FIFA World Cup 2010 South Africa

So the draw will happen tomorrow at 6am, NZT, live on Sky Sports 2

more opinions and debates later on

post anything about the tournament here

^^ What happens when fish-boy and a United fan breed.

http://www.biggie.co.nz/interaction/forum/viewtopic.php?p=3710082#3710082

bring back minty imo!

lol

i am minty, this is now my new username

Group H: Spain, Switzerland, Honduras, Chile

Group G: Brazil, North Korea, Ivory Coast, Portugal

Group F: Italy, Paraguay, New Zealand, Slovakia

Group E: Netherlands, Denmark, Japan, Cameroon

Group D: Germany, Australia, Serbia Ghana (Group of Death?)

Group C: England, United States, Algeria, Slovenia

Group B: Argentina, Nigeria, South Korea, Greece

Group A: South Africa, Mexico, Uruguay, France

group of death is group G for sure, NZ's group is ok, we did recently play Italy and pushed them all the way, we have to fancy getting a draw or a win against Slovakia and maybe Paraguay?

Aussies have a bloody tough group

England have the easiest group out of all the top seeds?

more to follow, gotta go to work now

I don't see how Aussie's group is tough

Ghana sucks - African teams never win anything
Serbia chokes at major competitions
And Germany has an average age of 58


Hardly any of the groups are amazingly tough. I actually think South Africa's group is the toughest because the teams are all so even

yeah Ghana and African teams are horribly overhyped in general. There are too many teams from that conference, they should lose at least one to Europe. Having said that in do think Aussies group is kinda tough and Im happy about that

Great draw for England! Netherlands and Denamrk in the same group too! Massive.

Im Thinking group G and H look pretty tough esp H without an obvious sucker

mintgamecube. Your new log in sucks balls. Only vain homos change their handle. Your name means nothing yet it means everything so change it back fast or lose any cred you ever had in Sports Forum. Troof

No wait...Honduras are pretty bad, I think?

I disagree with vadz, African teams could go far, they are very physical sides.

fact that NZ aren't drawn with any African sides in their group could be a good thing

Aussie have it tough, Ghana have Essien, Serbia has Vidic, Germany always perform in the big stage

so before you actually start watching any decent football, look at what you're about to post before writing some bullocks here

and Maestro, go fuck yourself, only post football WC here for once you can stop whinging and nagging

Watch Italy choke in this group

South Africa has got a pretty tough draw.. but any draw was gonna be tough for them unless they got the same group as Australia and New Zealand....

Ghana aren't as good as you're making out minty, other than Essien they have pretty much no one and as good as he is he can only do so much. The only god African sides are really Cameroon and Ivory Coast, but neither would have gone further than the quarter finals at best, and based on the draw I think they'll both struggle to make the second round.

A, D, and G do stand out but only because there is no stand out side in A considered how poor France have been. In D barring Germany who usually show up for World Cups it's pretty open, toughish draw for Aussie but only in the context of how easy a lot of other pools are. G has Brazil and Portugal, and Ivory Coast could upset one of them, but it's unlikely. England hve go the easiest pool in history, it was funny seeing Beckham trying to be diplomtic but he was obviouly stoked. I think we got a very good draw though, essentially every team I was hoping for (based on who was left in the draw) we got. We might be able to get a something from either Paraguay or Slovakia.

Preditions

Mexico, South Africa
Argentina, Greece
England, USA
Germany, Serbia
Netherlands, Cameroon
Italy, Paraguay
Brazil, Portugal
Spain, Chile

my predictions

Mexico, France
Argentina, South Korea
England, USA
Germany, Ghana
Netherlands, Cameroon
Italy, New Zealand (long shot but if they get 4 points they might just sneak in)
Brazil, Ivory Coast
Spain, Chile

It appears this new forum has killed minty's awful new login!

Dammit!

OMG is that Minty's new login? What was wrong with the old one Minty!?



gc.

