any and all of Scotland's previous managers would do better than that.

Has Strachan been mentioned? I expected us to lose to Belgium, who have good players, but what's done for us was the draws against Serbia and Macedonia, two pisspoor mediocre nonetities along with 60% of the other teams in Europe that Scotland managers perenially give too much respect too

http://twitter.com/BetfairSports/status/258307237376835584

whoops

Now why didn't I think of that? 4-0 is a dangerous score.

I've seen Strachan mentioned a few times, but mostly accompanied by "aw fuck no' him" on a Celtic forum of all places where you'd think they'd remember he's a guy that got a team of Naylors and Telfers to a couple of respectable places in the Champions League, which is exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for in a Scotland boss. Might not have been pretty, but it worked.

Don't think he'd take it, like.

Jim Jeffries is second favourite after Strachan o_O

strachan's boro stint was so awful i dont see how he'd be any different to avril really

walter will probably be alright short term but whats the point if youre already out

coyle nah, mcinnes promising but too soon

kinda like the look of john collins actually

Antoine Kombouare 33/1

haha what is this dude doing on the list

kinda like the look of john collins actually

If we're going for beefcake not brains, you mean?

dreamy

http://shop.sportsworldcards.com/ekmps/shops/sportsworld/images/hibernian-john-collins-419-panini-football-90-football-trading-sticker-28165-p.jpg

From Kombouare's Wiki page:

To this day, he is the only player to ever take a shot that cleared the top of the Richard Donald Stand at Pittodrie

whats the point if youre already out

Stop the slide down the rankings, regain a bit of pride, keep up the attendance figures at Hampden, start building for the next campaign?

Collins' man-management techniques none too popular at Easter Road, iirc.

..not that I think Walter Smith is the choice for building for the future, but managerial change urgently required for any number of reasons.

steve kean

otm

mourinho

waitin on lfc iirc?

steve kean?

Is cleverley playing as the left attacker today? Doesn,'t he play in the centre for Utd?

yes

Tom "None Too" Cleverley

Gerard just connected with a beauty of a 40 yard pass. Expect ten more attempts to follow.

that's more like it

the min by min hand-wringing here is brilliant: http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/19979312

countdown to "after the buzz of the olympics, watching this bunch of overpaid haircuts playing makes me even more proud of doing the mobot."

Needs Boris for half time team talk

just give us a roobot, that's all we ask

Eng have looked okay down the right. Milner staying quite wide. Cleverley v narrow on the left which is to be expected given that number none says he's usually in the centre. Eng don't half love playing in straight lines tho.

Robot delivers

Roobot

and there it is

Clairvoyent Klata.

shoulder and a deflection. Fitting

Ash's dummy in his own six-yard box!

Experience

lol how's that a free kick to England?

Hart not the best goalie in the world

BKITW

BGITW

lol

De Gea would've been proud of that

best keeper in the world

might lose him his superdry sponsorship deal

Waiting for full time when the pundits will say that when the keeper comes for the ball he's got to clear everything out. Unless it's Theo.

I enjoyed that

did daniel sturrisge go to chelsea

FAI EGM meets and confirms we can't afford to sack trap. well done holding that meeting there lads

could you not just wind him up until he quits, appoint him a really annoying deputy or something?

i dunno i mean he works with robbie keane and john delaney already

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/20259676

M'Vila suspended from the French squad until June 2014.

The French Football Federation made the decision after the five players spent a night in a Paris club between the two legs of a

disappointingly, this sentence continues with "European Under-21 Championship qualifying tie against Norway"

ha

idk where this should go but i love the photo, doesn't look real http://www.stadiumporn.com/post/36746692047/the-goalposts-have-been-installed-at-brazils

lol a friend of mine runs that site

(and I thought it was long dead, but I guess not)

Nice site. Beautiful photo of Salvador, Bahia:

http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mdraquNDsw1r9lhk1o1_1280.jpg

http://www.wsc.co.uk/forum-index/27-football/777492-a-history-of-hate-cro-vs-srb-22-mar-2013

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2013/mar/21/sinisa-mihajlovic-serbia-croatia

perhaps i'm just an ignorant person but i'm fairly amazed that stimac played 6 years in england as 90s triffic croatian lad footnote without any of this ever really coming to light

I don’t believe in violence but Igor Stimac is the only human I would actually want to kill.

i wanna track down that red star-bayern semi-final. anyone seen it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mi5QfffJNGQ

were goalkeepers just more crap back then

Backed sweden two goal handicap 4/1

I have that match on DVD, it really is excellent. So was the home leg of their QF win over Dynamo Dresden.

check prosinecki at 6 mins, fucking badass