Segun Oluwaniyi

Any fan of Nigerian football is required to hate Argentina, just based on the history, but I was supporting them today. So happy for Messi. He has fully earned this night. It was and is tiring to hear about what this man has not done, when has given us so much as lovers of football.

3 minutes ago, Mike said:

Given that Mike is posting this, it is notable that the flags listed reflect that it was taken from a place where Liverpool supporters congregate.

11 minutes ago, Mike said:

I'm not shocked that you dived, y'all always dive and cheat, I'm amazed it was reviewed and upheld.

We have fundamentally changed the sport, and (imo) made it less enjoyable, only to still have rubbish like this result in a free goal during the biggest matches. It is terrible. A disgraceful decision.

Anyway, I quite like the English people. On here and in real life, I have generally found a level of joy and acceptance when interacting with them and obviously have been trained to speak their language. I wish them well. Forza Azzurri on Sunday.

Mbappe is not even the fastest player on the French team.

3 minutes ago, gbandit said:

I’d make them favourites if they had a different manager, maybe they still are in spite of him

People should calm down with the hatred for Deschamps a bit, imo. They have had nothing but positive results and strong tournaments since he has arrived and this was not the case at all before his arrival. They will be incredibly difficult to beat, assuming they survive here.

In terms of centrebacks with Congolese parentage, I will take Mbemba over Kimpembe. I have never understood the hype around this guy. He is fine in Ligue 1, but struggles in big matches, often.

Rabiot is actually a significant downgrade from Matuidi when comparing this team to the WC winners in 2018. I am not really sure what he provides to this side and he looks awkward out wide, tbh.

1 minute ago, KaKa said:

That centre back that was on him was so bad.

Lenglet. He was consistently mistake prone and weak when I saw him play for Barcelona this season.

8 minutes ago, Super Duper Branko Strupar said:

 

Id feel bad for most of the Portuguese players which I like. Be fucking mint if Ronaldo fucked off early in tears though. Would love to not have to endure more fucking Ronaldo patter for the rest of the tourny

 

 

 

Unless my calculations are off, Portugal will need to lose by four goals to actually go out below Finland. So a simple loss would not affect them too badly.

Edit: Hungary could beat Germany and knock them out I suppose.

I favour Denmark to beat Wales and then Netherlands to reach the semifinals.

Turkey are the worst team in this tournament by a large distance.

2 minutes ago, triggs said:

One of those that is very soft as a penalty but its definitely given as a foul anywhere else on the pitch 

Right, this is given as a foul multiple times every match I feel, but I cannot recall ever seeing a penalty for a challenge like that before, pre-VAR or post-VAR.

Daka will be a wonderful signing for Leicester. There is always a danger of a player flopping from a small league, but it is just hard for me to see him being anything other than very good. Soumare and Daka for <50 million pounds would be good work and typical for that club.

The multiple locations make this an odd tournament, imo. I am not sure what I am meant to be making of Italy and the Netherlands beating inferior opponents in front of loud, home crowds. It doesn't bear any resemblance to what the knockout stages will be, outside of England, who can win the tournament only playing away from home once and are the de facto host nation. Some of the groups even have 2 of the 4 teams playing 2 or 3 of their matches at home. Very different from any group stage I can think of in a tournament like this. 

9 minutes ago, Super Duper Branko Strupar said:

 

 You know people will give a fuck. That's why we have fucking VAR. If someone is played through and is possibly going to score, if the flag is then raised and they stop, only to then have VAR say it was wrong. Theyve been denied that goal scoring opportunity. Or the player plays on, the defenders stop and raise thir hands. The players scores then the defending team kick off because they stopped because it was given offside. But then VAR over rules it.. Happened a couple of times. Both situations are awful. So is the late flag but it's a symptom of VAR.

There is a difference between someone being clear for a shot on goal (Shelvey vs. Sheffield and Iheanacho vs. Everton last season) and just being offside and continuing play for an indeterminate amount of time, though. We can definitely waste less time and not wait 30 seconds to call when a goal is not immediately resulting.

Edit: I love Mbappe's style of running. So little wasted motion. It doesn't look like he is working hard at all and the boy is just flying past everyone.

 I do not know enough about the player to be making any sort of pronouncements, but based on 30 minutes of this one match, this Nico Gonzalez boy is complete rubbish. 

1 hour ago, Wullie said:

The more people boo, the less likely they are to bring it to an end, and rightly so. Fuck giving those Neanderthals any satisfaction.