Exactly what I tried to tell him smf.... and he threw a tanty @ me

What you dont seem to realise minty is your handle has a lot of history attached to it, you are famous for misleading people with your Engrish posts back in the day. And mintgamecube is like 1000 x better than your new log in anyway

+...generally speaking, changing your log in is ghey as hell

I haven't listened to HardHouse since 2003 but I haven't changed my username even if it annoys me sometimes :p

England to win the WC

New stadiums are fucken INSANE to say the least. Hope we can play rugby there ... JHB Soccer City stadium can host 90K people.

94600 to be exact

I'll be going to 2 matches at the soccer city stadium in J'Burg

woop woop

2-0 loss was a decent result for the All Whites I feel. Almost scored too with that offside goal. Vela's goal could be contested a bit too but ah well. I wonder how we would have done with Nelson?

definitely not a bad result, the Mexicans were all over us in the second half, Coombs had a decent debut, McGlinchy made us solid again, why he didn't start I don't know, Smeltz hardly had a touch, Fallon had a few nice touches but to no effect, minus Nelsen and Vicelich and lost by 2 goals not all that bad! although no saves from the Mexcian keeper would worry Herbert

Given that the referee gave us absolutely nothing and might as well have worn a Mexico shirt it was famtastic result, Mexico are a much better side than Paraguay.

Didn't the previous World Cup squad beat Mexico 4-0? Once we had a team that qualified properly and deserved to be at the World Cup - the 1982 World Cup campaign was something to be proud of.

They were New Zealanders - they celebrated winning and expected to beat smelly foreigners like the Mexicans.

Now Kiwi soccer supporters are such conditioned losers that their cultural cringe celebrates a 2-0 defeat to a mediocre third world country. Yay! We lost! But not by much!

An yet we have a rugby team that have underachieved for 23 years, belittling once great achievements like Grand Slams and a winning Lions series' all the while failing to achieve on the biggest stage and disappointing a country over and over again when they only have to win 2-3 games against good opposition to do so. Hell in 1991 and 1995 there was only one other good team at each tournament and of course we lost, and then in 1999 we got an easy path and our first big game was against France, which we lost.

Never mind the sport has become so bad that they need radicals rule changes every few games to try and make it watchable, to the point where the game is completely different depending on which country you are in.

Do any of you football geeks know what the deal is with timings for the opening ceremony etc??

I can see the first game is on at 2am on 12/06/10, but is there USUALLY a big opening ceremony type buzz before the first game? Or do they have one the night before?

Also, my work could be planning a massive (invites only) party for this, so I'll keep those of you who I know posted.

Chur.



gc.

Opening Ceremony is before the first game, they generally don't go too OTT with the opening ceremony though, so it shouldn't be more than half an hour or so... Then again it's South Africa so they might have a lot of 'we're in Africa BS' since it's the first WC on the continent, they had a whole lot of African stuff prior to the draw so they may do the same. South Africa has also been pretty staunch on making sure they get their way as well - FIFA really wanted an African World Cup and there really is no other option so FIFA have had to acommodate a lot of things they wouldn't otherwise - so there's a chance we could end of with 3 hours of Soweto choirs. In the past they haven't made a massive deal though and generaly try to get on with the opening game.

Awesome cheers.



gc.

the WC trophy will be on show in Auckland next Tuesday at Skycity

you can win tickets on this website

www.winwiththeherald.co.nz

you can only get admission by winning tickets

goodluck

you can get a photo with the trophy and there'll be a press conference too

I was one of the lucky 120

I saw the socceroo strip today. fucking rank!! Shame on your country!

They dont deserve to win a single game wearing that monstrosity.

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/soccer/socceroos-unveil-world-cup-strip/story-e6frey4r-1225858859535

Shame Aussie!



gc.

