Brazil v Croatia Match Thread

[ScouseFox]

Slight different between qualifying for under 8s on a Sunday to the Fifa World Cup.

Liverpool Sunday league is probably a better quality than the Asian cup he's reffing every week

[Dan]

Mexico will be soundly beaten by both sides. They're shit.

 

I genuinely would rather Germany or Argentina won this than Brazil.

[ScouseFox]

brazil got lucky beating croatia, they looked woeful going forward. and pretty poor defensively too. the bookies must know more about this bribing and corruption than the rest of us folk to make them favourites for the competition, quarters at best unless they get 3 solid "homer" decisions each game from pathetic refs like tonight. 

[Dan]

If you offered me Hulk for Mahrez I genuinely would turn it down.

[Amin]

Get in Brazil!

 

Croatia had me worried for the first 20 minutes but Neymar once again stepped up for Brazil. Oscar was brilliant today, so I'm glad he got the goal right at the end. Croatia certainly tested Brazil and they'll obviously feel hard done by but Brazil deserved the 3 points imo. I expect both of these teams to get to the next round.

[Captain...]

Massive overreaction on here, shocking I know, the only decision I disagree with was the penalty, Croatia attacker clearly jumped into the Goalie, foul no argument.

Even the penalty, you look at it from the ref's perspective he can see an arm coming over from the defender and the attacker going down. The fault is with FIFA not giving referees the tools to reach the correct decision. We will see many more bad decisions in this World Cup and the next and in the upcoming premiership season until FIFA change the rules of the game.

[ScouseFox]

Massive overreaction on here, shocking I know, the only decision I disagree with was the penalty, Croatia attacker clearly jumped into the Goalie, foul no argument.

Even the penalty, you look at it from the ref's perspective he can see an arm coming over from the defender and the attacker going down. The fault is with FIFA not giving referees the tools to reach the correct decision. We will see many more bad decisions in this World Cup and the next and in the upcoming premiership season until FIFA change the rules of the game.

did you agree with Neymar looking at modric, then the ball, then back at modric, clearly not being bother about the ball before lashing an arm in his face but only being booked?

If that's a Cameroon centre half midway through meaningless group game next week he's sent off, disgraced and banned for the rest of the competition. It's Neymar so well just book him. Ok.

[AKCJ]

Liverpool Sunday league is probably a better quality than the Asian cup he's reffing every week

 

He's been an international referee for 10 years, he refereed the 2010 club world cup final and refereed 3 games at the 2010 World Cup (notably the quarter-final - Brazil vs Holland) and is only one of 5 to be retained for this tournament.

 

But apparently because he comes from Japan he's not good enough lol

[Dan]

Neymar staying on the pitch summed up all wrong with the ref as well. Any Croatia player pulls some of the shit he was up to tonight and they're off.

[Kitchandro]

Massive overreaction on here, shocking I know, the only decision I disagree with was the penalty, Croatia attacker clearly jumped into the Goalie, foul no argument.

Even the penalty, you look at it from the ref's perspective he can see an arm coming over from the defender and the attacker going down. The fault is with FIFA not giving referees the tools to reach the correct decision. We will see many more bad decisions in this World Cup and the next and in the upcoming premiership season until FIFA change the rules of the game.

 

You're an idiot. If you can find an argument for those decisions there is no hope for you.

 

None of the 3 big decisions are even remotely defensible.

[The Horse's Mouth]

Croatia should have been down to 9 men so it really is swings and roundabouts.

[ScouseFox]

He's been an international referee for 10 years, he refereed the 2010 club world cup final and refereed 3 games at the 2010 World Cup (notably the quarter-final - Brazil vs Holland) and is only one of 5 to be retained for this tournament.

But apparently because he comes from Japan he's not good enough lol

i don't really give a shit where he comes from he was just shit at his job. he could've won the Second World War and found a cure for aids for all I care he'd still have been a shit ref tonight

[Alf Bentley]

Massive overreaction on here, shocking I know, the only decision I disagree with was the penalty, Croatia attacker clearly jumped into the Goalie, foul no argument.

