FIFA World Cup 2018

I can’t believe Russia pulled this off. Great tournament.

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You can’t find the eloquent grace of soccer in hockey, that’s for sure. It’s almost like a ballet at times. You can find pathos in some of these WC games, especially near the end when everyone is playing their hearts out, and fighting back tears knowing they won’t have another chance for 4 years.

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Your fixing needs some fixing :yum:

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Because, as per rule, the VAR cannot be used when a foul happens outside the penalty box.

I think Croatia looked like the better team throughout the game. Very active and aggressive, going forward all the time, passing really well, creating many chances, going into France penalty box quite easily.

The first goal was bad luck, defender needs to head this, was just a little bit too high, so not his fault, really.
The second goals was awesome.
The third goal was a clear penalty, his hand had no business going from high up down toward the ball.
The two long-distance goals by France were a combination of individual class and a bit of poor defending, can’t give Pogba and Mbappe so much space to get a shot off.
The last goal was hilarious.

In the end, France weathered the storm, they did win without really controlling the game.

Was fun to watch, end-to-end football. Not much controversy. Unlike some posters here, I think the ref did not make any major mistake.

In the end it’s a big nation that wins again. Very difficult for a smaller nation to break through that ceiling. Brazil (5), Germany (4), Italy (4), Argentina (2), France (2), Spain (1), England (1), the only smaller nation was Uruguay (2), but that was a long time ago.

The Netherlands came close 3 times, now Croatia. Now one else in recent memory.

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Colonialism, yay!

I would’ve loved to see Croatia win.

Ah well. As World Cup champs France would say “c’est la vie!”

It is not representative of the country though. The reason why there are many blacks in French team is because in sport everyone has the same chances to succeed, and since blacks usually are good at sports that require speed and strength, they succeed in football. I think a lot of people are overreacting about this “African French team” but I guess that 's the Internet era we are living in.

By the way @Belgian_Pie must be in utter ruins after yesterday’s result. Such a cute hater :star_struck:

Of course. Although it still says something, and I’m guessing not the kind of thing that Trump, Boris or Le Pen feed on.

In any case, a big congratulations is due to France.

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That if you cherrypick talents born in different countries they can be a better team than one whose players are all born in the same (and fairly small) one? True dat!

Don’t watch soccer. But: Allez les bleus! :fr:

My granddaddy’s great great granddaddy would be proud.

Ok, back to LeBron joining the great purple & gold! :smiling_imp:

The Clippers back to playing second fiddle for the next few years, that’s for sure. :slight_smile:

Now that I think of it, I’m surprised we don’t have an official Nba thread. We have many 'muricans here, and even people from other countries tend to follow it.

How many of the French team were born and raised in France ?
It did look somewhat like Croatia against France and Rest of Africa .

Interestingly it’s the reverse case. There were 50 French-born players at the World Cup. 21 of the 23 man French squad were born in France. 29 French-born players played for their countries of origin.

About time, they’ve stolen our thunder for far too long! How ya liking Detroit now, Blake Griffin??

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Yep it seems it was common to both teams. There were actually 50 players in the world cup that were born in France.
Two of the French team were foreign born.
Even then I think they are qualified to play but if they were just hoovering up players from Africa that would be weird.
France with its large population simply has a big advantage , same as other countries in Europe with large populations .

I think generally speaking, threads about sports have not been that popular on Forumosa in the past. We could easily start one about the NBA. I would add my three pennies all the time…