Awesome. another very good reason to hate on them and yell for whoever they are playing

This thread needs more: ************ OFFICIAL ************** in the thread title

Provisional 30 man England squad:

Goalkeepers: Joe Hart (Man City), David James (Portsmouth), Robert Green (West Ham)

Defenders: Leighton Baines (Everton), Jamie Carragher (Liverpool), Ashley Cole (Chelsea), Michael Dawson (Spurs), Rio Ferdinand (Man Utd), Glen Johnson (Liverpool), Ledley King (Spurs), John Terry (Chelsea), Matthew Upson (West Ham), Stephen Warnock (Aston Villa)

Midfielders: Gareth Barry (Man City), Michael Carrick (Man Utd), Joe Cole (Chelsea), Steven Gerrard (Liverpool), Tom Huddlestone (Spurs), Adam Johnson (Man City), Frank Lampard (Chelsea), Aaron Lennon (Spurs), James Milner (Aston Villa), Scott Parker (West Ham), Theo Walcott (Arsenal), Shaun Wright-Phillips (Man City)

Forwards: Darren Bent (Sunderland), Peter Crouch (Spurs), Jermain Defoe (Spurs), Emile Heskey (Aston Villa), Wayne Rooney (Man utd)

A few surprises in there!

Carragher and King are the only shocks, and that's because they've been out of the running for so long. Carragher looks a bit past it now, and the concern over King was whether he can play two games in a week which he has shown at the end of this season with 4 in 15 days. I'd expect Warnock, Upson, Parker, SWP, Bent, and two from Carrick, Huddlestone, Adam Johnson, and Joe Cole to be excluded from the final 23... Presuming Gareth Barry is declared fit.

Brazil final 23:

Goalkeepers: Julio Cesar (Inter Milan), Doni (Roma), Heurelho Gomes (Tottenham)

Defenders: Maicon (Inter Milan), Dani Alves (Barcelona), Lucio (Inter Milan), Juan (Roma), Luisao (Roma), Thiago Silva, Gilberto (Cruzeiro), Michel Bastos (Lyon)

Midfielders: Gilberto Silva (Panathinaikos), Felipe Melo (Juventus), Josue (Wolfsburg), Elano (Galatasaray), Ramires (Benfica), Kleberson (Flamengo), Kaka (Real Madrid), Julio Baptista (Roma)

Forwards: Robinho (Santos/Manchester City), Nilmar (Villarreal), Luis Fabiano (Sevilla), Grafite (Wolfsburg)

No Ronadinho, no Adriano, no Ronaldo, no Alexandre Pato... Dunga definitely opting for team over individuals and sticking true to the majoprity of players that have served him well over the last 4 years rather than bowing to public pressure to select the stars.

Actually add Dawson to list of probably axings and make it one omitted from the last four I named. Just realised I was still listing 5 centre backs, and with no specialist right back cover that should make Carragher and Milner definites as they can both cover there. Plus ther's no reason for Capello to talk Carragher out of international retirement if he's not going to pick him.

France's 30 man prelimuinery squad:

Goalkeepers: Cedric Carrasso (Bordeaux), Mickael Landreau (Lille), Hugo Lloris (Lyon)

Defenders: Steve Mandanda (Marseille); Eric Abidal (Barcelona), Gael Clichy (Arsenal), Patrice Evra (Manchester United), Rod Fanni (Rennes), William Gallas (Arsenal), Marc Planus (Bordeaux), Adil Rami (Lille), Anthony Reveillere (Lyon), Bacary Sagna (Arsenal)

Midfielders: Sebastien Squillaci (Sevilla); Abou Diaby (Arsenal), Alou Diarra (Bordeaux), Lassana Diarra (Real Madrid), Yoann Gourcuff (Bordeaux), Yann M'Vila (Rennes), Florent Malouda (Chelsea), Jeremy Toulalan (Lyon), Franck Ribery (Bayern Munich), Hatem Ben Arfa (Marseille)

Attackers: Nicolas Anelka (Chelsea), Jimmy Briand (Rennes), Djibril Cisse (Panathinaikos), Andre-Pierre Gignac (Toulouse), Sidney Govou (Lyon), Thierry Henry (Barcelona), Mathieu Valbuena (Marseille)

No Benzema, no Saha, no Nasri, and no Vieira.

