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I'm delighted this young England team got so far and surprised so many, it's been an incredible summer here and I don't think I've ever seen football grip the nation like it has this past month. The media started to get ahead of themselves but overall it's been a brilliant few weeks with wall to wall sunshine, soaring temperatures and football fever taking over! I'm sure the lads will be disappointed but they did themselves and their country proud.

Congratulations to Croatia of course, simply the better team on the night and pretty much outplayed England from the second half onwards. They were always one to watch and while I think France should beat them, anything appears possible in this World Cup!

I’m very happy for my man Luka, he’s been an unsung hero so long at Real and his performance for Croatia at this WC drives home the need for a brilliant midfield to excel at the highest levels. You saw it again tonight how organized they were and the experience just wore down the younger guys. Very classy England squad though up and down the ranks. However, the relentless press back in the UK will need to shoulder some blame. You saw the post match comments from Croatia and they were clearly motivated to the nth degree by everything they read about their chances. Talk about cups coming home makes sense maybe in the latter minutes of the second half of the final but woe unto yea who bang that drum before a semifinal, very bad juju that.

I am grateful that it is Croatia against us in finale. At least french team has a tremendous respect for them and will prepare the game very seriously. We still remember 1998 semi and the pain in the ass they were.

Against England, they were thinking they should easily win and it is a dangerous state of mind.

Great result!

Happy to see England knocked out. The #itscominghome started way too early and exposed their arrogance.

The best thing about this World Cup was Germany going out in the Group stage. Talk about misplaced arrogance.

Freakysh wrote:

Great result!
Happy to see England knocked out. The #itscominghome started way too early and exposed their arrogance.

I saw this today and have to share it:

"When you lose in the World Cup, they send Trump to your country the next day to remind you that things could always be worse."

Good one. You can count on us to drop a giant shite grenade all over your collective depression and double it. What else are special allies for right?

On behalf of 53M of us my sincerest apologies. With any mercy Putin’s rat in 1600 will be gone in another year and a half.

Tomorrow: England - Belgium 2.0. Only for the 3rd place, I know, but still should be an exciting match, much more exciting than last time around.

so it was Belgium winning 2-0 against England. They were the better side but for a good 20 to 30 minutes, there was a fair amount of pressure applied by England (that they had more shots on goal in this match compared to the previous 3 is something to reflect on). Not too sure about what England does with the Sterling conundrum - he does make some decent runs but Rashford looks like the player that England needs to partner Kane as when he and Lingard came on, the whole performance perked up.

What England would do for a de Bruyne or an Eden Hazard though. I do wonder if they "regret" winning the group match as you would have been sure of Belgium being in the final with them having the easier knock-out games that England took advantage of.

I thought England had good players but didn't want to win enough. Once they had one goal in they didn't even try to double up, costing them the final in the end.

David_itl wrote:

so it was Belgium winning 2-0 against England. They were the better side but for a good 20 to 30 minutes, there was a fair amount of pressure applied by England (that they had more shots on goal in this match compared to the previous 3 is something to reflect on). Not too sure about what England does with the Sterling conundrum - he does make some decent runs but Rashford looks like the player that England needs to partner Kane as when he and Lingard came on, the whole performance perked up.

What England would do for a de Bruyne or an Eden Hazard though. I do wonder if they "regret" winning the group match as you would have been sure of Belgium being in the final with them having the easier knock-out games that England took advantage of.

Neither Belgium nor England made the final, regardless of which side of the draw they were on.

This arrogance is the reason why neither made the final. No respect and classifying sides of draws as easier or harder. What makes you think Croatia couldn't have beaten Belgium in the semi? Belgium was nothing special

David_itl wrote:

I do wonder if they "regret" winning the group match as you would have been sure of Belgium being in the final with them having the easier knock-out games that England took advantage of.

None of the people I know regret winning that game. Looking at interviews with players and coach, there are no regrets there either. Because also on the "easy" side, you could get eliminated because of an offday, or you could lose the final. There was critisism on the Belgian team before going into the world cup. Could we deliver against the big teams? If we were on the "easy" side and went out against Croatia, Sweden or Colombia, it would truely have been the lost generation. Now we beat Brazil and went out against France but beat England for 3rd place. This goes into our collective memory. We can only praise them for being interested in just one thing: being the best!
This also is why we absolutely wanted to win this 3rd place game. They're coming home on a high and are VERY motivated to work towards the EC in 2 years time.

