2014 World Cup (Brasil)

kosherrock · **Joined:** Fri Aug 19, 2011 3:35 pm **Posts:** 3187

Tiny Tim wrote:

Fair enough. But Spain' close fixtures are kinda escaping me for some reason. Quater finals with Italy in 2008? Quater finals with Paraguay in 2010 when Paraguayans had an unconverted penalty? Semi finals with Portugal in 2012? Yeah, that's quite a few. Still when these tournaments are over I have no doubts that Spain was the best. Kinda same with France probably.

...the final in 2010

Jose · **Posted:** Thu Jun 19, 2014 8:03 am

Spain needs a clean out.
Torres, villa, xavi, xabi, Ramos, cassilas.
They really missed the passion, hunger and fight of Carlos Puyol.
Need younger, hungrier players.

Tim · **Joined:** Mon Mar 18, 2013 7:47 pm **Posts:** 11198

Bones wrote:

Based on success probably not. But overall I'd say Brazil 1970, Holland 1974, Austria 1953, Brazil 1982, and Germany 1974 were better teams. A case for 1958 Brazil and 2000 France could be made to but I personally think Spain are better than those teams.

What the fuck?

Georgi · **Joined:** Thu Oct 07, 2010 4:37 pm **Posts:** 9165

Hungary

Tim · **Joined:** Mon Mar 18, 2013 7:47 pm **Posts:** 11198

It also can be Austria 1935 but I doubt it. Good team for sure but I am not sure how you can claim that it was better than Spain without footage and all.

corrections · **Joined:** Thu Oct 07, 2010 9:11 pm **Posts:** 27988

Bones wrote:

corrections wrote:

Bones wrote:

chicken sandwich wrote:

This is filled with so much hypocrisy that my eyes rolled out of my head

Really? Do I try to act like I know everything about every team? There are even teams that I haven't even bothered to talk about. I know nothing about teams such as Iran, Nigeria, Cameroon, Ecuador, Costa Rica, and others. I don't know where the hell you get this impression. And even on the teams I do speak upon, I never act like I know everything. How can you even watch that much football to know everything about all 32 teams? You'd literally have to watch each individual qualification campaign for each team to know every single detail about them. What bothers me is Lalas acts like he does.

Yeah but the way you present knowledge is always with a heavy degree of authority and certainty

Well there are things that I do know about and if those things are proven facts, what's the problem? Do you mean the way I present my opinions? I never express them with certainty. Back when I said Italy wasn't good enough of a team, that was only because I didn't believe their squad was good enough. I never said "it is absolutely a fact that Italy will not do well because their squad isn't good enough." When I saw Italy's performance, I immediately thought they could possibly go all the way playing like that. It looks like the old vintage Italy again. But did I expect them to play like that? Absolutely not. If I ever stated an opinion in an overconfident or arrogant manner, please quote it because I don't remember doing so.

I can't speak to soccer where I definitely have less knowledge than you because I don't watch but every 4 years but I can speak to American Football where you make extremely confident and often ridiculous pronouncements only to reverse yourself like a weather vane when they end up being wrong (often predictably wrong).

And even your admission in the paragraph there with regards to Italy demonstrates his point that you sound exactly like what you accuse Lalas of being.

corrections · **Joined:** Thu Oct 07, 2010 9:11 pm **Posts:** 27988

Bones wrote:

Based on success probably not. But overall I'd say Brazil 1970, Holland 1974, Austria 1953, Brazil 1982, and Germany 1974 were better teams. A case for 1958 Brazil and 2000 France could be made to but I personally think Spain are better than those teams.

So you're admitting Lalas has an argument and we shouldn't take you seriously then?

corrections · **Joined:** Thu Oct 07, 2010 9:11 pm **Posts:** 27988

Bones wrote:

I agree with you on that. I just think Lalas should have said one of the best national sides ever. Because they definitely aren't the best. His reasoning for it was dumb too. He said that they changed the way football was played. How did they do that? What they did was take the passing elements of total football that Cruijff brought to Barca and tweaked it in their own unique way. It was some beautiful stuff but god the guy is making a huge overstatement by saying it changed football. It didn't change anything but football for Spain and Barcelona for a few years. The Brazilian team in the late 50s-early 60s is a team that you can say changed football. It was the birth of Joga Bonito. Joga Bonito was entirely new to the football world at the time. Just like total football in the 70s. But Spain's style was not something completely new like Lalas is trying to make it seem.