Dutch 30 man preliminery:

Maarten Stekelenburg (Ajax), Sander Boschker, Michel Vorm (FC Utrecht); Vurnon Anita (Ajax), Khalid Boulahrouz (VfB Stuttgart), Edson Braafheid (Celtic), Giovanni van Bronckhorst (Feyenoord), John Heitinga (Everton), Joris Mathijsen (HSV), Ron Vlaar (Feyenoord), Gregory van der Wiel (Ajax) Andre Ooijer (PSV); Otman Bakkal (PSV), Mark van Bommel (Bayern Mnchen), Wout Brama, Orlando Engelaar (PSV), Nigel de Jong (Manchester City), David Mendes da Silva (AZ), Stijn Schaars (AZ), Wesley Sneijder (Inter), Rafael van der Vaart (Real Madrid), Demy de Zeeuw (Ajax) en Ibrahim Afellay (PSV); Dirk Kuyt (Liverpool), Jeremain Lens (AZ), Eljero Elia (HSV), Ryan Babel (Liverpool), Klaas-Jan Huntelaar, Robin van Persie (Arsenal), Arjen Robben (Bayern Mnchen).

No Van Nistelrooy.

Spain 30 man preliminary:

Goalkeepers:

Iker Casillas Fernández (Real Madrid CF)
David De Gea Quintana (Club Atlético de Madrid, SAD)
Diego López Rodríguez (Villarreal CF SAD)
Paez José Manuel Reina (Liverpool)
Víctor Valdés Arribas (FC Barcelona)

Defenders:
Raul Albiol Tortajada (Real Madrid CF)
Alvaro Arbeloa Coca (Real Madrid CF)
César Azpilicueta Tanco (Club Atlético Osasuna) - César
Joan Capdevila Méndez (Villarreal CF, SAD)
López Carlos Marchena (Valencia CF, SAD)
Gerard Piqué Bernabeu (FC Barcelona)
Carles Puyol Saforcada (FC Barcelona)
Sergio Ramos García (Real Madrid)

Midfielders:
Xabier Alonso Olano (Real Madrid CF) - Xabi Alonso
Sergio Burgos Busquets (FC Barcelona)
Francesc Fabregas Soler (Arsenal FC)
Andrés Iniesta Luján (FC Barcelona)
Javier Martínez Aguinaga (Athletic Club)
Marcos Antonio Senna Da Silva (Villarreal CF, SAD) - Marcos Senna
David Jimenez Silva (Valencia CF, SAD)
Xavier Hernandez Creus (FC Barcelona) - Xavi

Forwards:
González Santiago Cazorla (Villarreal CF, SAD) - Santi Carzorla
Gonzalez Jesus Navas (Sevilla FC SAD)
Juan Manuel Mata Garcia (Valencia CF, SAD) - Mata
Pedro Rodríguez Ledesma (FC Barcelona) - Pedro
Daniel Gonzalez Guiza (Fenerbahçe SK)
Fernando Torres Llorente (Athletic Club) - Fernando Llorente
Alvaro Negredo Sanchez (SAD Sevilla FC)
Fernando Torres Sanz (Liverpool FC)
David Villa Sánchez (Valencia CF, SAD)

Took this from a Spanish site so apologies about all the full names and formatting.

*I've added the common names of the players that aren't immediately obvious, some of them might be a bit unnecessary but I'm only trying to help so bite me if you spot any Captain Obvious ones that I've added the well known name for.

Argentina Provisional:

Goalkeepers
Sergio Romero (AZ Alkmaar)
Mariano Andújar (Catania)
Diego Pozo (Colón de Santa Fe)

Defenders
Nicolas Otamendi (Velez Sarsfield)
Martin Demichelis (Bayern Munich)
Walter Samuel (Inter)
Gabriel Heinze (Marseille)
Clemente Rodriguez (Estudiantes)
Nicolas Burdisso (Roma)
Juan Manuel Insaurralde (Newell's Old Boys)
Fabricio Coloccini (Newcastle)
Ariel Garcé (Colón de Santa Fe)

MidfieldersJonás Gutierrez (Newcastle)
Javier Mascherano (Liverpool)
Juan Sebastian Verón (Estudiantes)
Angel Di María (Benfica)
Maria Bolatti (Fiorentina)
Javier Pastore (Palermo)
Juan Mercier (Argentinos Juniors)
Jose Sosa (Estudiantes)
Sebastián Blanco (Lanus)
Jesús Datolo (Olympiakos)
Maximiliano Rodriguez (Liverpool)

Strikers
Lionel Messi (Barcelona)
Gonzalo Higuaín (Real Madrid)
Carlos Tevez (Manchester City)
Diego Milito (Inter)
Martin Palermo (Boca Juniors)
Sergio Agüero (Atletico Madrid)
Ezequiel Lavezzi (Napoli)

No Cambiasso
No Zanetti
No Banega
No Gabby Milito
No Lucho Gonzalez
No Ansaldi
No Lisandro Lopez
No Perotti
Veron in

The worst part is none of them are shock omissions...

