Player2 said:
DakonBlackblade said:
Player2 said:
DakonBlackblade said:
You know this has gota stop, if theyre semi-finalist theyre obviously playing good football. Its more a matter of perception than anything, the deal is every so called "weak team" in this cup were actually a lot stronger than we were giving them credit, so every match for the so called "great teams" has been super hard. Still they won, the favorites are trough and we gona have two awesome matches on the semis, I have no doubt about it.
|
Yes, like Greece in the 2004 Euro.
|
They obviously played better footbal than anyone else on that Euro, beeing defensive does not equal beeing bad. Football is made of both ofense and defense, if you excell in defense (like Greece did on that Euro) and you do it so well that nobody gets to score a goal againts you and you are good at scoring when you have oportunist than youre definetly playing better football than the oposition.
In 1982 Brazil had a squad that played a super ofensive football, it was a joy to watch, but the Italian side on that world cup was much more efficient and defeated Brazil. I am Brazilian and I have no problem in admiting that even tough that 1982 team played the most fun to watch football ever played, it wasnt the better team (or at least didnt play better x Italy). Its not rocket science, whoever plays best wins, and you cna play better than your oposition in a lot of diferent ways not only beeing ofensive.
|
Regarding Greece's 2004 Euro I have a better theory: Ottmar Hitzfeld stole the three German traits and imbued the Greek team with them. If their defenders (and goalie) were so great all the big european teams would've tried to sign them.
Football isn't an exact science, you can score in a corner/freekick, play like trash for 89 minutes and still win.
I didn't want to believe it, but it seems to be true: Brazil began to change after their failures in the 82 and 86 World Cups and eventually fell to the dark side. Apparently now there's offensive and defensive football, and Brazil choosed the latter because it's the faster and easier way to win. That's why they have coaches like Scolari and Dunga and their midfield has been full of Paulinhos, Felipe Melos and Gilberto Silvas in the last ten years, meanwhile creative players had to give up and play for another country. |
Problem with that theory is in practice it works in one or two matches but not in a whole tournament, Greece beat Portugal twice on their home ground, Czech Republic who were the second best team in the world at the time, France who were the holders and had the likes of Zidane, Viera, Henry etc... and held an upcoming Spanish side to a draw. They were playing strong football even if it wasn't attractive.
