broke

I see.

That was a great goal, I'll give you lot that.

I'm predicting 2-1 to Sweden.

that sweden goal was a schoolboy error in defence... but its given sweden confidence to lay on the pressure more.

hopefully we come top of the group, but i could see sweden beating us here.

Gerrard! That as damn pretty.

Joe Cole gets Man of the Match in my book.

Wow. Tie game on a goal by Larsson in the 90'. Terrible defending by the English defense.

Yeah, we need to sort our set-piece defense out. But still...


GERRARD!

And England fails to defeat Sweden yet again

the final goal was just comical...what the f*** we were doing with our set plays I have no idea...

still top of the group and Rooney is getting better, although owen is a worry. Although I'm still wondering what was the point of bring Walcott along if he isn't going to use him!!!

Walcott might get a run against Ecuador. They're probably the side with the least quality to make it through to the next round, and I can't see Eriksson risking him against the likes of Brazil, Argentina, et al.

not I, sadly. Booked tomorrow off as I figured with the last match of the group plus it's my friend's birthday, I'd be getting rather hammered tonight. Alas, I am pathetically sick. Spent the match alternating between trying to inhale some steam from a bowl with a towel over my head (not the best view of the tv) and sitting on the sofa shivering and clutching a lemsip. Not quite the evening I had planned.

Anyway, I thought the game wasn't too bad, better than we've done so far. Especially in the first half, I really felt we were putting some good moves together, much less of the crap lobbing of the T&T game. That chance of Rooney's was a shame to have missed, amazing ball from Beckham and a great first touch, just too difficult to fight it out with both the defenders. Stunning goal from Joe Cole.

Our defense (particularly of the set pieces) does leave much to be desired, but I wouldn't say it was all bad. There were some great challenges, Sweden could have been a couple more goals up, easily. I must say, I was a little nervous when Campbell came on (and this is coming from an Arsenal fan!) just because he's had so little play this year, but overall he did very well, just the one iffy moment that I remember, and he made up for it.

I do think it was a shame that Walcott didn't come on, but on reflection, I can see Sven's thinking. Obviously, if he's going to make his debut, then the game we only need to draw for an optimum result, and could still lose without going out, would be the best time, but there just wasn't the right opportunity. Owen going off within the first minute was terrible, and I did kinda despair at seeing Crouch come on, but playing Walcott for 90 minutes would be insane. Then we lose Ferdinand, and need to get Campbell on. Rooney was clearly getting tired at this point and needed to come off. I think if we had still been 1-0 up, it would have been worth the risk, but another goal from Sweden and we would have been facing Germany. Getting an extra man in midfield made sense, and still paid off (up until the awful defending in the last minute). If Owen's in trouble, it could be the sensible way to play. I can't see Rooney and Crouch meshing all that well, and even so, Rooney's not going to be fully fit for a while, if at all this tournament.

Rooney didnt look too happy to be substituted.

I wasnt overly impressed with England's effort. Their goals were classy enough, but with a back line of Ferdinand, Terry, Cole, Carragher etc they really shouldnt be letting in dead ball goals like that. England had every change to win the game 2-0.

haha yeh he acted like a spoilt kid, though he basically is.

And agreed, England didn't do great today

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  do her}
elseif(getThingFlags(source) & 0x4){
  do other babe}
else{
  do a dude}

Those Swedes are cursed, I tell ya!

Our back 4 is populated by clowns.

Apart from Ashley Cole, who is usually fairly classy. Ferdinand and Campbell in particular are a ****ing liability. We should not concede from set pieces, and by concede I'm counting the one's saved by the woodwork.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrangry.

Tomorrow is a day where many people will die... Mexico V.S. Portugal... a game that I look forward to anxiously.

People are going to die? You really do have a crazy view of the world.

I really would've liked to see Germany vs England. Hopefully we'll see that later.

But when I think of all the people who crowded Cologne today ...
There were mostly English, only a few Swedes. It was really hard to get through these masses to get to the train station.