Maradona

He picks on favourites and ignores players who are plainly better than what he has. We could probably put together a team from the players he omitted better than what he has in all areas except attack.

Obviously with that attack anything can happen but with the omissions the balance of the squad is somewhat underwhelming.

Fuck me, looking at that Spain should walk this. Looking at who they could leave out of that 30 is ridiculous, sure Brazil have left out big names but most of them are past it, Spain's depth is retarded right now, any player they left out would be guaranteed a spot in any other World Cup squad.

But because this is a World Cup and they're heavy favourites they'll probably fall early. If you're a betting man I'd put money on Brazi las the odds will be better than Spain and Brazil are the only team that wins World Cups away from their continent.

South Africa will be the first ever country and only country ever to have the rugby, soccer and cricket world cups at the same time.


BOOOOOOOOOOOOM! You heard it here first!

Best make sure the salmonella vats are in full production, buddy! It's a whole lot more difficult poisoning the entire world than it is just one bunch of All Blacks ^_^

yeah my money is on Spain owning this competition. im sure 1 or 2 of the other strong footballing countries will stand up but you have to think that going by player form Spain should do pretty well.

Im pretty keen on Argentina and will bet on them before it all starts, will also bet on England..... mostly cos I like yelling for them. Will prob start adding bets on other teams as the tournament progresses. Fucking hell ....I am normally SO excited at WC Time, and now this time? With us BEING THERE@!?? Im beside myself! Goosebumps an all! Cant wait to pin up my chart and start entering results! Gonna go buy a straight ballin' new TV for the occasion too! WOOT

Argentina could've been great but with that mentalist Maradona in charge I'm doubtful... It's like putting Gazza in charge of England.

There's the players above I listed as being left out, Cambiasso and Zanetti are by far the worst and probably rate as two best players in the world right now to have been left out of a World Cup squad. Cambiasso is easily in the top 5 midfielders in the world right now, he's one of the main reason Inter beat Barcelona in the CL semi as he is just so fearsome in midfield. Another key to that win was Inter captain Zanetti, who looked after the plethora of Barcelona right side attacking options. Both have been insanely good this season.

Right now they are defensively frail with Samuel and Mascherano having to do all the work and mop up after the other players who are likely to be first choice. Demichelis is a red card waiting to happen, Coloccini has had a good season in the Championship where he seems to have found his level after being way out of his depth in the Premier League, and Heinze is just plain awful now. Whereas they could have had Mascherano and Cambiasso utterly scaring the living hell out of every midfield in the world with their 'we're gonna get you' mentality to ball winning, combined with Cambiasso's skill on the ball. Then behind them had Gabby Milito and Zanetti completing what would have been a very very very good back four. But no, Maradona doesn't like them so they have a devastating attack and a frail defense.

Ya I meant to include just that in my post, its a bit of a worry. Sometimes though coach's dont seem to play that big a part in sport. I dunnoo.....Just hope he isnt *that* much of an asshat to not take advice from his advisers... and he could even actually inspire them. The man is utterly revered after all

I've looked at the draw and worked out who i think is going to finish in the top 2 from every group and looked at who would end up playing who in the qualifiers, semis etc and picked 4 teams to bet on. If all goes to my predictions, which is unlikely, there were a few hard choices there, it'll play out with two teams on one side and two on the other with hopefully one playing the other in the final.

Holland
France
Spain
Germany

Still thinking about a possible dark horse pick...

ENGLAAAAND!

