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| Euro 2008 Qualifying | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Mar 22 2007, 08:27 AM (1,999 Views) | |
| valenciano | Jun 6 2007, 03:30 PM Post #46 |
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Excellent review Winslow. So it looks like Poland may be coming back to earth after all. Portugal and Serbia didn't play today but they were both winners after that Poland loss to Armenia. Good win for England on the road with Beckham apaprently supplying their inspiration and Owen got a goal. But they still have a lot of work to do in what looks like a complicated group. After nearly qualifying for the last World Cup I guess we should not be surprised Israel are staying near the top of that group. And we all know Mr. Hiddink still has some tricks up his sleeve with Russia. A very intriguing group that is turning out to be. |
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| Merengue | Jun 6 2007, 09:57 PM Post #47 |
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Germany's win at the Czech Republic in the spring and the Czech's subsequent tie at Wales last weekend have enabled Germany, who keep on winning, to open up a comfortable lead in their group. Many thought Joachim Low was the real power behind Klinsmann's throne last summer and now that he's getting a chance to run the team himself, you can't complain about Low's results. Scotland's win keeps them on the tail of France and Italy and next fall if there is a loser in the World Cup Final rematch then the Scots could take advantage and move back into 2nd spot in the group. Their success is good to see after so many recent years of futility. I'm trying to remember but I don't recall Scotland qualifying for a major tournament since France 98. Meanwhile as I discussed in the Italy forum, the Azzurri look to have found a new sensation in Sampdoria's Fabio Quagliarella, scorer of both of their goals today, one with each foot. I am always pleased to see players who can shoot from distance with either foot. |
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| hobbes | Jun 7 2007, 11:07 AM Post #48 |
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I watched the France-Georgia match. Nasri looked good, but still made some young mistakes. I wish more Americans spoke French. I would love to see bigsoccer watch a game from TV5 where they read viewer e-mails on the air. A typical exchange: "Pierre from Nice wants to know why we never read his e-mails. Well Pierre, obviously I have to call play-by-play and we get 6,000 e-mails per game and I don't have time to read them all and follow the action. Actually I don't have time to read 6,000 e-mails period. I'm a busy man!" "You're not that busy" chimes in the colour man "Well maybe not. Anyway Pierre thinks it will be 4-0 France, right now that seems unlikely, but we shall see -- as Riberry goes wide! Well that would have got us halfway to Pierre's pick." It's actually entertaining, but you're pretty on your own as far as figuring out what the hell is going on. Though at one point they said Georgia was "afraid to leave the shallow end of the pool." in reference to their negative bunkering tactics. I'm still laughing at that one. I was so hoping Georgia could nick an undeserved point, but it wasn't in the cards. cheers, hobbes |
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| Martin | Jun 8 2007, 11:42 PM Post #49 |
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The hammer came down on Denmark, the game was officially awarded to Sweden as a 3-0 win, Denmark were fined a large sum (around $80,000), they'll have to play their next game behind closed doors and the 4 next home matches 250km away from Copenhagen. A very harsh sentence on my opinion. Naturally UEFA are trying to send a message to prevent any repeat offenses but the Danish guy who ran after the ref said he had 15-20 beers that day so I don't think any rationality was going through his head at the time! Hobbes, that TV5 broadcast sounds hilarious, I too wish more English language broadcasts had some humor in them. I usually see GolTV games in Spanish but the few times I've heard Ray Hudson on their English language matches, he's been a hoot. In Spanish I miss the late Norberto Longo and his philosophical waxings during a game, many of which were quite funny. |
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| Pepe | Jun 9 2007, 07:22 AM Post #50 |
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Denmark really had the book thrown at them. I'd agree the tough sentence is meant to deter other nation's from preventing future drunks running onto the field but as you said if you've drunk 15-20 beers you aren't going to be subject to listening to reason! While this sentence helps my nation Spain I still feel bad for Denmark. |
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| shelsoccer | Jun 12 2007, 12:34 PM Post #51 |
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A little off topic, but I'd be interested in some discussion about the state of Hungarian soccer. Since the downfall of communism, just about all of their Eastern European neighbors have experienced some success, reaching World Cups and Euros finals. See Poland, Romania and Bulgaria. Plus "new" countries like the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Serbia and Croatia have done the same, despite the break-up of the former Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. Hungary has made a fairly reasonable adjustment to democracy/capitalism and has a proud soccer history. What gives? |
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| Pepe | Jun 12 2007, 01:58 PM Post #52 |
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This is a very good topic, thank you for starting it. I wish I had an answer to the question and it is something I've thought about before. Hungary has as successful an economy as any nation in the former Soviet bloc and we all know about their football history. If I'm not mistaken Hungary has not had a team in a major competition since the 1986 World Cup. That is a long dry spell at the national team level and it has been similarly as long since one of it's clubs did well in a European club competition. Maybe the problem is the country is doing too well economically and younger people are more inclined to pursue other pursuits besides football. Consequently that creates poorer teams which leads to apathy about the domestic game and then it feeds upon itself and just grows? |
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| shelsoccer | Jun 12 2007, 02:55 PM Post #53 |
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Thanks for your views, Pepe, and I recognize you're postulating more than stating a hard rationale. I'm not an economist, but I'm pretty sure the Hungarian economy isn't doing any better than that of the Czech Republic and is probably comparable to Poland. Whatever success Hungary has had economically, I'd argue that's it's too soon for apathy to set in with the younger generation. In fact, there's been less than a full generation (usually considered 20 years) for this theory to have an impact. As you point out the Hungarian league is a mess. But, is it really that much worse than the Czech league, Poland's, Romania's, Bulgaria's or Slovenia's? There has to be something fundamentally wrong with the administration of the Hungarian FA, its youth development system or the economics of its domestic league. Don't know as anyone here has any concrete insight -- just thought I'd ask. Maybe we should ask Lothar Mattheus. |
