Yes.Finally those days are about to start.If I say frankly world cup days are few days which I just forget all other things and enjoy myself.Being a person coming from football crazy Kerala I am waiting anxiously for June 9.

Let us discuss about it.Tell about your favourite tams and players(if any body is interested in football).

My favourite team is Brazil(as always)

My favourite players are Kaka and Adriano(Brazil).

After Brazil my support goes to Holland.

only team which I dislike is France.

I feel missing my home now .it would have been great If was there with so many friends and football fans .

Don't know how far they will go but definitely glad to see Australia make it to Germany. Football (code=soccer) is almost non-existent in Australia (well, was non-existent untill a few months back). Just this opportunity they got, regardless whether they make it round 2 or not, will do very good for the sport there.
With all the interest this worldcup has aroused in Australia, they will be the team to watch for in the next world cup.

My tip, Germany, the 2006 World Champs.

Rooting for Brazil here. My player to watch, Ronaldinho, the bucked toothed assassin. I think Argentina and Italy also have good chance though you can never ignore the Germans, plus they have home advantage this time round.

My mates reckon England have a great chance, HAHA, I promised each of them a new jersey should that happen!

Milao Azad ji haath Apoon bhi Germany ka fan hai.

Football is my fav sport. but delhi people hardly like this game.
I dont have cable at home....so totally clueless abt players and hype that usually comes with such events.

but apoon ko Germany ka game hamesha pasand hai. so this time also its Germany for me.
Brazilians individual efforts per kaafi depend karte hai.

ghar me kaha hai ek mahine ke leye cable lagane ko.... . unko darr hai kahi Baywatch na dekhne lag pade ladka



Sonu

Oh Man, great thread Ashraf bhai, Football is one of my most favourite sports.

My team is ITALY !!!!

I hope this time they don't let us down, the past two tourney's have been big letdowns, being eliminated by SK in 02 and then failing to qualify to the second round in the Euro Cup in 04.

My favourite player is Del Piero, he's re-invented himself and is in the form of his life right now, he's had a great season with Juve and hopefully he will shine in this tourney, but the question is can he and Totti play together, considering they have had their share of problems in the past.

I hope they finish first in their group so they don't meet Brazil right away in the second round, not that I think they can't beat them , but that would be a good semi-final or final clash.

Nice to know there are football fans here on HF.

LOL......................

England All The Way!

Players to watch, Messi, Kaka, Toni, Ronaldihno, Rooney(if fit), Adriano, and HENRY.

Hari bhai

You mean u like England or England has the best chance to win?

Actually England disappoint always.In premior league English players are stylish and plays attacking style of football,but when it comes to international matches English football sucks.They always plays defensively.
I like Steven Jerrard in English team.

I hope 'Ronaldinhco-Ronaldo-Kaka-Adriano-Robinhco' will be in good form so that Brazil can score at an average of 3 goals in all matches.So even if defence goes little weak Brazil can win the matches.

Any Argentine fans here?.

Prince bhai.Italy has improved a lot and now a days playing some fast/attacking game unlike they plays in 90s.But they need to have some luck going on their favour(just like the dutch)

Most luckiest team in the world is France sure.

my teams: france, brasil, argentina, germany. but 1 thing i dislike about germany is
they r very aggresive and do misdeeds to take the game in their favor ...

i was in full support of france during france v switzerland, but they couldn't win. kya dayaa game thaa ...
bore ho gaye the ... henry has been in form but did nothing remarkable.

i guess the best goals came from "kaka" ( brasil, with croatia ) and "frings" ( germany, with costa rica ) ,
what say ? anybody watched all the matches ???
to know all the updates of matches & results, plz visit this ... FIFA WorldCup-2006

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Nature ji

Frankly speaking France has no chance this time.Their game is just average.I really don't know why the teams like England and France getting prominence in the media where the truth is that teams like Netherlands are way aahead of them.

Brazil disappointed everybody including diehard fans like me.

best result so far is Spains 4-0 victory against Ukrain.Inside of my heart says that this time the cup will be won by either Netherlands or Spain.

Great thread. I took half a day from work yesterday to watch my favorite team (Brazil) and what a let down it was. Croatia stiffled then in the middle third and suddenly the Brazilians looked oh so ordinary. I think they were very lucky to garner full points with such a scrappy performance. But may be they are holding back, it might just be that they are playing percentage soccer and saving their best for sterner tests ahead. But all in all I am greatly dissapointed. Till now I have been very impressed with Germany, Spain and Argentina. Germany's defence looked a bit shaky though. Also Spain has this habit of playing its heart out in the group stages only to dissapoint in the knockout phases. They had been the biggest under-achievers in the history of WC Soccer.
BTW, any of you watching India/WI game. Howz the pitch behaving, any chance of India prising out the remaining seven wickets

Boy oh boy! What a thriller that Poland vs Germany turned out to be... !!! Click to view attachment

Poland vs Germany. That was a real thriller, going down to the wire. Unfortunately the Poles lost to Equador & may not be able to enter the next round of the tournament.