The major concern is who else he's going to leave out as there's still 7 more players who won't make the cut, and also what mentalist selections he'll make at the cup. I imagine his starting line-up will include Aguero will will be a huge mistake if it meant leaving out Tevez, Diego Milito, or Higuain. Plus where a manager is important is the changes he makes throughout a game, especially in knock out games where they need to consider the possibility of extra time. Argentina went out of the last World Cup because Germany got a late equaliser and the manager had already taken off all their attackers to protect the lead. In extra time they had creative outlets or scoring threats on the field and Germany were happy to let it go to penalties because Mad Jens was such a great penalty saver - plus all their recognised penalty takers were already off the field. From what I've seen of Maradona he doesn't have the nous to select make intelligent selections based on his opponent, and make the right changes throughout a match.

Who will be watching the All Whites vs. Socceroos game tomorrow night?

See CL Final for why Argentina have such a poor defense... Demichellis was 100% at fault for the first goal and left Van Buyten fairly isolated for the second. While Diego Milito looked good, finding a place for him will be difficult.

Anyone know if the game tonight is being live streamed anywhere?

And why Sky aren't playing this on SS1 is totally beyond my comprehension.

Their players are so shit, they can only make a team that's in the champions league final? Righto.

Video someone sent me to keep me excited, poor old New Zealand had to face these guy first time round:



They didn't win but my god they were ridiculous, for any of you non-football fans, kinda like Mitchell's 2003 All Blacks all they cared about was playing beautifully and in an attacking way.

82 Brasil vs 2003 ABs?
The 2003 ABs weren't that beautiful. Remember the fucking flat backline?
If you said All Blacks 96-98... I'd agree... look at the scores

The flat backline was Henry wasn't it?

But 2003 was basically just spread it... Or get King Carlos to do something ridiculous, no need to kick goals at all. Not even conversions, they just wasted time that could've been spent scoring tries.

I got Australia and Ghana in the sweepstakes today fml ...

Nope, Mitchell brought in the flat backline. It worked with Carlos but he was the only first five it could have worked with, and even then the scores weren't that amazing.

While it's off topic, the 96-97 ABs with Lomu/Cullen/Wilson and Kronfeld in support was far and away the most beautiful rugby team of all time to watch.

I actually watched the Aussie-NZ game and for the life of me I can’t understand the euphoria around NZ at the 2-1 loss. We arrived better prepared and that performance was as good as this side will get. The Aussies were obviously complacent, diffident, and under prepared. Yet when they upped their performance only marginally in the second half they were too good for the New Zealanders. It seems to me we play a fairly limited and old fashioned long ball game, lack any real class up front and have an easily unlocked mid field. It seems to me we lack any real athletes and I think we'll be playing to keep the score down.

I don't know how this team compares to the 1982 squad, but I would suggest the gap between them and the other teams at this years tournament will be wider than it was in 1982.

Theyre in the same fkn group too lol

LOL SERBIA
seriously embarrassing guys
:/

Lol serbia, why so angry

goal here.

http://www.footytube.com/video/new-zealand-serbia-may29-48172

LOL how's that foot tasting now?

p.s. take that negative attitude away please

Fish_boy negative? No!!!!

Well done New Zealand!

Been reading some comments on various sites.
Lots of Serb supporters are crying about it being an experimental team without 3-4 of their best players
My answer would be: you're Serbia. You should be able to play your 4th XI and win 2-0

Yeah, Id read comments on how the Serbs were without some of their 'usual' starters too. So were the All Whites; Killen, Brown for example....

Lol @ Fish_Dick. Read a few articles in the paper and now you're an expert huh? Platitudinous as ever you moron.

Great result this morning, we played to our strengths and didn't get overawed when the Serbs lifted a gear in the second half. The boys will be buzzing and will carry a great attitude into our other friendlies and the Cup afterwards.

Next up is Slovenia on saturday. :>

Hmmmm, I don't think I've been negative - I just don't like an attitude that says qualifying is enough - and all I think was that based on who we played to qualify we hadn't earnt the right to be in South Africa ahead of other, much better and more deserving countries.

Clearly the Aussies are not as good as everyone thinks and the All Whites are peaking quite nicely... This is a great result and one that goes a long way to doing what I expect any New Zealand team to do - demonstrate they deserve to be there and they are hungry, and they are afraqid of no one.

