It's FIFA Time Again

[Liberalman]

It's FIFA Time Again

http://www.fifa.com/

Up until world soccer came to America I thought the game was invented for people that couldn’t play any other serious team sport.

The scores were low as in you could go for a whole game and get one goal and if no one scored then you go to overtime and still no goal, shootouts.

A friend talk me into a sucker bet which I thought at the time that I had the advantage I think Italy and Brazil I had Italy and I knew they played good soccer and who the heck was Brazil some backwoods agriculture country growing coffee, bananas and drugs I thought what would they know about soccer.

I later found out that Brazil has a modern economy and they don’t depend on oil from other countries and they are very high tech.

Since I made a bet this meant I had to watch the game so I could collect my money but at the end of the game I owed the money and I became hooked on the world cup soccer.

Soccer is a great game and is cheap sport all you need is a soccer ball and a lot of energy to play because when you are on the field you are constantly running.

Soccer is my new sport well the FIFA World Cup is since I live in a city where there is five different major sports to watch I don’t have time to watch soccer now if I lived in Saskatchewan I could watch more soccer because all they have is the CFL and that’s another story.

 

[Tonington]

That was a sucker bet. Brazil is the only nation which has qualified for every single World Cup, and they hold the most titles. On my high school soccer team, we had a few exchange students. Two Brazilians and a Mexican. Very skilled, but they flopped like mad. Coach used to rip them when they would do it during practice! Lol

 

[L Gilbert]

What is flopped?

 

[darkbeaver]

you know, after sex

 

[L Gilbert]

you know, after sex

People have sex during soccer practise? How strange.

 

[darkbeaver]

You're just uptight, soccer practice is very er lubricating exercise, after practice it's the first thing you go for.

 

[L Gilbert]

You're just uptight, soccer practice is very er lubricating exercise, after practice it's the first thing you go for.

Ton said "during practise". Can't read very well today?

 

[Tonington]

Flopped, like taking a dive. Acting, and not very good acting. Cortez would flop to the ground after any contact and say "Penalty, penalty!" ...during practice no less!

 

[Blackleaf]

Up until world soccer came to America I thought the game was invented for people that couldn’t play any other serious team sport.

The only serious team sports are football - or "sacker" as North Americans mysteriously call it - rugby union, rugby league and cricket. Baseball, American football, basketball and ice hockey are not what I consider to be serious team sports. They're all sports that would appear on something like Monty Python. Consider American football. Whose idea was it to play a game in which the players not only wear leotards but also oversized hemets, extravagantly huge 1980s-style shoulder pads and probably a bit of Kevlar body armour, even though the game is about as physical as butterfly catching?

Football is THE number one team sport on the planet, and probably the ONLY team sport in which you are guaranteed to see kids playing in almost every nation (you'll be hard pressed to find British kids playing baseball in the local park). And the Brazilians, who have won the World Cup more times than anyone else, undoubtedly produce the world's best footballers - Brazil has given us the likes of Pele, Ronaldo, Ronaldinho and Kaka.

Cricket is probably the second most popular team sport in the the world, being the national sport of more countries other than football. In India, with a population of over 1 billion, cricket is almost a religion.

In fact, the top 6 biggest international sporting tournaments are football or Rugby Union tournaments.

Here are the biggest international sporting tournaments in the world in terms of total attendance:

Football World Cup (1994): 3,587,538
Rugby Union World Cup (2007): 2,274,037
Women's Football World Cup (2007): 1,190,971
Euro2008 (2008 ): 1,140,902
Football's Asian Cup (2004): 1,000,025
Rugby Union's Six Nation's Championship (2008 ): 981,060
World Baseball Classic (2009): 801,408
Cricket World Cup (2007): 672,000
******************************************

Countries which have won most Football World Cups:

Brazil: 5 (1958, 1962, 1970, 1994, 2002)
Italy: 4 (1934, 1938, 1982, 2006)
Germany: 3 (1954, 1974 (both as West Germany), 1990)
Argentina: 2 (1978, 1986)
Uruguay: 2 (1930, 1950)
England: 1 (1966)
France: 1 (1998 )

 

[Blackleaf]

By the way. The draw has taken place for next year's World Cup in South Africa, and England have been given an easy ride to make it through to the latter stages.

They have been drawn in Group C, with USA, Algeria and Slovenia.

England, Algeria, Slovenia, Yanks

England have never played Algeria, either in tournaments or friendlies. England have played Slovenia only once - in September this year - in a 2-1 friendly win.

England last played the USA earlier this year, winning 2-0. Though the two nations haven't played each other in the World Cup since 1950 - England's first World Cup - when the USA minnows ran out shock 1-0 winners in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. US football fans still consider this their greatest ever win - and England fans consider their worst defeat.

And look at poor North Korea. They are the lowest ranked team in the tournament, and it is their first appearance in the tournament since 1966. King Jong-il has said that any match that North Korea loses will not be shown to the public in case it embarrasses the "Democratic" Republic of North Korea. And you have to laugh, because they have been drawn in the Group of Death, alongside five-time winners Brazil, Portugal, and the Ivory Coast (who are many people's favourites to win the World Cup).