Brazil was a let down, Ronaldo looks like he has weight issues, he wasn't effective at all, but there's still time, they should get it together against two relatively weaker sides in Australia and Japan.

France (as Ashraf bhai pointed out) seems like no real threat this time, they looked sloppy on the field, but they do have a team of veterans and are capable of giving a fight, we'll see how they do.

Netherlands and Spain are both strong, but Spain has a history of choking as Deghosh put it, the Netherlands have the team that can make some noise this year.

Poland had no offence at all, Germany should have won that match earlier but their chances didn't go through for them until the end, Ecuador who just made it to the Final 16 have faced two easy sides, and now they will find it harder in the Final 16.

I am disappointed with Del Piero's form which is why Lippi is playing all the other subs ahead of him, I hope he gets back his form in time so that he can get more playing time. This is def. not the same Del Piero of this season and of old. I think Italy should play Del Piero and Totti along with Toni, that would be the right combination and bring Gili off the bench. (although Gili has alot of speed, but this way you would have two playmakers DP and Totti to feed Toni and DP serves both as a playmaker and a striker)

I hope Italy beats the US, the big match is against the CR on Thursday, Italy have to finish first in their group.

Germany any day..........
The kind of aggressiveness they showed against the poles and won the match (Oh boy, Was it a thriller?), i'd say it w'd be the Germans.
Though Ronaldo looks a bit soft now, one still can't rule him out entirely, he may still be able to tilt the balance,so ,To watch a final conflict between the brasilians and germans yet again( if it so happens) wd be a dream come true.
But there is also Argentina....

... who (Argentina) are making mincemeat of poor Serbia n Montenegro. I am cringing at the thought of watching US vs Italy tomorrow

Can't wait for tommorow T-ji, I hope Italy washes out the US and eliminates them from the competition.

Totti is still 70 percent fit, he needs playing time to get back his form and then there is not a midfielder in the world that can stop his talents.

I hope Del Piero gets his form back, he is a big part of the squad, he needs to prove his talent on the international stage.

Argentina are good, and the Netherlands are great as well, they have a team that can go all the way this time.

One mother of a game!

That second goal was one of the best team goals I've ever seen; 23 passes, back heel by Crespo, bang, GOAL!

u r very true ashraf ji, france is not in form. the very first game was not at all enjoyable. very bad attacks
from both of the teams. let's see how they do next. henry and few others may do better. i like france ...

i am not aware of that. it might be in many places, here there is no media hype i guess.
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anybody watched england vs. trinidad & tobago ??? it was good, awesome defence by terry.
bas ekhi shot mein main terry kaa fan ban gayaa. it was good to see rooney's come back, people
were shouting for him in the theatre, he had lots of fans. but i didn't see any special effect from him,
see next time ...
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what about netherlands v ivory coast 2day ??? so many golden opportunities yet ivory coast couldn't
make more goals. but they played well ... here is the top 10 fifa world ranking teams.

1 brazil
2 czech republic
3 the netherlands
4 mexico
5 usa
5 spain
7 portugal
8 france
9 argentina
10 england

who do u think have a change to win worldcup 2006 ??? interesting thing people was not satisfied
with performance of brazil with 23rd rank holder croatia and the condition was even worse with
france v ivory coast ( 32th rank holder ) .....
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let's start a poll, let's see how many of us can make a good guess. choose 10 best teams, put them
in the poll and let's see who wins ... what say ??? i will be happy if 1 of the following wins

france, brazil, argentina, netherlands, spain ...

The Italy-US matchup was crazy, three red cards.....De Rossi's elbow was bad though, he should not have made such a move and now it might cost him playing time in the rest of the World Cup if he comes back....Italy should have still won having the extra man....Del Piero had two great chances but they didn't go through.....I am hoping Italy beats the Czech's to top their group on Thurs.....they play best under pressure.

France's situation is bad....they can be knocked out and to add to it Zidane misses the next match, so the match against Korea might have been the last WC game of his career....a sad way to exit.

What else do you guys/gyals think about the First Round so far ?.

Love the caricature!

Sadly, he hasn't fired like I thought he would, there again many of the big players and teams have looked poor and unimaginitive. Maybe the minnows have caught up.

Argentina look a good bet for the finals.

Argentina looked good with S&M or maybe S&M made them look good? I didn't see them play Ivory Coast, lets wait and watch what develops with the Netherlands. I need a break from football, have it coming out of my ears over this weekend

4 saal baad WC aya, abhi break chahiye kya?
10 july ko kehenge ki, kaash worldcup thode din aur chalta

Satya vachan!

esp v. tun, awesome game !!! similarly bra v. aus .... i am happy now, though france disappointed me a lot.
this time, i see good teams disappointing very much. france is for sure 1 of them, brasil doing the same
though they won, samething applies to czech ... what an awesome win by ghana ... they tried very much
and they won ... frankly speaking, it doesn't matter which team will win, cause my country is not playing
but i have started liking some teams and i wish 1 of them wins ...

i got an idea, the idea of "3rd umpire" concept in soccer like in cricket ??? i mean "another referee"
cause i noticed these facts:

1. wrong decisions by the referee regarding fouls/yellow cards/free kicks, sometimes they don't give
when they must give ... a camera can say u everything and helps u taking better decisions ...

