SPORTS BALL!!! v2.0

[Johnny Novgorod]

S. Korea beats Czech Rep 2-1 in a much more fun game than Mex/S. Africa. SK dominated the whole game, yet Czechs snuck in a header and SK had to score a tie and a win with a couple of fairly crafty goals. Best team won after some dramatic swings, always a good game.

 

[Kyrian007]

Mexico beats South Africa 2-0. Weak opening game. Mexico dominated both halves yet kept missing easy strikes. And even though they're leading by 2, the captain goes on to make a criminal foul at the last minute for no reason other than to get carded away from this game, the next and gift SA a free kick (which of course they waste anyway).

On the showbiz side of things I'm not a fan of the Americanization of the sport. Hydration break 20 minutes into the first half, what? And the clock keeps going? And there's a potato chip cam doing replays? And the ref is doing POV shots now?

Yeah, I really wasn't expecting less though. Mexico looks good, but that's kind of a tough group. I didn't expect an upset in Group A to come from South Africa. But South Korea is capable of beating them outright. And like they showed, Czechia is capable of hanging around and getting a sneaky win.

 

[Xprimentyl]

On the showbiz side of things I'm not a fan of the Americanization of the sport. Hydration break 20 minutes into the first half, what? And the clock keeps going? And there's a potato chip cam doing replays? And the ref is doing POV shots now?

Is this really a production choice driven by American design? That's a genuine question; how has it been different historically? How/why have those who run the game been influenced by America? I plan on watching a match or two, so I'm curious what the differences would be less American influence.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Is this really a production choice driven by American design? That's a genuine question; how has it been different historically? How/why have those who run the game been influenced by America? I plan on watching a match or two, so I'm curious what the differences would be less American influence.

Water breaks kill the momemtum of the game and only exist to add 3 minutes of commercials every 20 minutes.

Traditionally it's up to each venue whether to enforce them or not (it's extremely rare), but by mandating that all 104 games have routine water breaks every 20 minutes regardless, FIFA is butchering the flow and structure of the game and quartering it into shorter bouts. Not only does it take you out of the moment, but the clock isn't stopped and the commercials inevitably end up eating some live action when play resumes.

This stop and start bullshit is antithetical to the sport, something nobody outside the US likes and all of us associate with more sluggish American stuff like baseball.

Real association football is halved into 45 minute matches (team switch side in between) and there's a flow to every minute of the game that is lost when you break it into quarters.

 

[Xprimentyl]

Water breaks kill the momemtum of the game and only exist to add 3 minutes of commercials every 20 minutes.

Traditionally it's up to each venue whether to enforce them or not (it's extremely rare), but by mandating that all 104 games have routine water breaks every 20 minutes regardless, FIFA is butchering the flow and structure of the game and quartering it into shorter bouts. Not only does it take you out of the moment, but the clock isn't stopped and the commercials inevitably end up eating some live action when play resumes.

This stop and start bullshit is antithetical to the sport, something nobody outside the US likes and all of us associate with more sluggish American stuff like baseball.

Real association football is halved into 45 minute matches (team switch side in between) and there's a flow to every minute of the game that is lost when you break it into quarters.

I don't understand how you feel that's uniquely American, though. You mentioned baseball; they've actually taken measures (like a pitch clock) to speed the game up so it's not so traditionally sluggish. Sports nowadays are fluid, and a lot of them are trying different things to improve the flow of the game, respect viewership, and protect the athletes; none of that necessarily sounds "American." What has America done specifically that you feel FIFA has purposefully adopted to the detriment of their sport?

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I don't understand how you feel that's uniquely American, though. You mentioned baseball; they've actually taken measures (like a pitch clock) to speed the game up so it's not so traditionally sluggish. Sports nowadays are fluid, and a lot of them are trying different things to improve the flow of the game, respect viewership, and protect the athletes; none of that necessarily sounds "American." What has America done specifically that you feel FIFA has purposefully adopted to the detriment of their sport?

