ponsaelius

Panenka to win it from a Spanish born player

Last minute Spain winners gonna be a sickna

Ffs man

Maroc in French. MAR is their official FIFA code.

I'm back to hating Spain again. There's no worse kind of football than death by a thousands cuts.

Their whole squad is gonna be on loan at Olympiacos next year.

Yeah I'm all for open games but Paulo Bento should have played 8 at the back here.

Hate these shitty pens. You shouldn't be allowed to stutter a run up imo. It's one thing I would change, especially since they started enforcing keepers staying on their lines so vigourously

That was absolutely dreadful. Felt like a waste of a match to see such pathetic penalties.

Extra time and pens always a useful bridge between fixtures.

Out of nothing that mind.

Get in, well deserved I think too.

Spain went out in group stages 2014 and then last 16 of both Euro 2016 and Russia. But I don't think they had a bad side for any of those tournaments. Just the sense that things has gone stale and teams had figured out how to beat a side that couldn't quite play how they wanted to anymore. This Germany definitely feels similar.

Genuinely don't think Germany played that bad in this tournament FWIW nor is the team that terrible. Early 2000s side was definitely worse despite that jammy run in 2002. Just seems to be something mentally not there and tactically stale about them at the moment. And the lack of a proper CF both in terms of available players and system is completely un-German like.

Four favourites comfortably through so far. Some upsets next couple of days wouldn't go amiss.

Nice little bonus for the tournament GPG rate.

Different class

Got to hope now they're out of the group they'll change tact a bit.

Exactly. Biggest problem for Arg was lack of pressing and intensity without Di Maria, and that allowed comfort for the Aussie defence. But once they brought in the extra CB it allowed the midfielders and wing backs to push on and they looked like they were going to cruise to a win to me. Was only a total freak goal which made things interesting in any way. Very few teams have won games convincingly in this World Cup against any sides. I thought this was pretty comfortable.

Lautaro Martinez alone missed 3 sitters and he was on about 10 minutes.

De Paul for Udinese was a silky playmaker. Now he looks like a scrapper. It's very odd. That said he's much better than some of the other CMs Argentina have had in previous years.

Bottled it. Sell.

I agree. They've won the last 3 games with relative ease, scoring 6 and conceding one freak goal. For the first time ever the system (be it 4-3-3 or the 3-5-2) is built around Messi. It's just a shame that so much of his peak powers was wasted by chaotic management from the likes of Maradona and Sampaoli. Don't think they'll convincingly beat anybody but I think they'd make every game a scrap and have a chance.

Other than a completely freak goal and a few studs up challenges Aussies offered nowt in that game tbh. Fair play to them for getting this far though.

Tactical switch, deliberate or not, has helped. Having the extra CB means the midfielders have more license to press.