I state in the red text I agree. I then proceed to completely disagree while pretending to agree

corrections · **Joined:** Thu Oct 07, 2010 9:11 pm **Posts:** 27988

cloudstr wrote:

They perform very good in their club, well except Torres...but extremely poor in national team. What needed here is to change coach, training methods, tactics more than focus on players.

Why would their enourmously successful tactics need to change?

Georgi · **Joined:** Thu Oct 07, 2010 4:37 pm **Posts:** 9165

I think beyond any pronouncement about the the death of tiki taka and any tactical corrections the team needed (and they did need them - you always have to evolve to avoid being worked out), I would say the key factor for Spain's demise was that after being so enormously successful, it wass incredibly difficult to maintain that hunger. And additionally, basically all of Spain's team are regularly fighting for La Liga and the Champions League simultaneously (with this year's title race involve 3 teams) - a lot of the big players in the team have played c 60 games a year for 5 or 6 years now. They were just visibly more slugglish than so many teams at the World Cup. It's just inevitable that they would slow down. It's just incredible how sharply they did.

I suppose the trick is to recognise how to regenerate and phase out your past stars. It's very difficult to cull players who have brought you so much success though. Puts into perspective how good Fergie was.

chicken sandwich · **Joined:** Mon Oct 18, 2010 12:28 am **Posts:** 3104

Bones wrote:

chicken sandwich wrote:

Bones wrote:

Alexi Lalas is an arrogant bastard who thinks he literally knows everything about every team and everything about football. Every time I see the guy on talk shows, I simply feel like changing the channel. He still has to balls to say that Spain are the greatest national team of all time. That's fucking hilarious. I don't even think they're better than the 1998-2002 France squad.

This is filled with so much hypocrisy that my eyes rolled out of my head

Really? Do I try to act like I know everything about every team? There are even teams that I haven't even bothered to talk about. I know nothing about teams such as Iran, Nigeria, Cameroon, Ecuador, Costa Rica, and others. I don't know where the hell you get this impression. And even on the teams I do speak upon, I never act like I know everything. How can you even watch that much football to know everything about all 32 teams? You'd literally have to watch each individual qualification campaign for each team to know every single detail about them. What bothers me is Lalas acts like he does.

you are the Alexi Lalas of DDD

The Seeker · **Joined:** Tue Oct 12, 2010 9:53 am **Posts:** 1170

I hope Mourinho/Roman havent signed that £35 million cheque for Diego Costa yet.

Irrespective of his goals in Spain this year, he looks like a rabbit in headlights.

Chile play the closest to Premiership style and he just seemed so slow that he couldn't get away from anybody.

Add that his temperament is questionable (Should maybe have been sent off for the headbutt in the 1st game.)

If he moves to the Bridge, he could end up with more red cards than goals.

Georgi · **Joined:** Thu Oct 07, 2010 4:37 pm **Posts:** 9165

Nah, despite being a striker graveyard, I'd still expect him to do well at Chelsea. It wasn't so much Chile's pace that was the issue (and don't forget he's been injured a lot recently) but more he doesn't fit the Spain team. A more all round guy like Villa 2010 fits them better. He's just the kind of striker Mourinho loves.

Chemical Ali · **Joined:** Thu Oct 07, 2010 10:57 am **Posts:** 3080

Georgi wrote:

pink wrote:

What a laughable spectacle Spain have been. I thought the way they tried to run up the score in the Euro 2012 final was pretty tasteless.

Karma. They did worse than Lippi II.

I remember you going on about this in 2012. I think it was fair game. Everyone wants to see more goals.

No one told Spain that in 2010

Chemical Ali · **Joined:** Thu Oct 07, 2010 10:57 am **Posts:** 3080

Eh, I think it is a couple of things; I have been saying for about a year and a half that I thought Xavi was getting very slower, so much so that it was becoming a problem for Barca but because of his stature you can't take him out.

It is also probably fatigue - most of that team played well over 50 games for club since a ton of them were in the Semi-finals and finals of the champions league.

2014 World Cup (Brasil)

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