It's easy to identify it as uniquely American because the world cup is being primarily hosted in America and coincidentally for the first time in 96 years hydration breaks are suddenly mandatory. To say it's entirely up to FIFA is a bit disingenuous and wilfully ignores every other world cup where no such thing was implemented.

Breaks have always been up to the ref. Making them mandatory doesn't make games safer, it just guarantees more ads per game. They interrupt the flow of the game, you miss out parts and the extension at the end doesn't even necessarily cover the time wasted.

On another note, they've overstuffed a world cup with 48 teams instead of the usual 32 so we end up with even more nothingburger matchups like today's Canada vs. Bosnia. Real bottom of the barrel stuff.

 

[Xprimentyl]

It's easy to identify it as uniquely American because the world cup is being primarily hosted in America and coincidentally for the first time in 96 years hydration breaks are suddenly mandatory. To say it's entirely up to FIFA is a bit disingenuous and wilfully ignores every other world cup where no such thing was implemented.

Breaks have always been up to the ref. Making them mandatory doesn't make games safer, it just guarantees more ads per game. They interrupt the flow of the game, you miss out parts and the extension at the end doesn't even necessarily cover the time wasted.

On another note, they've overstuffed a world cup with 48 teams instead of the usual 32 so we end up with even more nothingburger matchups like today's Canada vs. Bosnia. Real bottom of the barrel stuff.

Ah, I didn’t know any of that. Didn’t know a host country had that much say over the governing body of FIFA, least of all the execution of the World Cup. My apologies from America; I’d say we’ll do better next time, but given we’re at the center of World War III, “next time” might be a postapocalyptic “Fallout” scenario. Can ghouls play soccer? And will they require the hydration breaks?

 

[Offworlder]

Australia plays tomorrow at the world cup, sick to my stomach. The new format is a bit confusing but is probably our best chance to get to the RO16 since 2006 (I won't rant about that because I'd hold the thread hostage for a whole week). Getting past the USA will be the challenge but I think it's possible. Here's hoping.

The less said about the Avs the better. Disgrace of at WCF. Lost their heads at the worst time. Carolina have to take it this week, LV winning would leave a bad taste in my mouth. Marner and Tortorella tripping their way into a cup win would be horrible.

https://www.espncricinfo.com/story/stokes-and-atkinson-investigated-by-ecb-over-nightclub-incident-1540197

Welcome to the world of Commonwealth sports. Not for the first time, England cricket captain Ben Stokes winds up in an 'altercation' at a nightclub. Mans 35 with children and is at a club at 3am after a test match, dumb fuck. I won't bore you with the details but his exit is a long time coming. Got battered last time they came here and he's overstayed his welcome, on top of his obvious problems with alcohol. I want our team to demolish England next time we play them but not if I know the entire England team are drunk as skunks the whole time. The best part? The heir apparent for captain can't be moved up because he also have a nightclub 'incident' last year in New Zealand. I'll never complain about the Australian team again, they all know how to hold their liquor/have the right PR people.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

USA vs Paraguay (4-1) was fun even though I was obviously rooting for Paraguay.

Brazil vs Morocco should be fun too today.

After that I only care about Argentina vs Algeria on Tuesday. Should be an easy clear but wouldn't be surprised if we fumble the first match in the grand tradition of making things way harder than they need to be.

 

[McElroy]

Just in time for my summer holiday. In a twist of events the broadcast rights for matches are split evenly between our national broadcast company (YLE) and a commercial tv company (MTV, the M stands for the Finnish word for advertisement and it predates the other famous MTV by a couple of decades). While they are shown on free broadcasts:
1) MTV has such a shit-ton of commercials the broadcasts are a pain.
2) …or so I've heard. Because of a recent dispute between MTV and a nationwide cable company, I can't watch MTV on my tv.