Also, we scored 16 goals this WC. If I remember correctly, 14 of those open play goals, no other teams comes near. Many of those exceptionally beautifull goals. 10 different players scored a goal, no team ever did better. In all but one game, we scored at least 2.

So no, we don't regret anything. We can only be very proud about what we achieved.

Freakysh wrote:

This arrogance is the reason why neither made the final. No respect and classifying sides of draws as easier or harder. What makes you think Croatia couldn't have beaten Belgium in the semi? Belgium was nothing special

I wonder at what point the Belgian team was arrogant? There was a bit when we lost against France, because of the way they played. Other than that, we only talked during the 90' match time.
And nothing special, I'm quite sure Brazil and Belgium were the most attractive teams to watch. And since Brazil games had like 10 minutes per game of Neymar screaming in agony plus we beat them, I do wonder what team was more special than Belgium in this world cup? Perhaps Croatia, because of their fighting spirit. France? Granted, they probably are the smarter team. But thrilling games, no.

Jalap wrote:

Freakysh wrote:

This arrogance is the reason why neither made the final. No respect and classifying sides of draws as easier or harder. What makes you think Croatia couldn't have beaten Belgium in the semi? Belgium was nothing special

I wonder at what point the Belgian team was arrogant? There was a bit when we lost against France, because of the way they played. Other than that, we only talked during the 90' match time.
And nothing special, I'm quite sure Brazil and Belgium were the most attractive teams to watch. And since Brazil games had like 10 minutes per game of Neymar screaming in agony plus we beat them, I do wonder what team was more special than Belgium in this world cup? Perhaps Croatia, because of their fighting spirit. France? Granted, they probably are the smarter team. But thrilling games, no.

England Panama and Tunisia were hardly tough opposition.

You were lucky to get past an average Japanese team.

Brazil, they were nothing special this year either.

First test, and you fell at the hurdle.

Belgium had more hype than substance. Was the same in Brazil when the golden generation was supposed to shine but fizzled instead. I've got nothing against Belgium, but their fans do like to talk them up.

Freakysh wrote:

Jalap wrote:

Freakysh wrote:

This arrogance is the reason why neither made the final. No respect and classifying sides of draws as easier or harder. What makes you think Croatia couldn't have beaten Belgium in the semi? Belgium was nothing special

I wonder at what point the Belgian team was arrogant? There was a bit when we lost against France, because of the way they played. Other than that, we only talked during the 90' match time.
And nothing special, I'm quite sure Brazil and Belgium were the most attractive teams to watch. And since Brazil games had like 10 minutes per game of Neymar screaming in agony plus we beat them, I do wonder what team was more special than Belgium in this world cup? Perhaps Croatia, because of their fighting spirit. France? Granted, they probably are the smarter team. But thrilling games, no.

England Panama and Tunisia were hardly tough opposition.

You were lucky to get past an average Japanese team.

Brazil, they were nothing special this year either.

First test, and you fell at the hurdle.

Belgium had more hype than substance. Was the same in Brazil when the golden generation was supposed to shine but fizzled instead. I've got nothing against Belgium, but their fans do like to talk them up.

I enjoyed watching the Belgium games. France has a strong team, so quite a hurdle to take. Easily Belgium could have won that match, with a bit of more luck, they weren't over-classed at all.

I think France will win this world cup. Croatia will put up a good fight, but in the end will be over-classed. Although I hope for a Croatian win.

Good match so far. The own goal for Croatia hurt a bit, but not much could be done on that.

This is acruel game. Croatia deserves the win.

And a new star on France's jersey

Dutchy wrote:

Croatia will put up a good fight, but in the end will be over-classed. Although I hope for a Croatian win.

I disagree in one respect: I think France was over-classed by Croatia, especially in the first half. But France did win...

What an undeserved World Cup...

France was clinical. Think 3 games going to penalties for Croatia took its toll. Croatia can hold its head high

Croatia kept the ball a lot but couldn't do much with it. I'm glad they put on a good fight and I'm glad we won !

Freakish I don't know, I thought the Croats looked in great shape.

What a party!!

Finally off to bed....

Video of Croatia A319 overflying Zagreb on arrival of the football team: https://youtu.be/e4EubEzWNdM