Unfortunately the picture I took doesn't show very well how crowded it really was.

[Edit: This picture was taken 7 hours before the game. :ninja:]

Argentina and Holland are currently tied at 0-0. Nothing really doing as of right now, so the game is something of a let down. Although, in hindsight, we might've expected two teams of similar style to cancel each other out.

The main reason I'm posting this is because the commentators have just mentioned that Michael Owen has been sent home from his injury sustained during the Sweden game, which sucks something terrible.

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/world_cup_2006/teams/england/5100516.stm

he arrived back here at 6pm, it's pretty serious

I need Riquelme to assist or score for my office fantasy league! Come on!

0-0. Sorry, Martyn

Fair result, both teams played well.

Ahh well. Such is life

What an amazing handball by the Serbia Montengro defender in the Ivory Coast game. It was a goalkeeper-esque thump of the ball inside the box. Astounding to see a player make a mistake like that.

This ref is also stupidly strict, he's really hindering the flow of the game.

I despise both teams, and rooted for Portugal today only because there was a chance Mexico could be eliminated. All those teams do is whine and dive.

Australia vs Croatia coming up in 5 short hours, win or tie and we go through to the next round!

Must... Contain.. Excitement...

The way the American team has been treated by the referees in this tournament is just disgusting. You can't give a penalty kick for something like that.

Yeah, that was a complete bull**** call. I'm pissed off.

I'm sorry, but how less of a foul could that have been? I mean, his arms were as far away from pushing as a person can get. The Ghanan player was essentially doing the same thing, both players were going for the ball! That had to devastate the Americans.

1 - 1 Australia and Croatia at the half. I'm quietly confident, the Aussies have been very solid.

WOO, equalizer. Go Aussies!

Harry Kewell is my God.

/faints

Ok I've regained consciousness....

This is massive. MASSIVE.
What a game, it had everything. Guus, for the love of Kewell please bring Schwarzer back for the game against Italy, our goalie was extremely questionable to say the least. As were some of the ref decisions, but at least a few of them went our way for once. One of the Croatian players even got 3 yellow cards for the game - he wasnt sent off after his second for some reason.

Harry Kewell - what a player. Clearly man of the match. Thank Kewell he didnt get suspended after the Brazil match.

The Socceroos just never say die. Twice I thought we would be very lucky to equalise, twice we did. I give us half a chance against Italy in the next round.

G O A U S S I E S ! !

did they win yet?

gotta have a bit of a laugh at the ref's expense, 3 yellows needed to send someone off...and it was the English ref...oh dear

still, I'm glad the aussie's got through.

Yeah, he simply forgot that he had already given the guy a yellow earlier. He also missed three serious penalty situations for Australia.

COME ON YOU AUSSIES!!

What a game, absolutely fantastic atmosphere down the pub (an australian pub admittedly - although we did avoid The Walkabout, that would have probably killed us). You guys deserved it, really solid performance, although Croatia got a bit scary in the last ten minutes.

Harry Kewell absolutely rocked, and my love for Emerton is growing, despite the sending off. He's just always there, constantly pushing. Which kinda sums up Australia. You may not have the best team in the world, but you've got a damn good coach and you want it so bad, you guys deserve to be in the second round.


A shame about the second goal. He's gonna get so much stick for it. Yes, Schwarzer would probably have held it, but it's a mistake any keeper could have made. Talking of goalies though, the Croatian keeper managed a couple of classics - you could have scored a few more.

3 Yellows to the Croatian player was a really stupid mistake by the ref. Also, looking back at the recording of it (<3 my new Hauppage WinTV card), Australia's second goal should have been called offside.

However, I'm very, Very, VERY happy Australia is moving on. Almost makes up for the disappointments that were Poland and the United States.

They were lucky on a couple of points. The penalty wasn't actually a hand ball, although I think just having your hand that high and close to the ball in the box is asking for a penalty. The second goal was just offside. Also the bundle in the box after the Croatian keeper was holding the ball was a bit iffy, could have got some boys in trouble.