There are ways around this, but honestly I am sticking with my tax-funded YLE-broadcasts and looking up a foreign re-stream if I really need to for the other half of the matches. For example this Saturday's matches are all MTV's.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

 

[Phoenixmgs]

 

[Xprimentyl]

7-time (8-time; never forget Abu Dhabi 2021) World Champion Sir Lewis Hamilton won his first race in Formula 1 as a Ferrari driver yesterday in Spain. I shocked myself when I found myself rooting for him when I saw he had a strong chance. I spent a lot of years hating Hamilton when Bottas was his teammate at Mercedes, but after Bottas left Mercedes and Hamilton's winning ways got overshadowed by the Verstappen era of dominance, the hatred cooled to a mild indifference. I was glad he won again finally.

 

[BrawlMan]

Toxic sports fans need to go fuck themselves. They lose a champion game? They riot. They win? They still riot. Also, Knicks fans were beating up Spurs fans.

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[Bob_McMillan]

Loving the Spain vs Cabo Verde memes. Genuinely thought people were just joking about the 0-0 score. Lotta things wrong with this world cup, but magic moments like this can still happen.

Toxic sports fans need to go fuck themselves. They lose a champion game? They riot. They win? They still riot. Also, Knicks fans were beating up Spurs fans.

​

Not gonna lie, I really fucking hate sports fans. But I do have to wonder if many sports would be this successful if their fans weren't batshit crazy. I love badminton, and it would be rare for badminton fans to even cheer too loudly, but it is also a shrinking sport. I'd like to think sports can still succeed without toxicity. I guess Formula 1 is good example maybe?

 

[Xprimentyl]

Not gonna lie, I really fucking hate sports fans.

I started to post this sentiment in response a couple f days ago. "Sports" fans are not a unique, all-encompassing group by virtue of "sports;" fans of sports, as in pretty much every walk of life, have a subset of mental people who are problematic and not necessarily representative of the larger group. The fans that behave as in this case are most likely people with self-control issues; they probably drink too much, are prone to anger, quick to violence, etc., and those things are probably just as likely to be an issue on a random Tuesday as an NBA Finals game. I don't think the handful of people who stormed the Capitol on January 6th represent EVERYONE who's passionate about politics.

I'd like to think sports can still succeed without toxicity. I guess Formula 1 is good example maybe?

Formula 1 fans are the WORST in terms of toxicity, they're just more passive-aggressive about it. They may not take to the streets in a few minutes of angry passion and attack someone, but they certainly can make any outsider feel unwelcome if their opinion is unpopular/differing from their own. No matter which driver/team you support, there is no shortage of F1 fans who will disparage that opinion. Their level of toxicity is befitting the rich man's sport that is F1; they won't lower themselves to publicly burn a couch in protest, but they will certainly personally attack and gaslight dissenters of differing beliefs. I jested about it a couple of post up, but it's been 5 years, and the debate is still a heated one between fans as to whether Lewis Hamilton's record-breaking 8th title was stolen by Max Verstappen in 2021. You want toxic? Go into any F1 forum and take any opinion on the issue, and you'll be received with the kind of passive-aggressive vitriol that calls into question you fundamentally as a person.

 

[BrawlMan]

Loving the Spain vs Cabo Verde memes. Genuinely thought people were just joking about the 0-0 score. Lotta things wrong with this world cup, but magic moments like this can still happen.

Not gonna lie, I really fucking hate sports fans. But I do have to wonder if many sports would be this successful if their fans weren't batshit crazy. I love badminton, and it would be rare for badminton fans to even cheer too loudly, but it is also a shrinking sport. I'd like to think sports can still succeed without toxicity. I guess Formula 1 is good example maybe?

The Spurs fans did not riot though. They accepted their losses gracefully and went on about their lives.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Messi, pushing 39, scores a hat trick against Algeria and Argentina wins 3-0. Beautiful first match for Arg. Love this game.

 

[Gordon_4]

Australia loses against USA 2-0. From what I gather, we did not put a good showing in and the USA team took advantage of that; as they should.