Maybe violent wasn't the best word, but strong fouls should be punished with a yellow card anyway. Also, people talk about the foul that Neymar made, but don't say anything about the foul that Srna made on Hulk, that was pretty much the same thing and had no YC.

BTW, when Srna did this, the game was still 0-0. It was around 4min 1st half

It looked intentional yes, but I feel like the yellow card was the correct decision since it was really Neymar's forearm making most of the impact. What do the experts say on this? I turned off the TV before they got to discuss this.

Yeah, no. Yellow card was the right call. I think you should check again what an elbow actually is. Let's not make football absurd, sending people off for something like this is laughable.

I don't believe football will be fair until they introduce video review. There should be 3 refs sitting in a studio and analysing the video material in such vital moments. Waiting a minute means nothing in comparison to making the call right, since we waste even more due to players complaining and arguing.

Even then, handing off an opponent is against the rules... And following through with your forearm or elbow definitely is.

The Prem has been a sissy league for about 4 Years.

Seems Im in the minority here anyway. Where is kowenicki when I need him?

Great quality webm of the penalty decision, for anyone who missed it -

http://a.pomf.se/vtxegm.webm

And in a poor quality gif -

Disgraceful stuff. Brasil are too good a side to resort to such tactics.

I'm in!

Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Neymar's goal may be lucky but what about the fact that the only reason Croatia had a goal was because of an own goal? If that's not luck, I don't know what is. Croatia's whole game plan was to stack the box and when you do that, it always breaks down eventually. They got a lot more interesting when they were down.

I was not impressed by both teams, Brazil was very nervous and Croatia's team seems a bit slow to me and their goalkeeper was awful. Also Kovacic should play as a CM and not AM, he always sucks there even when he plays in Inter.

I think Mexico has a very good chance, we already know how to play against Brazil and can use the pressure against them. Croatia is good but I feel we can win the possession with high pressure and tempo in the midfield, but we need to score our chances.

First things first, tomorrow Cameroon, I'm really nervous cause we always have trouble against African (or fast) teams :S

Ugh! Question, should I have guessed the whole "three" up to the final and the victor to participate in the prediction competition here, or was it enough that I predicted who gets out of the group stage? I though that's the only thing we are betting on right now, as it doesn't make much sense to bet on the tournament stage without knowing who actually gets out, but if that's they way it was supposed to be done, I can quickly add ma later bets before the second game.