Italy will have to work far harder in the home leg if they are going to qualify for the World Cup. They were disappointing in the first leg as they allowed Sweden to outwork & out-muscle them. The Swedes certainly deserved an advantage going into the second leg..

Honduras 0 Australia 0. Many chances created for the away goal but none taken. 30 hours travel back to Sydney before Wednesday's decider.

The Republic have completed the first half of the challenge, now for the second leg!!

Well that's the first 11000+ miles of the 24000+ mile round trip for Scunny's Clayton Lewis and the other UK based All Whites .......

http://www.bbc.com/sport/football/41860130

No goals last night as the first leg decides both games.
Disappointing result for Northern Ireland to what was an outstanding campaign.
Croatia had done more than enough in the first leg & I am sure that few football fans will be sorry to see the exit of the Greek side...

goodison wrote: ↑

November 10, 2017, 4:48 pm

Surely as long as the correct decision is eventually made then V.A.R. is the solution. it works in Rugby, Cricket, Tennis, nothing more frustrating than to work for a period of a few years on preparing for a competition to have those preparations flushed down the drain by an inept official who picks up his pay check regardless of his poor performance and what it means to Managers (the sack), Players (benched) and fans ( mickey-taking on a web-site) etc.etc.

Just ask the fans in Germany who are all up in arms because their teams are forced to have it for league matches. Massive protests and even their main footie journal "kicker" has said it wants VAR out. Even had one VAR referee sacked coz he was using it to influence the ref in decisions about the team he supported

I think it very much depends exactly how it is introduced Statts & I think that the authorities have done far too little by way of suggesting methods & trialling them - I would have thought that meaningless friendlies was an ideal time to try a few different things, personally.

The methods used in both cricket & tennis work, in my opinion, exceptionally well. However they are both games with many natural interludes in the action anyway. The 'number of wrong referrals allowed' at least makes a good stab at stopping ridiculous appeals going off the field.
I am often surprised, while watching cricket, just how good the umpires are in their decision making, given the speed of the ball.

I have watched (howbeit a limited amount) of rugby league & I think they have the technological assistance just about as wrong as it is possible to get. Every score sees the referee ask the video judge to adjudicate on some part of the play. I think that the fact he knows he can & will do this means he doesn't bother to make the tough decisions himself while the play is in motion. To be honest he may as well not be on the pitch & let the man in the stands make all the decisions once the ball crosses the line..

Italy not in a World Cup for the first time since 1958..
they were in an almost impossible group to qualify out of, being paired with the best national team in Europe - Spain. They took the first leg against Sweden far too casually though, while Sweden worked their socks off. This game was all Italy (76% possession) but Sweden knew that if they defended successfully then they were through...

Can't remember ONE of Italy's chances where you would say they SHOULD score. Plenty of half chances and tame shots, but in truth they didn't look like scoring. Ventura their coach has resigned (and so should the people in the Italian FA who appointed him in the first place) with Carlo Ancelotti and (I want to go back to Italy) Conte being touted as possible successors. Putting it into perspective, the best player on the park over 2 legs was Andreas Granqvist who at the peak of his career (about 10 years ago) played for Wigan Athletic, and the Swedes also relied on Seb Laarson who lets face it couldn't get into the Sunderland team
Can only say that Russia 2018 will be a better place WITHOUT Italy

NOT QUITE THIS THREAD BUT, England v Brazil Friendly game is being shown at 03:00 hrs (Wed) on Bugaboo.TV Is that a streaming only channel? Don't see it on TrueVisions?

Big shock Italy not qualifying but too many ageing players plus a 69 year old manager whose only achievement was to win the Serie C title with Lecce,but Ventura is also now been linked with the vacant Everton managers job !
Incredible that Insigne was not used when Italy needed to score.
But a chance for Italy to rebuild and bring in the youngsters.A sad way for an all time great like Buffon to end his international career,though.

goodison wrote: ↑

November 14, 2017, 9:28 am

NOT QUITE THIS THREAD BUT, England v Brazil Friendly game is being shown at 03:00 hrs (Wed) on Bugaboo.TV Is that a streaming only channel? Don't see it on TrueVisions?

Pretty sure channel 7 are showing Germany v France.

If your insomnia is really bad goodison you can get the England match via this site which has about 20 odd streams to choose from....

http://www.ronaldo7.net/video/mancheste ... tream.html

Congratulations to Sweden for their victory. The Vikings are back. Iceland is in too, are they not?

Laan Yaa Mo wrote: ↑

November 14, 2017, 7:24 pm

Congratulations to Sweden for their victory. The Vikings are back. Iceland is in too, are they not?

And Denmark could join the party tonight

and following the Viking theme England still have a load of "individual xxxxxx"'s playing for them as always

Dont blame me udonmap changed it from k i n g ...... I can see why they might think their version is better though

Good luck to the Danes. I don't think the Danes have been in since they had that goalkeeper who played for Manchester United.

See the England management have resisted the chance to think "outside the box" and have arranged to play friendlies in March against Holland & Italy.
Even if they were both in the cup these would be pointless wastes of time as we already know exactly how to play against both teams, but given the fact that both will be starting a complete rebuild for Euro 2020 there is a good chance they will only be playing against a bunch of kids anyway.

Why not take the chance to play South American (not Brazil or Argies)/African/Asian opposition whose mentality is different to our own and therefore require a different mindset and tactics?

or we could just play all the old favorites learn nowt and be shocked when we lose/draw to someone like Iceland etc etc

Thanks for that Stat. Watched Ireland v Denmark then Senegal v South Africa caught the last few minutes of Eng. v Brazil on utube, don't think I missed too much in that one. All footied out until the weekend?

Most of the play offs were won after the first leg, this one was decisively won by the away side in the second leg.
The Irish were lightweight in attack - due to lack of options - & so suffered when they felt that they had to try & win the game!!

And the "Socceroos" join the party after a Mile Jedinak HAT TRICK sees of Honduras (Yes Brian you are reading correctly) not sure when the last Hat trick by a Palace player was, but perhaps they should get him back and give him the No9 shirt

Any bored Scunny fans can watch Clayton Lewis playing for the All White's (on the night?) playing in black !! currently live Peruvian TV stream on Youtube