2. especially the goals & offsides ... they player is inside the posts(at the time of defending) and
still it is not a goal and there r some cases of invalid offisides ....

what say ??? forget it , soccer loves will laugh at me ... just chil man, i am joking ...

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Actually France were poor last time too, if I remember right they failed to score and hence didn't make it through the group stages.

BTW, why the old pics?

aaj italy ke liye bada zaruri din hai. Agar Czech se aaj har gaya to most likely they wont continue to the 1/8-finals, or thode time baad, italy ke corruption-scandal ka jawab milega. 4 clubs degrade ho sakte...

Italy had a good game yesterday, and are now playing the kangoroos in the 1/8-final. As Ghana also went through to 1/8 final and meeting Brazil, they dont have very bug possibility to get further. But if all the Ghana players give 110% in every part of the game, and with a bit luck, they may beat brazil. Hope so

Aussie Aussie Aussie! Oi oi oi!
Aussie Aussie Aussie! Oi oi oi!
Aussie! Oi! Aussie! Oi!
Aussie Aussie Aussie! Oi oi oi!

Aussie Aussie Aussie Oi Oi Oi!
We will give them Italians a fair crack of the whip, bring them on!

Kal kya hoga?

Germany vs Sweden n Argentina vs Mexico??

My money's on the Germans and the Argentinians... what say the rest of you fans??

T ji


I have same opinion as you....It will be Argentines and Germens to go through....We can watch good match in the quarter between the two teams....waiting for that.

I am so so happy that finally Brazil has started to play their natural game.....I hope Brazil can reach in the semifinals(No Ghana, Ukrain/Swiss can stop brazil sure)....Then 2 tough matches(semi final&final)....If there is some luck Brazil can win....Any way I am happy if Brazil plays well...thats all

Me bettin on Germany!!!!!!!!!!

N

What a treat it would be for football lovers...if it were to be an
ARGENTINA - BRAZIL Final on July 9th !!!!!!!
I'm keeping my fingers crossed for that.

Sri

I would love to see Germany vs Brazil, with Brazil winning of course

Gingz

So we're down to the last 16, here's where we currently stand:

1) Germany vs Sweden
2) Argentina vs Mexico
3) England vs Ecuador
4) Portugal vs Holland
5) Italy vs Australia
6) Switzerland vs Ukraine
7) Brazil vs Ghana
8) Spain vs France

Italy have the easiest route to the semis where they could possibly meet Argentina or Germany. I want the quarters to look like this:

1) Germany vs Argentina
2) England vs Holland
3) Italy vs Switzerland
4) Brazil vs Spain

watched the matches ???

1. england v. sweden
2. brasil v. japan
3. argentina v. netherlands
4. germany v. sweden
5. argentina v. mexico
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the most exciting match till now i have watched is " argentina v. mexico "
what an interesting match it was


i would go for france, argentina & brasil ... after france, i like argentina and above of all
messi & tebez ...
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u mean supporting or opposing ???
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i like germany, the way the play. they are the most disgusting team i guess. ask why ?
they will do all sorts of misdeeds, sometimes they deserve yellow cards but nobody will say
anything. but when the samething happens to them, they will fight to give red cards to the opponents
the last red card was pathetic ( i guess it was from argentina ), that fellow did nothing ....
only from this point of view i dislike germany, otherwise germany is my in favorite list ...
let's see if fra / argentina / bra can win or not ...

Supporting only Nature

you are kidding me !!! waise aap karenge bhi kya ? debate to kar nahi sakte !!!
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got some fifa babes in my email, wanna share with u guys ...

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want more ???

Did I ask at all Why would I be interested in babes

N

i see everything except one decent football...

ahh.. football.....well now it isn't what it used to be.

I am tired after the last match (Netherlands Vs Portugal). I felt like spanking everyone!!! Too much aggression not enough Football

Tji

(nimii sniggering to herself.. with a "I told you so" look on her face he he he )

am still betting on Germany..........
Being on home ground with the crowd behind you , and Podolski.....everything going their way.

Reeth join the club

Yipeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

Amongst the 4 that are already in QFs, to me Germany's looked the most consistent and solid so far. Aage aage dekhte hain kya hota hain.

cool down nimmi ji !!! babes are harmless ( soccer babes particularly ), they entertain us and take nothing
in return .... i just shared them with you guys for your fun ... so enjoy and forget ...

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sahi farmaaye !!! ... fouls, free kicks, yellow cards, red cards that's all about it . ... kya dayaa match thaa
after all portugal won which i didn't xpect, i thought netherlands would ... nothing impossible !!!

satya bachan. germany did very well, they are in better form than brasil i guess. aage aage dekhte hai hotaa hai kya ...
i hope argentina, brasil, germany would win. but germany v. argentina quarter final ... so very exciting ...

here it goes, few decent footballs ...

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Nature Ooffffff! No more OK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!