I have to go with Buffon and not Bartez for a finals. ITA must test him earlier from the distance. I would start Giraldino and let him (and Totti) shot from 25-30 meters. Besides , with 40 days annual vacation in France , there is a good odds that some frogs will take a day of. Viera is the man to mark for FRA. Forza ITALIA !
Don't lie awake about it. Next week, the whole world will have forgotten everything about it. Soccer is basically a politician's scandelously financed gimmick giving those plenty of opportunity to show their faces on TV and to posture themselves as sharing the "little man's tastes". In fact they reach deep in the soccer drugged "little man's" pockets to entertain lifestyles far beyond the dreams of most hardworking people.
man oh man... some people make it too obvious. you haven't lived outside of the US for any amount of time. so it is almost impossible for you to understand other cultures.....
The thing that makes me mad is when players dive, fake excruciating pain and then ask the ref for penalty kicks or showing the red card to the other guy. Portugal, Argentina, Italia, and Brazil (in this order) are the masters of BS imho. Why does the FIFA rules and refs allow BS teams to get away with it, I have no idea. Portugal is the team I hate most, I'm sure a lot of people wants to kick that Ronaldo guy's ass, first in line is Rooney. That's why good soccer has been scant in this tournament. BS paid off better than good playing. I didn't like the US team at all. I like the no BS, aggresive, effective play of Germany, England and Netherlands', France is OK too. The Czech Republic first match was spectacular. I have no idea why they lost their other matches.
He has kind of a point, though, and it is valid for all popular sports. I went to Hamburg last week, and on the train I met a Mexican. He was in Germany to follow all the matches that Mexico played. He told me he was a vet working at Bayer. Now, how much can he earn? And he has a family. Well, this guy told me that for Argentina - Mexico he paid 600 euros. When I think of it I can't believe it. Either this guy has some other money somewhere else or he is completely crazy
Valid comment. Yet I would like to make a distinction between the case when a player just dives for no reason and when a player dives after a foul, even if he really doesn't have to. In the second case the player might be to blame, but it's still a foul, and maybe a penalty. As far as I know FIFA gave explicit instructions to be particularly severe with faked fouls. That, as far as I see, hasn't been really done. A real shame, in my opinion, is also to fake a foul to waste time when your team is winning. oh yeah? Wouldn't you say that Henry helped it a bit? I would tend to disagree, but I guess we could discuss it for ages. Nevertheless, as I said, it was foul. Carvalho clearly touched him. Very stupid.