This is a fabulous result, and I think the hero has to be the coach Herbert... He is bringing out the absolute best in his squad.

those of you who decided to discuss and compare rugby with football and start changing the actual topic of this thread, GTFO now!

I'm stoked about this morning's result, and like the experts said it's not a flukey win, we actually had a lot of composure and the stats don't lie

this cracks me up!



less than 2 weeks to go now, can't bloody wait, in a process of organising an 8th game over there (Netherlands v Denmark)

The thing you're forgetting about the Aussie game is that we took off a lot of players in the second half, so Aussie getting on top coincided with our reserves coming on, and once we start getting too many of the non-Phoenix NZ based players on the pitch we're always going to struggle.

Although I will concede that Aussie aren't as good as their 2006 team, and any knowledgeable Aussie fan will admit that.

Pretty much any fan that actually knows anything about football knows that this Aussie team, despite finishing top of the Asia qualifying, is no where near the calibre of their 2006 side.

I really like the look of this Winston Reid. As the commentators were saying, he's still a bit raw but he has a lot of class about him. His vision and his long passing game is superb!

1-0 win to Australia against Denmark overnight. Although their goal was a stroke of luck.

Final England squad: J Hart, D James, R Green; J Carragher, A Cole, R Ferdinand, G Johnson, L King, J Terry, M Upson, S Warnock; G Barry, M Carrick, J Cole, S Gerrard, F Lampard, A Lennon, J Milner, S Wright-Phillips; P Crouch, J Defoe, E Heskey, W Rooney.

Only surprise is that Baines missed out for Warnock and SWP got the nod over Walcott. Baines' admission that he might get homesick being away from his young family for six weeks probably set off alarm bells for Capello so he went for the player who he knew would be committed. Whereas Walcott was lucky to still be in the reckoning at all, barring that hat trick he's produced very little of note for two years and has really only been in the team because of his potential. Completely unrealised potential and Capello is too smart to pick someone because of what they might do in the future for a World Cup. So while the inclusion of SWP might be a surprise the exclusion of Walcott is only surprisingly in that it took this long to occur. Adam Johnson might also feel unlucky, but Joe Cole recaptured some form at the end of the season and offers too much to the team to be left out if he's in any sort of form.

Just casting an eye over the odds for the tournament....and England are 3rd favourite @ 7-1?

Really? I was hoping to put a bet on them but those odds are terrible

I have I got this wrong but arent the US normally about a 20-1 shot? They are about 60-1 this time round. Weaker squad than past WC's or do I have that 20-1 stat wrong?

I got myself in a football pools.... $100 buy in Winner take all (1600) , 2 random draws..........and I drew France and Brasil lol

One of you clowns organise a biggie football pools too

One of you clowns organise a biggie football pools too

Yeah but he looks a bit gangly/donkey like
His height means he doesn't quite seem to have exact body control of his extremities

Here's some anaylsis of the likely formations and tactics of some of the teams from www.zonalmarking.net (one of the best football blogs around), click on the heading for the full artcile

New Zealand:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/01/new-zealands-world-cup-2010-tactics/#more-3183

Netherlands:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/02/holland-world-cup-2010-tactics/#more-3197

Portugal:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/05/31/portugal-tactics-world-cup-2010/

Mexico:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/05/27/mexico-tactics-world-cup-2010-javier-agurre/#more-3099

Uruguay:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/05/27/an-old-fashioned-3-5-2-for-uruguay/#more-3115

North Korea:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/05/26/north-korea-a-better-side-than-you-might-expect/

Greece:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/05/29/greece-lightning-probably-wont-strike-twice/#more-3131

Switzerland:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/02/switzerland-world-cup-2010-tactics/#more-3218

They'll be covering everyone so there's a lot more to come.

