Groups C&D

Quick ?. Why is it so amazing to everyone that the USA beat Portugal. Everyone is saying that it is one of the biggest upset in WC history and to me it doesn't look that crazy. I will admit the skill of Portugal is much better that that of the USA but accourding to FIFA rankings the USA is 13 and Portugal is 4. I think that Senegal beating France is a much bigger deal. France is ranked number 1 and Senegal is 42.
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David,

The US win did get a lot of coverage. The featured it on the evening news, which they hardly ever do for sports. It also made the front page of the USA Today, the biggest nationwide publication here. The problem is most coutries around the world have only one sport soccer(South America & Africa), then the is Europe which is mainly soccer with a small amount rugby, crickett, racing, tennis, hockey and basketball thrown in. And in Asia it is Soccer and Baseball. In the USA we have a complete overload of football, baseball, hockey, racing, basketball, tennis, golf, and God help us all, Professional Wrestling. Soccer is just having a hard time breaking through. With the creation of Major League Soccer, the win over Portugal and if we can get to the 2nd round it will definatly help. The number of players and fans is steadly growing here.
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Diavoletto,

Sorry about that, but the USA has got to do what we have to do and that is go to the 2nd round.

'Azzurri' impressed by Americans
-----www.worldcup.com - 6 June 2002, 20:48 Seoul - Tokyo

SENDAI, Japan, June 6 (AFP) - Italy stars Filippo Inzaghi and Paolo Maldini said Thursday they were impressed by the performance of the United States team that shocked Portugal 3-2 in their opening World Cup match in Korea.

Back in February Italy laboured to beat USA 1-0 in a friendly in Catania, Sicily and the AC Milan teammates believed that the world's most popular sport is coming of age in America.

Both men are clubmates of Portuguese midfielder Manuel Rui Costa and Maldini told journalists: "The US have developed a lot and did excellent things in the friendly at Catania.

"I spoke to Rui Costa before the World Cup and he was seriously worried about playing the Americans," said Maldini, who is at his fourth World Cup and featured in the Italian team that down the Americans 1-0 in the 1990 tournament in Rome.

Inzaghi was also an admirer of Bruce Arena's team.

Asked to name the teams that had most impressed him, he said: "Denmark were incredible and obviously Senegal impressed me when they beat France.

"But there are two teams - Senegal and the United States - who have impressed me with the quality of their play.

"But I want Portugal to qualify because Rui Costa is a friend of mine and we both had injury problems at Milan this season."
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Then that's great Seamus. I hope this will help MLS to get some extra attendance.

P.S.: That Indian stuff you've sent me was great.

"It is in moments as these that the large teams show what they are able".

David - got the final results of TV viewership for the USA - Portugal game. About 1,000,000 TV's were turned to ESPN and it is estimated that between 3,000,000 and 5,000,000 people stayed up all night to watch the game. Not to bad for a sporting event in the middle of the night. Also these stats are only for English programing. A spanish station here (Univision) is also playing the games and I have heard that another 2 to 4 million more people were watching the game in Spanish in the US.

that is how many people watch the yugoslavia football games!
not to mentione that yugoslavia is a 10 million people cointry!

Brazil 4-0 China

1x Rivaldo, Ronaldo, R. Carlos, Ronaldinho

The R Connection ::

There are 22 million people living in Romania and the WC and Euro games are usually watched about 70% of the population on TV's, huge screens in squares, etc. Not to mention the other 10 mil. Romanians living abroad.

That says much about how addicted to soccer is this country.

I guess that's an improvement, regarding the audience. That's great nonetheless.

Forza MILAN!

yeah I know that with a country w/ as many people as the US that is not a big part of the population, but the game was also on in the middle of the night. The true test will be to see how many people will watch the Korea game.

another point for USA!


where are you seamus?

I am right here - . I watched the game and I I think we got lucky to come away with a point. Korea had a couple of chances to win and just could not finish. Did you see our goalie, Brad Friedel? Wasn't he amazing! Saving the penalty kick. It was only old, crappy Jeff Agoos (the guy who scored the own goal vs. Portugal) that let the goal happen. How about the US player that scored, Clint Mathis. His mohawk looks stupid, but he is a goal machine.

Not that I want to keep dwelling on this but did you see the penalty on Landon Donovan that set up the penalty kick for South Korea that they scored on. Another crappy call. He got the ball 1st and went in with his cleats down and they still called it. Another game of bad officiating. All right I will try not to bitch about it anymore, at least until it happens again.

I am just glad that we got a point. We are in good a spot to go to the 2nd round and can even win the group.

Portugal 4-0 Poland

3x Pauleta
1x Rui Costa (+ 2 assits)

Wonderfully played game by Rui Costa, considering he was a substitute but still managed to score 1 goal and assist 2 goals!

i am very happy with him!!!

maybe, next season, he could be REAL Rui Costa in Milan

Portugal has to win this crucial match against South Korea.Oh,I hope there will be no nonsense like the first match against the usa..i hope that they'll play carefully now because they should!They should not repeat what other big teams had suffered before this!Wish for the best!

I`ve watched all games in Group D (though now I wish I hadn`t seen the Polish ones...) and I must say that to me, Portugal doesn`t stand a chance against Korea. Koreans play beautiful football, unlike anything played by European teams. Their combination of technical skills and speed is deadly. I hope they win with Portugal and advance to the next round. I also wish good luck to USA against my national team...Poland didn`t learn anything from the match against Korea: they let Pauleta score three times, when they should have guarded him closely...Apart from Dudek, Krzynówek, Kryszalowicz and Olisadebe - the rest of the Polish national team may not come back. I`m so ashamed that I`d never like to see Hajto or Wałdoch wearing white and red again...