The idea that the players will make a political gesture in front of 20,000+ people representing a large sampling of society and receive no backlash is silly, though. What makes their gesture separate from the countless other ones made daily in your society and met with varying levels of genuine support, reluctant acquiescence, apathy, and outright opposition? I find the kneeling a waste of everyone's time, frankly, but the players should continue with it if that is their wish, I suppose. It does vex me to continually see these articles of people who are supposedly outraged that there has been booing, though. There was a significant level of unhappiness with this one year ago when public sentiment was more in favour and people were desperate to see football in any capacity. We are now a year on from this, with less favourable conditions for it, what else could be expected?

3 hours ago, Jaqen said:

It's a difficult one. Actually feels like we are going backwards with views and attitudes on racism in football though. Unbelievable the abuse that players have to put up with now. So there's a definite need for some sort of message and raising of awareness to be done. 

Is there a genuine increase in abuse or just a magnification of the anti-social, deviant, and demented behaviour permeating in the wretched realm of social media? Any one of the billion or so people following Premier League football can post a monkey emoji at a player while wiping their ass. It is a fair bit different than policing what happens at football grounds; the sport has not control over this, nor does government in free nations. The clubs and players "boycotting" these platforms for a week was the only truly correct step taken in that regard because the proper response to this trend in society is to remove yourself from it entirely, if there is an effect on well-being or mental health.

15 minutes ago, Inferior Acuña said:

Set up Shelvey at Sheff U too - think maybe a few more assists?

My main memory is the header that hit Dier's arm to give Newcastle a nonsense point against Spurs. I suppose that would be an assist as well.

54 minutes ago, Super Duper Branko Strupar said:

Alex Scott.

And how do they mean "hang out"?

In one sense I will take that one Jamaican girl from ESPN, Alexis Nunes, and "hang out" with her. In another sense I will take Ian Wright or Shearer and "hang out" with them.

This Copa America has seemed poisoned from the beginning. They did the same trick as AFCON in 2013, when changing from even to odd years, and instead of having one extra year between tournaments, decided to have tournaments in consecutive years for purely financial reasons. Having this tournament and WC qualifiers all in this break is madness and just reckless towards the players. They needed to just cancel this or move it to Florida months ago, but I am sure they will persist.

On 03/06/2021 at 11:07, gdm said:

Ligue 1 going from 20 teams to 18 teams from 2023

Surprising that this would be done after the Coupe de la Ligue was terminated last season. You would think it would be one or the other in terms of limiting fixture congestion.

Watching Burnley attack is a carcinogen.

On 16/05/2021 at 07:06, Stifler said:

We should be all over David.

I doubt Lille will be selling David this summer. He cost 30 million euro and they would probably receive a fee less than what was paid for Pepe and Osimhen, who were bought for much less, if they were to sell him now. They will want to keep him a while longer to increase his value; the guy has shown great improvement recently, but struggled initially in Ligue 1, tbh.

Funny thing this year for Lille is that for all the wonderful young talent they sign, possibly the most important player this season has been a 35 year old they brought over this season. 

On 06/05/2021 at 17:12, neesy111 said:

Thought he would do well but he's on a tight rope now.  Should just concentrate on playing their youngsters and ditch PEA etc.

I thought Leicester were terrible outside of the brilliant goal and some great last-ditch defending by Soyuncu and Schmeichel, tbh.

Very happy to see them win, though. Delighted for Kele and Ndidi of course and anything that makes the Super League look even more ridiculous is great to me. Genuinely a very good club and very likable team, hard to dislike them at all.

I do not think Leicetser have been playing too well recently, tbh, Kelechi has been remarkably efficient around the box and their defense is very strong, but Vardy, Maddison, Ricardo, Perez, etc. are off-form/not scoring goals. If Newcastle play the way they did in April, not the rubbish against Arsenal, there is a good chance they can get a result here, imo. Put Saint-Maximin, Almiron, Willock, and Wilson on the pitch in whatever formation, let Leicester have the ball, and counter quickly when it's won back.

Like most, though, I am not too concerned with the result here, any positive result against Sheffield Blades would probably guarantee safety, and Fulham getting six points from the next three matches seems improbable anyway. Leicester are preferable in the Champions League to any of the clubs chasing them, so I don't begrudge them at all. It would be nice to see them win the FA Cup as well.

I actually quite like Mbappe, Kimpembe, and Navas, but it would cause me an inordinate amount of joy to this squad, assembled with billions and given two separate world class managers, lose the CL and Coupe de France, finish behind Lille/PSG, and end the season with nothing. 

Great goal by NUFC old boy Haidara for Lens today. Just promoted from the second tier and very good chance they go to Europa league next season, sitting ahead of OM now.