I always thought it was a requirement to root for England over Germany.


Wheels

Good luck

They will still lose in the penalties.

Damn, Belgium won 1-0.

Some thoughts on the group stage.

Once again, you never know. It's always tempting to feel like the teams that will progress are easily identified before a ball is kicked. But it never shakes out that way, and is one of the reasons that the World Cup is such a wonderful event. The German capitulation might be the biggest 'shock', but as I outlined in my last post, it really shouldn't be much of a surprise. You could see it coming in the build-up. Complacency and overconfidence are a dangerous mix in such an abbreviated format. The margin for error is very slim, with a single defeat being all it takes to fail to progress.

As holders, there was an air of 'wake us up for the final'. The Mexico result should have been that wake up call, and if not for Kroos' sublime free kick at the death, Germany would have failed to win any of their matches. They finished bottom of their group! South Korea were above them. A disgrace and Low should already be gone. How he hasn't already fallen on his sword and resigned I cannot understand. If there is a silver lining in this it will be the injection of a sense of redemption for the next cycle. Complacency cannot be possible when you finished bottom of your group.

Changing gears, VAR worked well enough. In the past that South Korea goal against Germany would have been disallowed. And then maybe Germany goes on to win the whole thing, who knows? Probably not, but the important thing is to get the calls right. VAR helps do that. There are wrinkles yes, but overall I think it's been a success.

One thing that stood out to me is that few teams really stood out (in a positive sense). Belgium have looked good, and Croatia too.Sweden topping their group has to be a surprise, and Argentina nearly went home, but now anything is possible, though you see the weight of a nation of Messi's shoulders. Uruguay topped the group, didn't lose or even concede. But that was a historically bad group and let's see how they do from here.

England did enough, and have a real shot at this thing. With Italy and especially Germany out, England's traditional bogey teams are not there. It's also traditional for England to lose in the quarterfinals, so we will see if this time they can push through. Their path could hardly be better. If they can get past Colombia in the round of 16 they would face the winner of Switzerland and Sweden instead of Brazil. If James Rodriguez cannot be fit for the game, then England's chances of reaching the semis have rarely looked better.

As for standing out in the negative sense, where do you begin? Serbia were one of my sleeper picks to reach the quarterfinals, but they are going home. A poor showing for a team with so much technical brilliance. They probably weren't going to finish ahead of Brazil, but Switzerland and Costa Rica should have been navigable. Poland seem to always waltz through qualifying then implode when it matters most. Disappointing.

In case it may not have been abundantly clear before, Diego Maradona is insane.

One last thought, even though I could write pages, is that fair play needs to not be a tiebreaker. There has got to be a better way. I'm all for fair play, but when a team like Senegal gets eliminated by a referee's perception the system needs to change in my opinion. If anyone watched the second half of the final Japan game I think they'd be inclined to agree.

That is true at any level.

Yes, the 'fair play' as a tie breaker needs to be looked at.

I'd replace it by the earliest goal, would maybe entice teams to push earlier so we get a better show.

Not a bad idea rollnloop, and is better than fair play as far as I am concerned. And by the way good luck to France, they have to be considered one of the favorites now.

I've thought about some alternatives to the fair play tiebreak. Shots on goal? Corners? Record against top team in group? Maybe, but the fact remains that, like fair play, these things can be 'gamed'. If shots on goal, suddenly the team needing more will start shooting from 40 yards out with zero chance of scoring, but accumulating SoG. Or if corners, trying to ricochet it off anyone standing near the goal line, even if a better option exists to take it closer to goal. People are natural schemers and you cannot have these sorts of things where teams are gaming the game, like we saw at the end of the Japan-Poland match.

For me there is only one possibility. And that is off-day penalties. The day after the group stage ends, any teams that find themselves in this situation would be required to fly to whichever stadium is most equidistant and have it out from the spot. I see no other sporting solution to this. And wouldn't that be fun to watch?

France-Argentina is a belter of a match so far

Thanks for wishes DBond, it worked !!!!

Oh messi ciao, oh messi ciao ciao ciao !!!

What a tense game though, up to the last second.

Both teams had genius (and stupid) moments. Di Maria then Pavard's goals are superb.

Yeah, sorry I missed it, but saw the result and congrats to France. They could win this thing.

Hey who knows, why not, just like every other team qualified

Ronaldo going HOOOOMME!!!

It's all going to plan so far

Well I wasn't expecting that! Russia through on penalties.

uraaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

Seems VAR didn't do its job in the Spain-Russia game for some reason.

Fantastic stuff yesterday! The Croatia-Denmark shootout was good theatre. Looking forward to more.

Wow, that Russian team is quite impressive.

The comeback of the Cup, Belgium down 2:0 to Japan and scores the winning goal with seconds left on the clock.