Anyone watching the World Cup?

[RaphaCam]

Some weird games so far, teams don't seem exactly motivated, at least not yet. Also, so many interesting scores: Saudi Arabia 2 vs. Argentina 1, Japan 2 vs. Germany 1, Spain 7 vs. Costa Rica 0, Qatar 6500 vs. human rights 0... I'm curious to see how Brazil will do tomorrow.

 

[Asteriktos]

No.

Also, NO.

 

[Jetavan]

Can I bring my beer?

 

[Ainnir]

Nope. Not sporty.

 

[Arachne]

Thank goodness, none of the men in my life has ever had the slightest inclination towards football... It's hard to ignore in the summer, but right now, with NaNoWriMo in full swing, I'm not even aware there is such a thing.

 

[J Michael]

What's the world cup? Why would I watch a cup? Is it going to do something?

 

[RaphaCam]

What's the world cup? Why would I watch a cup? Is it going to do something?

You can bring as many cups as you want as long as there's no alcohol inside. That's haram.

 

[RaphaCam]

I'm curious to see how Brazil will do tomorrow.

goooooooooooooooooooooooooooal

 

[Dominika]

Yes

goooooooooooooooooooooooooooal

O no!

 

[Saxon]

Yes. The matches begin at 5 am our time, so I get up and watch whatever is on before heading to work, and we have the rest of the matches on the radio at the office.

Despite being Canadian-born I'm of English descent and have always been an avid England fan. We have a particular crop of attacking talent at the moment and I'm hoping this might be the time when Southgate stops the negative defensive play and lets them go for it.

Most Canadians have roots elsewhere and cheer on their ancestral country (or countries), so it has been entertaining to watch fans here to see where their loyalties really are. It wasn't a problem before as many people got used to the idea that Canada would never be a feature in a World Cup again. I see lots of house and car flags with Canada + the "old country".

I have no interest in the Canadian national team. They've been a non-entity during my lifetime and will sink back into obscurity after they're in (and then right out) as hosts in 2026. My backup team has always been Germany, as I like their clinical play, so I always supported them whenever England was out. Now Germany seems to still have the defensive issues that sank them in 2018 and 2021 and it looks like England will go further.

 

[RaphaCam]

O no!

Brazil was (even surprisingly) good, it was really bad luck for Serbia to debut with us. I'd bet on Serbia hitting the quarter-finals after eliminating Portugal as a revenge against the Lusosphere if I didn't stay away from bets, though.

 

[Orthodox MT]

Personally I'm an avid football fan and my favourite team is Italy (which however hasn't qualified this time round for the second consecutive time). So basically I support the underdogs. Meaning I'm glad that Croatia and Morocco eliminated Brazil and Portugal respectively.

The Maltese national football team has never achieved much, except for some good results in the qualifying groups. But there's no continuity so it doesn't really inspire me that much. Historically, Maltese were divided into English and Italian football supporters for geopolitical reasons. So Italian supporters were considered right-wing if not outright Fascists. England supporters were on the other hand considered as loyal "British" citizens or even Socialist / Labour-oriented. But nowadays this has changed and no real distinction made.

What I dislike is that since more than 20% of the population in the country is now made up of foreigners, there have been big fights depending on the results obtained. So we had fights between Croats and Serbs, Moroccans vandalising places, etc.

 

[RaphaCam]

Croatia vs Brazil was a weird game. Brazil clearly played better, but Croatian defence was impenetrable (great goalie, specially) and our coach had bad choices for the penalties. Also, the referee seemed biased. I don’t trust European referees on games against non-Europeans, UEFA is a dirty shady thing.

Our coach actually had a couple of bad choices for escalating the team overall, including leaving behind the best national scorer of the history of the Libertadores Cup, Gabigol. Some claim that happened because he cheated on Neymar’s sister, which sounds like speculative gossip, but it’s so hard to explain anyway. The better and less saucy explanation is that his field mobility and his right leg are unexceptional, but anyway he could absolutely have saved us in the penalties. He never disappoints Flamengo, my team.

I’m sad Brazil loss, the subway was bizarrely silent for a Friday. I rooted for Portugal earlier today, but it’s cool to see an underdog like Morocco make it to the semifinals. I’m rooting for Argentina, but in all honesty France deserves it. England almost made it, but that’s definitely because France was lacking six titular players.

 

[Stinky]

Croatia vs Brazil was a weird game. Brazil clearly played better, but Croatian defence was impenetrable (great goalie, specially) and our coach had bad choices for the penalties. Also, the referee seemed biased. I don’t trust European referees on games against non-Europeans, UEFA is a dirty shady thing.

Our coach actually had a couple of bad choices for escalating the team overall, including leaving behind the best national scorer of the history of the Libertadores Cup, Gabigol. Some claim that happened because he cheated on Neymar’s sister, which sounds like speculative gossip, but it’s so hard to explain anyway. The better and less saucy explanation is that his field mobility and his right leg are unexceptional, but anyway he could absolutely have saved us in the penalties. He never disappoints Flamengo, my team.

I’m sad Brazil loss, the subway was bizarrely silent for a Friday. I rooted for Portugal earlier today, but it’s cool to see an underdog like Morocco make it to the semifinals. I’m rooting for Argentina, but in all honesty France deserves it. England almost made it, but that’s definitely because France was lacking six titular players.

I was rooting for Brazil too! And yes on the underdog!

 

[Dominika]

I support Croatia, that it is (non)obvious and Morocco (not pure Arabs, but still).