World Cup Fever

[Brudder Andrusha]

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Still incorrect. Brazil won the 1954 World Cup in Sweden. But yes, all the other times the WC has been in Europe, a European team has won. All the times its been in the Americas a South American team has won.

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Still incorrect...

Brazil won the WC in Sweden in 1958. Pele's first WC! He was a 17YO and scored twice in the 5-2 victory over host nation Sweden.

West Germany won the 1954 WC which was held in Switzerland 3-2 over Hungary after being down 2-0 to great Puskas and scoring the winner late in the game.

[Brudder Andrusha]

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The US is highly unlikely to be seeded, whereas Mexico will probably get seeded due to their lofty FIFA ranking.



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Actually Mexico (7th) is ranked only one spot higher than USA (8th).
No bias here to you Yanks, but this is clearly a misnomer.

The seedings for the WC Final Groups was calculated on a far more complicated and elaborate system which took in account previous WC Final performances and Mexico edged out USA on the count that USA failed miserably in the 1998 WC.

Arena was just recently quoted as saying Australia & Trinidad & Tobago will be a laughing stock at this coming WC. He has a lot of balls saying this coz outside the US the Yanks are the laughing stock in this sport!

[kenberman]

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[ QUOTE ]
The US is highly unlikely to be seeded, whereas Mexico will probably get seeded due to their lofty FIFA ranking.



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Actually Mexico (7th) is ranked only one spot higher than USA (8th).
No bias here to you Yanks, but this is clearly a misnomer.

The seedings for the WC Final Groups was calculated on a far more complicated and elaborate system which took in account previous WC Final performances and Mexico edged out USA on the count that USA failed miserably in the 1998 WC.

Arena was just recently quoted as saying Australia & Trinidad & Tobago will be a laughing stock at this coming WC. He has a lot of balls saying this coz outside the US the Yanks are the laughing stock in this sport!

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USA ended up being seeded #9 in the WC this year - 1 spot ahead of Holland.

If USA is a laughingtsock, then I guess so is Holland. And Sweden. And the Czech Republic. etc, etc

[Brudder Andrusha]

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[

USA ended up being seeded #9 in the WC this year - 1 spot ahead of Holland.

If USA is a laughingtsock, then I guess so is Holland. And Sweden. And the Czech Republic. etc, etc

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Seeded 9th means they have to face a real team for the once in 4 years.

Do I have to remind you how badly the US performed in the 1998 WC?

Holland has a far more impressive record going into this WC than the US and are ranked 3rd in the WC. Undefeated in the UEFA Group 1 qualifying group which had the high ranking Czech Republic and Romania. The only reason they didn't get seeded is because they failed to make the WC last time.


Here is the pot that the US was placed into:
Asia, CONCACAF and the lowest UEFA ranked team Serbia&Montenegro.

Iran
Japan
Saudi Arabia
South Korea
Costa Rica
Trinidad & Tobago
United States
Serbia & Montenegro

Yep - Thats about right!

[scott8]

I'm going to at least one of the USA games.

Whose with me??

[kenberman]

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Do I have to remind you how badly the US performed in the 1998 WC?

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no, b/c you seem intent on mentioning this useless fact in every post.

instead:

1) how about you tell me why this matters to the current US team

2) why don't you tell me why you are ignoring the last World Cup, where we reached the quarterfinals and outplayed eventual finalist Germany.

3)Tell me why you think 1998 is more important than 2002.

[Brudder Andrusha]

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no, b/c you seem intent on mentioning this useless fact in every post.

instead:

1) how about you tell me why this matters to the current US team



2) why don't you tell me why you are ignoring the last World Cup, where we reached the quarterfinals and outplayed eventual finalist Germany.

3)Tell me why you think 1998 is more important than 2002.

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1. It was a reason why Mexico was a seeded team and the US wasn't.

2. Yes, the USA qualified after the Round Robin Stage - but barely. Losing to Poland and drawing with South Korea. The Portugal victory was ok, but if they played today Portugal would be favourites. A victory over CONCACAF rivals Mexico. Fair enuff! But Germany is not what it used to be. Sure USA has improved but if you think you are worth your number 8 ranking in the world - Then you must think think the world only exist in Columbus, Portland and Salt Lake City.

3. It just shows you that the US can perform better than other times. In 1998 the US was crowned the worst team at the WC tournament. 2002 was a much better performance. But I reckon the time zone of Asia helped. This time in Europe lets see which teams are drawn out of the hat Dec. 9th.

[Aces McGee]

[ QUOTE ]
Here is the pot that the US was placed into:
Asia, CONCACAF and the lowest UEFA ranked team Serbia&Montenegro.

Iran
Japan
Saudi Arabia
South Korea
Costa Rica
Trinidad & Tobago
United States
Serbia & Montenegro


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Doesn't this have a lot more to do with draw rules than how good the U.S. is? All the non-seeded European teams went into one pot so that the there wouldn't be more than two European side in each group, so the U.S. (and the rest of CONCACAF -- an admittedly weak region, particularly outside the top two) were bound to be placed with either the African nations or the Asian nations.

And as someone pointed out, it's weird that you are ignoring 2002, when the U.S. upset Portugal in group play and lost a very tough match to eventual finalists Germany in the round of 8.

-McGee

[Aces McGee]

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2. Yes, the USA qualified after the Round Robin Stage - but barely. Losing to Poland and drawing with South Korea. The Portugal victory was ok, but if they played today Portugal would be favourites. A victory over CONCACAF rivals Mexico. Fair enuff! But Germany is not what it used to be. Sure USA has improved but if you think you are worth your number 8 ranking in the world - Then you must think think the world only exist in Columbus, Portland and Salt Lake City.


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Portugal were seeded AND two years later were finalists at the European championships. South Korea were a semi-finalist in this World Cup. Germany were finalists. There is no viable way to discredit the U.S.' performance in 2002. I'm not saying they are deserving of a seed in 2006 (although as has been pointed out, the U.S. were just barely beaten out for the final seed by Italy), but you seem to be going out of your way to mock the U.S., when all recent signs point to them being an up-and-coming nation on the international scene.

-McGee

[Brudder Andrusha]

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And as someone pointed out, it's weird that you are ignoring 2002, when the U.S. upset Portugal in group play and lost a very tough match to eventual finalists Germany in the round of 8.

-McGee

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I'm not ignoring the 2002 campaign. In terms of seeding it helped of course.

The Portugal victory was a shock. Ithough they played better against a Mexico team that was intent on playing physical rather than playing the ball.

Even though Germany made it to the Finals, you could hardly equate that team to the 1974 West German team.