Argentina:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/05/28/argentina-tactics-world-cup-2010-diego-maradona/

Lol, smashed. Now everybody will be all doom and gloom

Nah, wasn't too concerning as two of the goals were off dubious direct free kicks and the walls and keeper were positioned well so there's not a lot you can do (especially when the award of the second was a blatant dive). The third was a mistake by Paston from an innocuous shot so while they did put 3 past us the defence actually did good job and weren't culpable for any of them (not including Paston of course). We really did trouble them on attack ourselves, if Woods had tucked away that chance at 2-1 it would've been interesting, plus we created a lot of chances because they couldn't deal with Fallon... Who also received a pretty rough ride from the ref. Second half they sat back and made it harder to create chances but overall I'm not too worried about the result, essentially it came down to 2 brilliant free kicks and an uncharacteristic mistake from Paston, we were far from outclassed and with some more luck might have actually won it.

Personnel wise, if Brown isn't fit then McGlinchey has to be his replacement, Jeremy Christie was the worst player on the park for the All Whites and broke down a number of moves with poor passes or bad decisions. As he has shown in the A-League he's only capable of a rare good performance and while he played well against Serbia, we don't have another 5 games to wait for his next performance. Reid and Smith looked very good, and I suspect Reid has done enough to earn a start against Slovakia... Possibly Smith too. As for Woods, he did well in winning the header for Fallon's goal - even if he did get lucky with the deflection - but overall I don't think he's done anywhere near enough to force a start. He'll be a good option off the bench against tired legs, but Killen and Smeltz will be the players up front with Rory 'Sky Tower' Fallon.

I just have a feeling that England won't win it this time

I fancy Spain or Argentina

Eng;and's odds of winning might be slashed even more following Ferdinand's exclusion from the squad, but he's not been the same this season and I'm not sure if England will miss that much, Dawson has been drafted in and going to SA instead

this will be the longest week for me waiting for the plane to get over there

Hope you guys have fun watching it on the tele, heaps of games and at ridiculous times too

shrug. Mysky for most and being self employeed for me means game times are more or less irrelevant. Its working out which games to skip/highlights package that Im battling atm. Theres 48 games just in the 1st round and I dont want to get football stale. I'll probably skip the opening game an watch France vs Uruguay

Keen to watch the opener as I want to see how the Saffas react when Mexico beat them.

See, I find comments like this silly. I mean, read it again slowly. How can you justify such a statement Jono? They scored three goals in 45 minutes? The defence did a good job? I would hate to see what you think is fucking it up.

probably not very PC to call black south africans Saffas. A misheard first syllable and you could be in a lot of trouble...

S and K can't be confused

you, fishboy have no idea what football is all about, just go back to your rugby forum and discuss there

Oops, I didn't realise the two words were similar, it wasn't until vadz subsequent post that I actually clicked what you were on about. Will remember that though just in case.

That's why you need to read the rest of my post, where I explained why... Or alternatively watch the game and see what I'm talking about. Or you could carry on selectively quoting the bits best suited to your trolls.

Ivory Coast:



Not nearly as fearsome without Drogba.

Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/04/ivory-coast-world-cup-tactics/#more-3194

Ghana:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/05/ghana-world-cup-2010-tactics/

Cameroon:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/07/cameroon-tactics-world-cup-2010/

Denmark:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/06/denmark-world-cup-2010-tactics/

France:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/07/france-world-cup-2010-tactics/

Honduras:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/07/honduras-world-cup-2010-tactics/

Australia:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/07/australia-tactics-2010-world-cup/

Do you know of any? Was looking around this morning but my googling is weak.

What are everyones picks for teams to go through into the second round?

Pools?

We have the picking comp on Footy Tips - entitled (probably not that appropriate for you guys) I Hate This Game.



gc.

France
Uruguay
Argentina
Nigeria
England
Slovenia
Germany
Serbia
Netherlands
Cameroon
Italy
New Zealand
Brazil
Ivory Coast
Spain
Chile

ESPN promo posters, some are awesome some are

Nigeria:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/08/nigeria-world-cup-2010-tactics/

Paraguay:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/08/paraguay-world-cup-2010-tactics/

Germany:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/08/germany-world-cup-2010-tactics/

Paraguay:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/08/paraguay-world-cup-2010-tactics/

Chile:



Full article: http://www.zonalmarking.net/2010/06/08/marcelo-bielsa-chile-world-cup-2010-tactics/