World Cup: Group D: Croatia vs. Nigeria, 6/16/2018

[Live in the Now]

Good chance, went to the wrong guy.

 

[Savi]

Part of a double-6 or an 8/10 (the advanced midfielder) in an inverted triangle

W - FW - W
8/10 - 8/10
6
LB - CB - CB - RB​

Thanks

 

[Live in the Now]

Some really crappy teams repping the CAF. As per usual..

Other than Senegal and Egypt, the best players on these teams are very young and inexperienced. And Egypt's best player didn't play, they still nearly got a point.

It is what it is. The last generation of footballers was not really that great, and there were even fewer quality footballers from Africa. In fact I can't think of any great 30 year olds from the continent at this moment. I'm probably forgetting someone but that I can't immediately think of someone says a lot.

 

[missingmika]

Wheels have fallen off after that PK goal.

Some really crappy teams repping the CAF. As per usual..

CAF has such a stupid qualification. Need some Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso.

 

[Timeless Winter]

Safe to assume no teams from Asia or Africa make the round of 16?

 

[Bakayoko Ono]

The only way to approach Nigeria is to expect nothing from them. Such an underwhelming team in World Cups.

 

[cgf]

Safe to assume no teams from Asia or Africa make the round of 16?

Senegal & Tunisia have a good shot. Group H has three teams that could top the group, though I favor Colombia most since Glik got hurt for Poland. And Tunisia has a chance because England.

 

[Corto]

Safe to assume no teams from Asia or Africa make the round of 16?

I think Senegal has a decent chance. We played them in a friendly, there's quality there, just depends if they can put it all together.

As for the game... I think Nigeria will win a point off Iceland or Argentina, but they're not exactly world beaters.

I hope Dalic goes back to 4-3-3 instead of this 4-4-2, Modric and Rakitic are wasted in a system without our own version of Casemiro/Busquets.
Once Brozovic came on, Rakitic looked "freed" and Modric looked better as well.
In the end, Messi will eat us alive in a 4-4-2. They need that 3rd guy in the block there.

Also, Lovren has been playing like a man possessed since VVD came to Liverpool, and he kept it up today.
Fantastic display.

 

[King 88]

Safe to assume no teams from Asia or Africa make the round of 16?

Senegal and Egypt have best chances. If Salah is able to play they have good chances against russia. Poland is decent but nothing special after Lewandowski.

 

[cgf]

Senegal and Egypt have best chances. If Salah is able to play they have good chances against russia. Poland is decent but nothing special after Lewandowski.

Do you get your information from ESPN FC per chance?

You seem to be forgetting that Linetty & Zielinski exist...and that Milik has been looking really good again since getting healthy...

 

[King 88]

Do you get your information from ESPN FC per chance?

You seem to be forgetting that Linetty & Zielinski exist...and that Milik has been looking really good again since getting healthy...

Well after Lewa there isnt huge difference that would make them far superior to Senegal.

 

[cgf]

Well after Lewa there isnt huge difference that would make them far superior to Senegal.

Well that's a very different statement; Senegal have a lot of talent themselves.

 

[Live in the Now]

Safe to assume no teams from Asia or Africa make the round of 16?

It depends how South Korea plays against Sweden, and Senegal/Egypt/Tunisia of course.

I'm also reticent to write off Iran, but the two games in front of them are so difficult. Nigeria and Morocco I can't give any chance at this point, but I remember Nigeria played horrendous against Iran in 2014 and still advanced. Croatia also lost to Iceland in the qualifiers and they have another difficult game. So who knows? Australia could turn up to play against Peru and Denmark as well.

The great thing about the World Cup, is simply that teams can shit themselves in the first game and fix it by the third. Spain lost in 2010 to a horrible Swiss team, prior to the more talented current Swiss generation. I mean, that team was really awful, and it didn't make any sense, but that's what happens in the World Cup. Morocco could always recover their f***ing up by beating Portugal and Spain. These things do happen.

Even though there's always groups that make you think a team should finish with 9 points, it's always only half or less of the teams that finish with 9 points. In 2010 only 2 teams won all their group matches and that was a year with some seriously imbalanced groups, with results that actually seemed quite obvious, yet they weren't.

 

[HajdukSplit]

Typical Croatia performance for 90% of this cycle, they somehow win despite creating very little and it was the same today, in fact they didn't get a shot on target from open play until late in the match. A win is a win but they have no reason to be overly excited, the pressure is somewhat off against Argentina but I will worry if they go to the Iceland game needing a win

On a side note, probably only the Croatian posters on HF will understand this but Dalic needs to pipe down his charlatan talk, its becoming Cacic/Stimac levels with the quasi-nationalism

 

[robertmac43]

CAF has such a stupid qualification. Need some Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso.

I miss Ghana

 

[Suiteness]

Much much MUCH better African teams underachieved so much in this tournament for the past 20 years that I'm not shocked in the least that the current crop will go out in a whimper.

Where do we start? The Cameroon of Mboma, Eto'o and Geremi that were so ridiculously lazy throughout? Côte d'Ivoire of Yaya, Drogba, Gervinho and Koné who were always stuck in the group of death?

Ghana were good to make it past the group stages a few times at least.

 

[Live in the Now]

If Senegal doesn't do anything they'll be more disappointing than any of those teams. They have more talent everywhere. The Ivorians had two world class players, but so does Senegal (Ivorian two were better), and the rest of their team is better. They're also in an easier group than the Ivorians ever got in, where they would have had to best Brazil and Portugal or Argentina and the Netherlands.

Mane is in such great form, if they can't do anything, I don't know anymore.

 

[koyvoo]

Nigeria 1998. Babayaro, Kanu, Tariboo West, Finidi George, Yekini, Okocha, Babangida, Oliseh...

 

[robertmac43]

Sarr - Mane - Balde

Is rapid, will be hard to contain the speed

 

[robertmac43]

Ghana were good to make it past the group stages a few times at least.

Still will never get over that Suarez hand ball

 

[Live in the Now]

Nigeria 1998. Babayaro, Kanu, Tariboo West, Finidi George, Yekini, Okocha, Babangida, Oliseh...

That team did pretty well. Defensively though, lol.

 

[Suiteness]

If Senegal doesn't do anything they'll be more disappointing than any of those teams. They have more talent everywhere. The Ivorians had two world class players, but so does Senegal (Ivorian two were better), and the rest of their team is better. They're also in an easier group than the Ivorians ever got in, where they would have had to best Brazil and Portugal or Argentina and the Netherlands.

Mane is in such great form, if they can't do anything, I don't know anymore.

They're in a tough group though. If they had landed in Group A instead of Egypt or maybe Group G...

 

[Live in the Now]

They're in a tough group though. If they had landed in Group A instead of Egypt or maybe Group G...

I don't think it's that tough. Colombia was not in good form during qualifying. All three top teams are about equal, and then there's Japan, who could surprise I guess.

 

[cgf]

I don't think it's that tough. Colombia was not in good form during qualifying. All three top teams are about equal, and then there's Japan, who could surprise I guess.

It's tougher than Tunisia & Egypt's groups

 

[robertmac43]

Tunisia

We all know they will beat England on one shot from the counter and the entire country will go up in flames and everyone will cry out for the golden days with Bobby Charlton even though most people were not even alive for them