A guide to England's 2010 World Cup opponents:

United States
Population: 304,059,724
Any Famous Players? Captain Landon Donovan, Everton's Tim Howard, Fulham's Clint Dempsey.
Notable Moments in History? Declared itself independent from Britain on July 4th 1776. About time we got our revenge.
Produced anyone famous? Where do we start? Neil Armstrong, Michael Jackson, Barack Obama, Vanilla Ice (maybe not)....
So What Have They Done In World Cups? Managed third place in 1930, their most successful showing in a World Cup. Shocked England by defeating them 1-0 in Brazil in 1950, which many US fans still consider to be their country's greatest victory. Reached the quarter-finals in 2002 and lost 1-0 to Germany. This will be their sixth successive appearance in the tournament, but have not faced England in the World Cup since 1950.
Most Likely To Say? "Our offence was awesome and kept pumping it into their endzone. We were two-zip up at the first time-out and ended up whupping them suckers three-zip..."


Algeria
Population: 34.9 million
Any Famous Players? Defender Antar Yahia is their star and Khamel Ghilas plays for Hull City.
Notable Moments in History? Gained independence from France in 1962.
Produced anyone famous? Philospoher Albert Camus (a former goalkeeper), and Cheb Mami, who collaborated with Sting on hit song Desert Rose.
So What Have They Done In World Cups? Never got past the group stage in 1982 or 1986 (though they were cheated out of qualifying for the next round in 1982 by West Germany and Austria), and have never played England.
Most Likely To Say? "What I know most surely about morality and the duty of man I owe to sport." (Albert Camus)

Slovenia
Population: 2 million
Any Famous Players? Milivoje Novakovic is considered their best.
Notable Moments in History? Only former Yugoslav state to join EU.
Produced anyone famous? Melania Trump, wife of US bilionaire Donald Trump, and Monkees legend Mickey Dolenz.
So What Have They Done In World Cups? This will be only their second World Cup as an independent nation. Their first, in 2002, was a shambles.
Most Likely To Say? "Slabo mi je kot a papiga, Brian..." (I am as sick as a parrot, Brian. "Smo bili ropar, Lawro!" (We wuz robbed, Lawro!"

Here are the groups for the 2010 World Cup. The top two teams in each group progress to the Last 16 of the tournament. The World Cup runs from June 11-July 11th 2010.

Group A
South Africa
Mexico
Uruguay
France

Group B
Argentina
Nigeria
South Korea
Greece

Group C
England
USA
Algeria
Slovenia

Group D
Germany
Australia
Serbia
Ghana

Group E
Holland
Denmark
Japan
Cameroon

Group F
Italy
Paraguay
New Zealand
Slovakia

Group G
Brazil
North Korea
Ivory Coast
Portugal

Group H
Spain
Switzerland
Honduras
Chile

 

[Liberalman]

I hope to see Canada in the World Cup one day

 

[L Gilbert]

Flopped, like taking a dive. Acting, and not very good acting. Cortez would flop to the ground after any contact and say "Penalty, penalty!" ...during practice no less!

Ah. Thanks, Ton. Funny characters.
We had a few that were the opposite, any contact would be grounds for all-out attack. They either smartened up or weren't included in the future. We had a pretty good handle on gamesmanship.

 

[L Gilbert]

The only serious team sports are football - or "sacker" as North Americans mysteriously call it - rugby union, rugby league and cricket. Baseball, American football, basketball and ice hockey are not what I consider to be serious team sports. They're all sports that would appear on something like Monty Python. Consider American football. Whose idea was it to play a game in which the players not only wear leotards but also oversized hemets, extravagantly huge 1980s-style shoulder pads and probably a bit of Kevlar body armour, even though the game is about as physical as butterfly catching?

lmao. Actually, I think you're right about American football, but outside of professional basketball, baseball, and hockey, these are pretty serious sports as the players who aren't looking to be big money makers in the future are into the sports because they love them. If you meant serious as in riots at real football games like you have over in the UK, then no, there is little of that.

Football is THE number one team sport on the planet, and probably the ONLY team sport in which you are guaranteed to see kids playing in almost every nation (you'll be hard pressed to find British kids playing baseball in the local park). And the Brazilians, who have won the World Cup more times than anyone else, undoubtedly produce the world's best footballers - Brazil has given us the likes of Pele, Ronaldo, Ronaldinho and Kaka.

Cricket is probably the second most popular team sport in the the world, being the national sport of more countries other than football. In India, with a population of over 1 billion, cricket is almost a religion.

In fact, the top 6 biggest international sporting tournaments are football or Rugby Union tournaments.

Here are the biggest international sporting tournaments in the world in terms of total attendance:

Football World Cup (1994): 3,587,538
Rugby Union World Cup (2007): 2,274,037
Women's Football World Cup (2007): 1,190,971
Euro2008 (2008 ): 1,140,902
Football's Asian Cup (2004): 1,000,025
Rugby Union's Six Nation's Championship (2008 ): 981,060
World Baseball Classic (2009): 801,408
Cricket World Cup (2007): 672,000
******************************************

Countries which have won most Football World Cups:

Brazil: 5 (1958, 1962, 1970, 1994, 2002)
Italy: 4 (1934, 1938, 1982, 2006)
Germany: 3 (1954, 1974 (both as West Germany), 1990)
Argentina: 2 (1978, 1986)
Uruguay: 2 (1930, 1950)
England: 1 (1966)
France: 1 (1998 )

Yep.