Love that Fox Sports just cut back to the studio ... they know that no one tuned in to watch Cirque du Soleil
Lol I turned it on when they were doing the cartoon at the beginning
Pretty solid mascot, tbh
Perhaps you searched for World Cup Raw on accident?
Please give us Group A come onnnn
UGH ANOTHER SONG- for the love of everything holy
If we are in G or H, our first group stage game is on Thanksgiving, that would be interesting up against the NFL.
Yes, that would create quite a conundrum. Do I watch the Lions find a way to lose a Thanksgiving game yet again, or cheer on the old U. S. and A. in the biggest sporting event in the world? I'm not a dentist [sadist], so I think I'll skip the Lions and watch football.
I find your lack of faith disturbing.
Never actually paid attention to world cup draw before -- not sure i ever will again, either. geesh, just get on with it.
yeah, best to just wait until it's done unless you want to be teased for 1.5 hours.
At least the sheikh had the self-awareness to remark no one gives a rat's ass about the intro/speeches
Is it requisite that the draw move as slow as the play on the field (sorry, I mean pitch)?
Just need a presenter to fall down screaming and grabbing hand due to a paper cut from one of the envelopes
I think you mean falling down screaming and grabbing his hand due to a paper cut before he actually takes hold of the envelope being handed to him.
VAR would confirm the foul.
You know, the shame of it is that soccer is actually a pretty physical sport. They do get after each other and there is plenty of hard contact- I just wish every clip didn't turn into pure pain.
I know 3-4 people who played D1 collegiate level soccer (a couple even went semi-pro in Costa Rica etc.).
Every single one of them has had multiple ankle, knee, foot surgeries. The shoulder to shoulder hitting/tackling can be rough.
It's odd that a sport that is that physically demanding and tough, people will act like they got shot by a 50 caliber sniper when they barely got grazed.
Which reminds me of this hilarious video.
Yes, it is brutal because of the speed of collisions, lack of protection and spikes on the shoes.
The acting is gamesmanship.
1) Because of the speed of the game and the size of the pitch (so distance from players that the ref is) it's very hard to see contact, so players tend show the ref when they need to make a call. That obviously has perverse incentives, so I do like the increasing crack down on flops.
2) because of the non-stop action and limited subs, you get really tired. there's no other sport like it in terms of fitness demands. so often, the wriggling on the ground is to give yourself and your teammates a breather.
they need these guys…
the play on the field (sorry, I mean pitch)
No, it was fine the first time. They play on a field.
As an aside, I'm sure this will be unpopular with many, but it's a huge pet peeve of mine when people act is if these foreign terms are the only acceptable ones to use, when we (Americans) have an entire, perfectly good lexicon at our disposal. Soccer players play on a field, wear uniforms, post shutouts if they win X to zero, etc. I've never really understood people (who have no connection to it) using British jargon in the first place (are they trying to sound cool?), but don't look down at me for not doing so.
Also not a fan of supporter groups (Outlaws for the USMNT, Ultras at Michigan, etc.) who steal British cheers verbatim; are they so unoriginal they can't come up with their own cheers, or at least modify them so they make sense in American English?
No, not really. :)
I've been around soccer for 15 years now, courtesy of a soccer-playing daughter who just won our area player of the year award, and it's not that simple. People fluent in the discourse use the terms interchangeably, just as you--presumably--vary up your language instead of repeating the same words over and over. And they use them because they have become embedded enough to be used comfortably.
It used to bother me a little at first, but you become part of the culture; using such terms becomes second nature.
It used to bother me a little at first, but you become part of the culture; using such terms becomes second nature.
Maybe for some, but not for all. I guess it comes down to whether or not you think soccer culture has to be viewed through a British lens. I personally don't. I don't feel like I need to adopt British customs and language to be a soccer fan.
It's also not like other sports, where you use certain language because that's what's always been used. I'm not trying to say that since we're American, we need to rename everything; this isn't a "freedom fries" deal. As far as I'm aware, the use of these British terms is a relatively new phenomenon. I played soccer from kindergarten until high school, and I'm pretty sure I never once heard terms like pitch, kit, nil, clean sheet, service, etc. used. I don't recall hearing people use those until college at the earliest. So to me, it comes off as incredibly fake, a way to sound cool because apparently the American terms that had been used for decades aren't good enough.
P.S. Don't get me started on the asinine British singular/plural designation for teams. Michigan is singular, Wolverines are plural, full stop.
I don't mind the use of certain borrowed terms but what makes me nuts is when Americans - especially American sportswriters - use the plural form of the verb to modify the collective/singular noun. "Manchester United are the best team in the Champions League tournament". No. Wrong! I'll go to my grave saying that this is grammatically incorrect! Those same sportswriters would never write "Michigan are the best team in the NCAA tournament" so why do they do it for soccer teams? This madness has to stop.
[NOTE: just saw the above comment, beat me to it.]
I just tuned in. Looks like I haven't missed anything.
Well it is called a draw. Sounds like it was 0-0.
Thank god the games don't start for 7 1/2 months, they might just finish this draw by then
I have 0 doubt we'll be with Ghana again. We play them every freaking WC.
Gyan has to be gone by now though, right? dude has owned us over the years
This is getting painful...
PUT US IN GROUP A
I really appreciate the European production value.
and why the fuck did they just waste 2 minutes drawing Qatar for A...
I'm really confused. Why is the 2nd guy drawing the red ball? Don't we know that they will be A1, B1, C1??
why am i watching this.
please take the red ball, i said the red ball - don't mix them up.
This is a ridiculous presentation.
Good spot for England. Win their group and they get the second place team from the Qatar group, basically a pot 3 team. Hopefully the US gets group A or B.
I wouldn't mind being in Portugal's group- they are a bad top team.
Confused about the pot balls. Do we really need the red ball? Just put them in the first slot. Also, does the order within the Group actually determine the order of games or is it meaningless? First time I've actually caught this live.
SWEET. love it. Solid group to be in. Let's see how 3 and 4 fall out.
Agreed - after group A, definitely wanted B or H
I always like how our style matches up with England- we struggle with the fast, European teams. England is like a slightly better version of us.
The revolutionary war begs to differ with this take
This England team is likely to have tons of pace. I think Saka and Grealish/Sterling are going to wreak havoc on a really poor US back line. England have the best 5-6 players on that field, it will be interesting to see how to the US copes.
england you're going down.
Argentina and Mexico- yeesh. That's a tough one
Mexico was lookin a little old and slow in qualifying.
Yeah, Mexico appeared to be one of the weaker pot 2 teams.
But they did get a relatively easy draw. Saudi Arabia is terrible. They'll just have to get past Poland which is kind of weak aside from Lewandowski.
YES. Love the pairing with England, also makes it somewhat less likely that we get Wales from pot 4.
If we can avoid Poland or Serbia, we should have a pretty favorable run.