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| hobbes | Jun 12 2007, 04:11 PM Post #54 |
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I have no concrete answers on Hungary. We just played them and they were okay, but clearly a second or even third-tier UEFA nation. I agree that the Hungarian league is a mess and it seems like violence and hooliganism are problems there as much as any other league I can think of. I’m basing that on what I read and heard when Millwall went there a few years ago on a UEFA Cup game. I would think that that kind of an atmosphere and a less than tolertant racial attitude (Adrian Serioux got racially abused according to what I’ve read) wouldn’t help your domestic league grow. They are getting more players into better leagues like Huszti, Bodor, Priskin and Gera and it sounds like they’re high on some of their young players, so maybe it’s coming around. But generally they aren’t producing enough players that can advance to better leagues and I think Matteus is a terrible manager (and that’s based partly on when he managed Jazic in Austria) so that didn’t help. We’ll see if the new manager can right the ship. Since we have Canadians all over, I would say the level of the Czech league is much higher than Hungary. The Czechs youth program is also strong, which makes a big difference. Poland definitely has had some youth level success. While Bulgaria and Romania have had some depth and great success in the post-Cold War era, those successes coincided with them fielding the best player they've ever produced. Maybe in time their success in the mid-90s will be a blip not too different from the Magic Magyars' run. cheers, hobbes |
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| Manzanares | Jun 13 2007, 08:15 AM Post #55 |
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This is an interesting topic and like the others I don't have an answer for Hungary's fall from grace either. But to me they just aren't producing top quality players. Hobbes named some recent ones and to be honest I take pride in trying to follow the game around the world, and this message board helps that too, but I had never heard of any of those Hungarian players he mentioned. To be honest the only Hungarian player I can recall recently was the goalkeeper, whose name escapes me now, who always wore long pants in goal and played for Hertha Berlin before going over to England. Why Hungary is not producing quality players, I don't know but while Bulgaria and Romania aren't reaching the levels they had when Stoitchkov and Hagi were leading their teams they still remain competitive and are exporting good players to many clubs throughout Europe. You can't really say the same about Hungary. |
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| Gunners | Jun 13 2007, 09:03 AM Post #56 |
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You're thinking of Gabor Kiraly, who was one of the world's top goalkeepers until age starting restricting his superior athleticism. You might also recall Kristian Lisztes, who was one of Werder Bremen's top players before injuries and age caught up with him. Kiraly and Lisztes are really the only top-level players I can recall Hungary producing in the past 20 years. |
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| shelsoccer | Jun 13 2007, 01:13 PM Post #57 |
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Good points, Hobbes, about the hooliganism and racism in the Hungarian league. Certainly impacts attendance and maybe -- by a long stretch -- player development. Good points, too, from Gunners and Manzanares about the short list of quality exports. The mystery is why that's the case. Too lazy to look up the population stats, but is Hungary really that much smaller than Holland or some of their other Eastern European neighbors? There ought to be a coupla dozen quality players coming out of the country unless their youth development system is totally messed up. Maybe we should expand this topic to the recent tailspin of Begian soccer. Similar size and population, but their current form is dismal. Perhaps that's the fate of such mid-sized to small countries. They'll go through down cycles. On the other hand, countries like Holland and Sweden seemed to have avoided these prolonged slumps. |
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| Merengue | Jun 14 2007, 09:54 AM Post #58 |
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Good discussion going on here. I wish I had an explanation for Hungary's decline too but I don't. But it wasn't just the Magical Magyars of the mid 50's as Hungary had good, but not great teams, after that including in the 60's with Florian Albert, who if I'm not mistaken was European footballer of the year at one point. Even up through 1986 with Tibor Nyilasi they had competitive teams but once that group of players declined, Hungary, in the post Communism era has fallen way short. Bulgaria's league isn't much either but they still have reasonably competitive teams as do the other eastern European countries which have been mentioned here. Plus those coun tries, unlike Hungary, are exporting numerous players to western European teams. Too bad we don't have any Hungarians on here to give their perspective. |
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| Gunners | Jun 14 2007, 11:38 AM Post #59 |
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Hungary's domestic league is worse than the domestic leagues in some of the other top Eastern European nations. Anecdotally, I'm sure most of us can remember the successes that Eastern European clubs such as Dynamo Kiev, Sparta Prague, and CSKA Moscow have experienced in recent season. However, clubs such as Shakhtar Donetsk, Slavia Prague, Lokomotiv Moscow, Spartak Moscow, Rapid Bucharest, Steaua Bucharest, Levski Sofia, Partizan Belgrade, Red Star Belgrade, and Dynamo Zagreb have also had some European success in recent seasons. Conversely, I can't remember any of the top Hungarian clubs having any recent success in European competition. |
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| shelsoccer | Jun 15 2007, 07:22 AM Post #60 |
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Heck, I'm not sure I can name a team in the Hungarian league. I can remember teams like Ferencvaros, MTK and Honved from the communist era, but I think many of the pre-1990 teams (not necessarily just those three) have disbanded or combined with other clubs. Taking it beyond soccer, I can't think of a sport -- other than water polo and the occasional swimmer -- that Hungary has excelled in the last 15+ years. |
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