Even the penalty, you look at it from the ref's perspective he can see an arm coming over from the defender and the attacker going down. The fault is with FIFA not giving referees the tools to reach the correct decision. We will see many more bad decisions in this World Cup and the next and in the upcoming premiership season until FIFA change the rules of the game.

 

Partly agree, partly disagree...

- By the rules, probably a red card and would normally be given (over-harshly); but yellow card is justice for me - didn't affect game, didn't do serious damage or risk doing so.

- Definitely not a penalty, but the sort of cheating by players that gets penalties sometimes - and the defender was silly to risk putting a hand on him;

- By the rules, Croatia's "goal" probably shouldn't have been disallowed, as the keeper had fumbled it before any impact, which was natural contact not obstruction....but would be given as a foul 95% of the time; wish it wasn't so, but standard practice - in practice, you can't touch the keeper, even in a fair challenge, unfortunately.

 

However, the realist in me knows that if the decisions had been the other way round, Croatia would have been down to 10 men and wouldn't have got a penalty (the foul on the keeper would almost certainly have been given for either team). A probably non-corrupt "homer" ref who flinched under pressure, I'd say,,,,not a rare phenomenon, unfortunately.

 

If I was being cynical and looking for corruption, I'd be looking more at Pletikosa.....got really near to all 3 goals and somehow let them all in. I'm unduly cynical, I expect....but that's what hearing about FIFA does to your feelings about international football.

 

Ah, well! An interesting match - and a useful reminder that mingled with the moments of glory, every World Cup has a pile of crap cynicism and injustice, unfortunately.

[Grandad.]

Shocking refereeing and I agree, if England managed to face Brazil on that performance then I would back our chances. 

 

3-1 was very flattering. 

[reynard]

Summed up as follows.

 

Awful Ref.

Never a penalty

Naymar clearly elbowed with intent and could be seen to look before doing it and should have been sent off.

Croatia were unlucky but were pretty negative for much oif the game.

Brazil didn't look that great but will get better.

[Finnegan]

I hate all this "you have to be English / German / Spanish etc to ref big games" shit.

Absolute horse crap. You think there aren't high pressure games in Asia? They don't have cup finals, do they? They don't have fierce rivals or challenging players? Would you tell a Serbian ref who'd controlled Red Star vs Partizan that he's less equipped for the big games than a premier league ref who's given a player THREE YELLOW CARDS in a major tournament match?

Grow up.

And don't even start with the corruption crap, the paranoid tinfoil hat rubbish about him being a FIFA puppet. He gave the host of a major game a soft penalty in their own back yard in the heat of the moment - how many times do we level that criticism against premier league refs at Old Trafford or Stamford Bridge?

Joey Barton is an attention seeking twat and anyone that agrees with him is flat out thick - I'd be disappointed in you, ttfn, if I've not misread your posts.

You're a good ref or a shit ref, regardless of where you're from.

[lavrentis]

I thought the ref did well

[Ross-Kemp]

Scolari waving imaginary cards around, awful.

[Guest ttfn]

I hate all this "you have to be English / German / Spanish etc to ref big games" shit.

Absolute horse crap. You think there aren't high pressure games in Asia? They don't have cup finals, do they? They don't have fierce rivals or challenging players? Would you tell a Serbian ref who'd controlled Red Star vs Partizan that he's less equipped for the big games than a premier league ref who's given a player THREE YELLOW CARDS in a major tournament match?

Grow up.

And don't even start with the corruption crap, the paranoid tinfoil hat rubbish about him being a FIFA puppet. He gave the host of a major game a soft penalty in their own back yard in the heat of the moment - how many times do we level that criticism against premier league refs at Old Trafford or Stamford Bridge?

Joey Barton is an attention seeking twat and anyone that agrees with him is flat out thick - I'd be disappointed in you, ttfn, if I've not misread your posts.

You're a good ref or a shit ref, regardless of where you're from.

I don't think it's a fix, that was a joke.