Now, with Poland out of the tournament, I can only say: FORZA ITALIA !!!

Well I agreed Korea has been showing a great performance in style of football. Particularly in last two matches against Poland and USA. But as I viewed they're still lack of FINISHING TOUCH and patience which it can be a 'key' in order to win the games. Portugal who is the opponent to, is now boosting theri confidence after crushing Poland by a 4-0 win. If Korea play like in last two matches, the objective result for both of them is draw in order to maintain their chance to the next round.

GROUP C

Brazil-Turkey 2-1
China-Costa Rica 0-2
Brazil-China 4-0
Costa Rica-Turkey 1-1
Costa Rica-Brazil 2-5
Turkey-China 3-0

Brazil
Qualified for second round 9 3 3 0 0 11 3
Turkey
Qualified for second round 4 3 1 1 1 5 3
Costa Rica
Eliminated after group phase 4 3 1 1 1 5 6
China
Eliminated after group phase 0 3 0 0 3 0 9


GROUD D

South Korea 2-0 Poland
United States 3-2 Portugal
South Korea 1-1 United States
Poland 0-4 Portugal
South Korea 1-0 Portugal
Poland 3-1 United States

South Korea 3 2 1 0 4 1 7
United States 3 1 1 1 5 6 4
Portugal 3 1 0 2 6 4 3
Poland 3 1 0 2 3 7 3

What went wrong at the portugal match against korea?I do not know...it is true that korean play good football thanks to guus hiddinkand i absolutely agree with other respected responses had said about the korean team but i don't want to sound bad but i think the referee is bias.I THINK!i don't know what other people would think about this..but i guess with portugal was down with 9 men as the result of the sent off of joao pinto and beto is of course had made the portugal team more vulnerable but at least vitor baia had made lots of saves from the opponents korea because usually with a team only played by 9 men will get in lots of troble,so a credit to the goal keeper and others too..i don't know maybe i sound so stupid for i am a girl and don't know how to play football and what so ever...that's only my view..and for korea..i don't know how to say this..they ARE playing good football but again i think the match is more towards the korean team...i'm just writing this crappy things just because i want to express my condolences to portugal maybe we won't see the likes of rui costa,luis figo and other 'golden generation' again after all this madness going on..and to korea,GOOD LUCK and have a good world cup!(at least they give asian region something to proud of!hehehe!)
whtever it is let bygone be bygone,we absolutely have no power of the past(that's what i had learn in college!)and i really would like to know what is your opinion about all of this match in group d?please do.thanks!and also i feel sorry for conceicao for the much anticipated goal of his.bad things happens..ok then that's all..hope to hear from all of you football fans out there!i write to much didn't i?

cute_medusa said:

i write to much didn't i?

Click to expand...

it's never too much!
and don't say you don't know anything because you made a few quite good points

what went wrong with portugal?
the same question can be asked for many others... france, italy, argentina...
don't say now that italy is through and no questions should be asked.

do you know what's the problem? long time ago, there was a saying that "no player can be bigger than the team" (or country, in this case). well, it looks like everybody keep forgeting that! especially the managers.
ask yourself: why! WHY is batistuta playing instead of crespo? and a player like saviola wasn't even taken to the WC! why is veron playing? yes, veron is a superstar! well, i'm sorry but veron didn't play a good game for more than a year now! and that goes for batistuta as well.
ok, enough about argentina. why is lebeuf (sp?) playing? why is totti playing instead of del piero? totti is a superstar, del piero (obviously) isn't! and what did totti do? played 3 games, did nothing! it would be better with 10 men! why is figo playing? and for God sake, WHY is rui costa playing instead of pirlo!?
answer!? there is an answer. same one for all of these questions. GLORY! OLD FAME! HISTORY! PAST! call it however you want!
unfortunatelly, players became bigger than the clubs! rui costa will always play for milan! figo will play for real and portugal until he's 40! batistuta would be called in the next WC squad if he didn't retire by himself!
we have now all the superstars of the mid 90s still being superstars even if they are playing like shit!
just look at denmark! NO superstars! NO individuals by any meaning! danish player newer said "I" but "WE"!!! the TEAM! that is what got them through, and with a little bit of luck, they can beat england too.
do a team/country have to be disgraced in front of the whole world to realise some things!?
argenina definatelly learned their lesson. most of the old players retired and that is good.
france? desailly, aged 33 (i think. maybe even more!) said: "why should i retire? i can still compete for the place in the team!"

hopefully our (milan) management will learn something on this. do we want to have a defence where 3 out of 5 players are 34+!? well, that's alright. if we want to compete for the uefa cup or maybe, possiblly champions league spot.
same goes with national teams! is croatia going to play with the same guys who won the 3rd place in france 98 and hoping to be 3rd again!? they can play. they can play on the next WC, as much as i 'm concerned.
but what will they do!? NOTHING! nothing! nada! nista!

i hope things will change soon. and if not... well, we won't see any quality football anymore!


scharatz

This world Cup is crazy one. . I really hated it & i wish everything finishing today. It`s the worst WC , no France, no Argantina, no Portugal!!!!!!!!!!!!! Who knows mayb 2moro will b no England or Germany .
I don`t agree with you Scharatz , Totti isn`t as famous for being a superstar as Del Piero. & As apposed to Del Piero , Totti playing much better than him. Totti may didn`t play well last game, but in general Totti`s much better player.