Looking Ahead to U.S. vs. Germany
This isn't a preview post, but instead an offer to (1) give thoughts about how this game looks on paper and (2) answer this question:
If Germany and the U.S. both advance with a draw (which is the case), what incentive is there for either side to be aggressive. Can we expect very conservative play since Germany is guaranteed the top spot if they simply don't make mistakes?
I don't know how Germany usually plays, but it seems like there would be every incentive in this game to just putt the ball around for 90 minutes. I mean, god forbid they try to advance it and we score and end up taking first place from them. Right?
There isn't one. You can't do what they do in hockey because it might take forever (wasn't there a high school game once, before they went to shootouts, that they had to come back and finish on a second day?).
They used to do something sort of like what they do in the FA Cup--if the game was tied after 30 minutes of extra time they replayed it the next day. That died with TV because it meant you couldn't set a firm schedule ahead of time.
A friend had the good idea of shooting the penalties before the extra time instead of after. Then one side would know they had to go out and win it on the field and would force the play. Don't they do something like this in fencing, draw lots to decide who needs to win?
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But that's for knockout tournaments. It's never made sense to me to have a shootout in a regular season game just so somebody can go home a winner.
No simple answer on a solution. I do hate finishing games on PKs since its deciding a basketball game on free throw shooting. But the alternative is simple exhaustion - asking these people to run around for 90 min, then 30 min then any other amount of time becomes cruel.
If you want to go out of box but do a perversion of the game to a degree - but maybe less than penalty shots you could adopt hockey and instead of a 30 min OT, begin with a normal 15 min OT then remove 1 man from each team so 10 a side for 10 minutes and then 9 a side for 10 minutes? Maybe that is too far out there and it would be unfair to the remaining players on the pitch because if you think 11 players out there is exhausting try 10 or 9. But I think the play would be so wide open, there would be a goal scored in quick order - it would however really help offensive teams and penalize defensive teams.
So back to square one - no easy answers.
Rather than penalty kicks from the spot they could do free kicks from outside the 18 yard box with the ability to use a certain amount of defenders to form a wall. That way it would at least be something that required talent that would end the game and not a kick at a net 8 feet high and 24 feet wide from 12 yards away. Allow teams to use their best free kick taker and go on a suddent death basis. It certainly isn't perfect, but better than a penalty kick in my opinion.
That would be kind of cool
Honestly I've always wished that overtime PKs were taken from further back. Don't even need the defenders IMO or to make it sudden death - just, enough space that the goalie has some reaction time instead of purely guessing and hoping he's right.
The alternative is exactly what they have now, ties. I agree there's no alternative once you're in the knockout rounds, but my reply was to someone complaining about it coming down to goal differential instead of ties, so I was just commenting on how it's done in the group stage.
Don't they play an extra 30 minutes? If they are tied after 2 hours what should they do?
If Germany and the U.S. both advance with a draw (which is the case), what incentive is there for either side to be aggressive
There is one incentive: the winner takes on one of Algeria, Russia or South Korea (three "meh" opponents) in the round of 16 while the 2nd-place team most likely will face a highly-touted Belgian team. This is more of an incentive for us, though, since a tie gives Germany the group win. But Germany may also want to prove that their so-so performance against Ghana was a fluke.
In any event, both teams are going to be bombarded with the "Is there a deal?" question for the next three days, so I don't think the game will end up being too boring.
To DVR or not to DVR. That is the question. I'm not sure it'll be possible to avoid hearing the result and I'm on the west coast so I have an extra 3 hours to kill.
Being on the west coast reallly hurts in the spoiler-avoidance departent
I'm at my internship until exactly 4:30, thereafter it takes 10-15 to get home, including a 5 minute walk in open streets where God knows what I'll see. Of course just getting to that point would be a miracle, given that in my office the nice window offices have TVs that I can see when I walk past, which have had World Cup games on over the past week and will surely have the game on come Thursday morning. Given my daily interactions with other guys in the office, it's highly unlikely I'd be able to keep from seeing the result, even with informing everyone that I'm DVR'ing and don't want to be spoiled (and knowing my co-workers enough that they wouldn't pull a dick move and spoil me on purpose).
OR... since I only intern 3 days a week, just come in on Friday instead of Thursday, assuming I can get proper clearence. That sounds like a much better idea... perks of not working full-time (yet)!
I set up the VCR (it was 1982!) to tape the game, secure in the knowledge (it was 1982) that nobody at work would give a damn and (it was 1982) I didn't have to worry about overhearing a score because, well, nobody back then gave a damn. Univision was the only TV option (I'm still grateful to our local PBS station for picking up the Univision feeds).
Came home from work, the game should have just ended. I turned on the TV and VCR thinking I'd rewind the tape and watch it right away...
...and there was still soccer on.
Shit. It must have gone extra time. So I turned off the TV, let the tape run another 45 minutes, and was pissed because I was now going to have to watch all of regulation knowing that it ended in a tie. All the excitement would be lost--I'd spoiled it all by myself.
Except it wasn't, because there were four goals in the 30 minutes of extra time. Might have been the most exciting game ever played.
That whole tournament was spectacular (and not always in a good way).
guys, how about just a bit of confidence eh? After reading this thread we might as well not even play Germany and just give them a 5-0 game. You wanna crown em, then crown their asses!
I think the most likely scenario is Portugal mails it in. They pretty much have been illiminated and I'm wondering if Ronaldo even plays the last game.
The U.S. NEEDS to play an incredible game just to tie Germany. I actually think Ghana is in a very good position and one could argue they have played as good as anyone in this group.
Germany will play hard until they go up 1 goal, they want to win the group and avoid Belgium. After they go up they will be satisfied with a one goal win or a tie.
My prediction - Germany goes up one by the 30th minute, they sub-out Ozil, Lahm, etc and the US ties the game late, Wondo. Ghana wins 2-0 vs Portugal.
We get through and face Belgium, Germany plays Russia.
Lahm auch gegen die USA wieder im Mittelfeld
"We see Philip in the midfield. He keeps us tidy and balanced."
Khedira strained an MCL against Ghana, which explains why he seemed to be struggling physically. He's practicing but I suspect he'll be replaced by Schweinsteiger.
Boateng had cramps; he'll be fine
They talk as if there will be few if any changes and they dismiss any suggestion of another Nichtangriffspakt. "To do anything but play for a win would be unfair to the other nations."
Of course they'd say that regardless.
They've got a lot of goal difference to play with even if they lose--my guess is they come out attacking like they usually do, but lock it down if the result in the other game starts to get threatening. Being fair to the other nations is all well and good...until you risk not going through yourselves.