Joey Barton talking about "back waters" is ill-judged and arguably a little racist. However, saying that he is not as qualified as somebody who is refereeing elite club football regularly is surely just common sense? The badges he's got are largely irrelevant to this discussion - obviously he's got them - I've got exactly the same accounting qualifications as most FTSE 100 finance directors but what I don't have is the experience of making decisions under that sort of pressure.

The standard of football he referees regularly is nowhere near the same level as this and the pressure in an environment where the host nation and favourite is struggling to break down a mid-tier side in front or a partisan crowd must have been pretty intense. The ball is being moved quicker than he's used to, the players are moving quicker, the players are cleverer with their cheating (*cough* Fred) - it's a a nightmare.

Your point about Graham Poll is fair enough but as I recall nobody particularly raved about him at the time - he was a crap referee who made a stupid mistake - arguably he shouldn't have been involved either.

UEFA and FIFA should be working together to get the best referees in the world refereeing in the Champions League, regardless of nationality. He might be a "good ref" in theory but his best chance of being sufficiently prepared is refereeing elite football before the tournament.

[AKCJ]

i don't really give a shit where he comes from he was just shit at his job. he could've won the Second World War and found a cure for aids for all I care he'd still have been a shit ref tonight

 

 

So why did you say that Barton was bang on? 

[ScouseFox]

So why did you say that Barton was bang on? 

 

because 

 

 

I don't think it's a fix, that was a joke.

Joey Barton talking about "back waters" is ill-judged and arguably a little racist. However, saying that he is not as qualified as somebody who is refereeing elite club football regularly is surely just common sense? The badges he's got are largely irrelevant to this discussion - obviously he's got them - I've got exactly the same accounting qualifications as most FTSE 100 finance directors but what I don't have is the experience of making decisions under that sort of pressure.

The standard of football he referees regularly is nowhere near the same level as this and the pressure in an environment where the host nation and favourite is struggling to break down a mid-tier side in front or a partisan crowd must have been pretty intense. The ball is being moved quicker than he's used to, the players are moving quicker, the players are cleverer with their cheating (*cough* Fred) - it's a a nightmare.

Your point about Graham Poll is fair enough but as I recall nobody particularly raved about him at the time - he was a crap referee who made a stupid mistake - arguably he shouldn't have been involved either.

UEFA and FIFA should be working together to get the best referees in the world refereeing in the Champions League, regardless of nationality. He might be a "good ref" in theory but his best chance of being sufficiently prepared is refereeing elite football before the tournament.

[David Guiza]

I don't understand the amount of people who are writing Brazil off already. Yes they were somewhat lucky and looked very shaky at times, but it was the opening game of the tournament as hosts. I'm not saying they'll win it, or even make the final, but i'm sure they'll improve and grown into the games no end.

[RowlattsFox]

Very little said about the cheating of Fred, he doesn't go down like that and the ref doesn't have a decision to make. Also I think the linesman gave the foul on the keeper.

I think the yellow was about right although most refs would have shown red.

Claims the ref is corrupt is harsh, generally he did pretty well I thought in letting things go but when under pressure he crumbled and was conned.

[ScouseFox]

I don't understand the amount of people who are writing Brazil off already. Yes they were somewhat lucky and looked very shaky at times, but it was the opening game of the tournament as hosts. I'm not saying they'll win it, or even make the final, but i'm sure they'll improve and grown into the games no end.

Obviously there is room for improvement and there needs to be a fair bit should they be challenging for anything other than the next round. Think most were just agreeing with the idea that if we were to get them somewhere along the line and they threw in a performance of that standard and nature there's nothing to be scared of.

[David Guiza]

Obviously there is room for improvement and there needs to be a fair bit should they be challenging for anything other than the next round. Think most were just agreeing with the idea that if we were to get them somewhere along the line and they threw in a performance of that standard and nature there's nothing to be scared of.

Definitely, they were very much below par. Got to be difficult for them with the pressure I'd imagine, Oscar stood up to it, but there's a lot that didn't. Surely if were to play Brazil, Roy would have to go with pace. Olic had Alves on toast in the first half.