I guess defenders will have to stop diving into the ground like idiots every time.
Soft penalties have been given, true, but once you know that a PK will be given for contact in the area, you have to adjust. Don't see what the big 'mess' is.
no 0:0's lives
Also, there have been quite a lot of penalties but how often do we complain/hear commentators complain that refs chicken out of giving fouls they'd give anywhere else on the pitch but don't in the box because it would be a penalty? VAR is essentially just rectifying that.
Fuck me, literally can't win with you lot.
'VAR will ruin the flow of the game!'
*VAR doesn't ruin flow of the game*
'VAR won't actually stop anything!'
*VAR nails stonewall penalty*
'The refs are bottling the big decisions!'
Aye, surely it's just as 'safe' to give it which then triggers the review. You can be wrong the other way and the game isn't left with that weird bit where everyone is waiting for the referee to start waving his arms about. Someone is going to score (or get sent off) in that hiatus, eventually.
Dickheads with airhorns <<<
I think VAR will get all the love when a diving wanker (Neymar?) is caught by it and sent off.
Given that refs don't seem to be giving yellows for diving I can't see that happening.
In fact, they seem to be being very lenient on all sorts of fouls which usually lead to yellows - shirt pulling for instance.
Diving needs to result in a three match auto-ban to compensate for all this penalty area bullshit.
A fair few of the games this World Cup have lacked flow. VAR doesn't help in that respect. The end of the Serbia - Costa Rica match was a prime example, two needless reviews with all the players fannying about waiting into 8 minutes of stoppage time.
I wonder why every time a commentator talks about the Korean military service business they seem to be hearing about the concept for the first time.
Ally McCoist, what the fuck are you talking about?
I have 1-1 in the predictor and Hwang Heechan in fantasy so he was bound to shank that header.
So I'm about as anti-VAR as it's possible to be, but that was a good advertisement for how it should be used.
I think that's the first time I've ever heard Battenberg speak. How did he ever command any sort of respect at all with that voice?
Well, that was alright. Granqvist
Still, no way we're making it out of the group with Méhico on 3 points now. We will get trounced by Germany and even if we somehow do beat the Mexicans, it still might not be enough on 6 points!
Forsberg was our worst player, which is so sad. He just doesn't have the head for this stage.
Yeah he wasn't great. Not worst though, I'd say that was Toivonen who really did absolutely nothing all game. Berg should have scored as well, he doesn't do much else so with the chances he had he should have put one away I reckon.
I feel a bit like Forsberg is a little wasted out wide to the left for Sweden.
Larsson - Ekdal
Claesson - Forsberg - Durmaz
Berg
Might work better. 4-4-2 feels cozy though.
Incidentally, I cannot believe that deeply unimpressive lot stopped us from seeing Buffon at a sixth World Cup.
Pontus is such a don. He should keep his place.
Italy seem to have fallen into a rut of just not producing any good players. Few defenders around but at the other end there's no one who lasts longer than a season.
I'm under no illusions that Italy are particularly good at the moment, but Sweden really didn't impress last night. Maybe they'll improve.
I don't think anyone has really impressed so far. They are far from the worst we've seen.
We're this years Greece.
The one theme so far is that European football is utterly supreme and the gap is getting wider.
WC should just be the seven best European teams and Mexico and be done with it.
1992 Euro's Semi
Helander, Jansson & Rohden all missed training today due to illness. Not good if some virus is going around in the squad.
Can't believe Moon is starting for Korea. He played for Djurgården like 2 years ago and was one of the worst players I've seen.
Why do some of the Koreans salute for the national anthem?
Patriotic af, us. At least when it comes to football.
We had to salute the flag and sing the anthem every Monday in school.
Nice skills by Hwang but that's great tracking back by Lozano.
Actually got my penalty bet on for this game.