Group B is drunk. With the top teams not sealing the deal in their first match, there’s a good chance that Qatar or Bosnia will qualify for the knockout stage. So if the US wins Group D, one of those could very possibly be our opponent.
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...or things could get really nuts and Canada could advance.
I understand Morocco is a sleeper favorite, but Brazil looks so..... pedestrian.
I was assuming Canada and Switzerland still finish 1 and 2 in the group. But you’re right. Canada could easily finish 3rd and setup a potential round of 32 meeting with the US. And that would be bonkers.
I’m not exactly sure how the 3rd place teams are distributed whether that’s a drawing or criteria.
Or worse. Switzerland could finish 3rd after only getting a draw against the weakest team in the group. That’s not a team I’d want to play in the round of 32.
They are, but the way the talking heads were making it sound they weren't exactly playing well before the injuries started piling up - as in, they didn't look great in qualifying, either (finished fifth in CONMEBOL). And it's been awhile since they've done much in a World Cup as well.
Not major injuries. Yea, Neymar is hurt, but many like me didn’t even think that he should have been called for the World Cup. Hasn’t played well in years.
It’s just a very average Brazilian team. Coach also playing favorites instead of players that have actually performed well.
Brazil may not look great as a team, but they still have individual players that can change the face of a game.
Sounds like Morocco hit the portal hard landing players from Canada, Belgium, The Netherlands and France! / sarcasm
Just flipped over from the NBA game. Saw the red uniforms and was questioning my understanding of the racial makeup of Haiti. Why is Scotland wearing red?
That’s been their secondary uniform for years, it’s Salmon (officially). They can’t wear their home blue because of some crazy uniform rules. In the World Cup, FIFA goes for the biggest contrast possible for TV and sort of for the officials. Since Haiti is the home team, they chose their goalkeeper to wear yellow, Scotland goalkeeper must wear his blue uniform (his secondary), which means even though it is a different shade, Scotland can’t wear their traditional blue.
Here is what every team is wearing for every currently scheduled tournament game.
FIFA Digital Assets Hub
digitalhub.fifa.com
I was dogging our team during the Germany friendly, but last night's match their offense looked amazing. And after witnessing that, I was not impressed by either Morocco or Brazil. Morocco especially had a very disjointed attack. The goal they got was beautiful, but was given to them by Brazil.
It's funny how people keep dogging the Paraguay game because "they finished 6th in CONMEBOL qualifying" and "their ELO rank isn't that high" so "we beat up on a team that wasn't that good"... but when you actually look at it Paraguay finished in a 4-way tie for 3rd place in CONMEBOL but was the 6th selection by goal differential; at the same time they beat Argentina, Ecuador, and Brazil in qualifying, and supposedly had the best defense of all the CONMEBOL teams... a defense we made our plaything.
Have we arrived yet? Of course not - there's a very long way to go, and we have a very long history of very underwhelming performances on the world stage. At the same time, I have zero problems with celebrating that performance for a few more days, either. That was a damn good performance against what might not be a great team, but at the very least was supposed to be a very good defense. And by winning in the fashion we won that game, we not only put ourselves in very good position to advance, but very good position to win the group outright. That 3 goal differential after one game is huge.
And as far as the ELO rankings (which I will put a whole lot more stock in, as I would say FIFA rankings are equivalent to the AP Top 25 whereas ELO rankings are more equivalent to pick your college computer ranking)... as of today's rankings USA and Paraguay are tied for 26th... and that was after what we did to them last night. So disparaging Paraguay as this team to somehow bring down what USA accomplished last night is one of those things I just don't get.
Pretty sure the only time Australia would ever have to wear anything different is if Brazil or South Africa (I think?) choose to wear their yellow jerseys. Can't think of anyone else that wears yellow.
