I've been impressed with Mexico. A crap qualification campaign made most people dismiss their Olympic gold as a meaningless fluke. Okay, everyone dismissed their Olympic gold as a meaningless fluke before their crap qualification campaign. But they look like a good team to me, creative, hard working and well organized. Competent officiating would have made them 4-0 first game winners. After one game, Germany and the Netherlands look head and shoulders better than the next group, which includes Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Italy and Chile. I wouldn't dismiss Brazil's chances yet, though. They did look better against Mexico, are very nearly through and will continue to have home field advantage, even if they're not a great team. Their last game was between the two last teams to win an international tournament. Meanwhile, Concacaf is 3-1-1.
Mexico have always been a good team to watch at world cups and they are another team to go with wing backs. If they played more open they would have caused Brazil more problems but likely lost, so another good game plan from a team that is happy to sit back and be smart. Lets see how Germany get on with their group games but we know from previous that when they find their top gear they could easily be the team to beat. Muller is a superb player and only 24? Plus am looking forward to see how Spain respond. Good world cup so far!
The amazing thing is how bad our players are, which confirms they are pretty average in the first place. The Belgians trio , Dembele is usual sideways impotent performance (15 million wasted) , Chadli 95% of nothingness . Verts in a wrong position but still a disaster . Paula the worst Brazilian first 11 player I think I have ever seen. How does he get in the team? Benty confirms that he will be another squad player that will eventually sold to a mid table team. Really none are worth keeping except for Verts in his correct position.
Belgium really didn't impress me yesterday, think a couple predicted they'd be the flops of the tournament on my outright predictions thread and judging by their first game, those people may be onto a winner. Someone on my Twitter made a good point during the game, "Belgium seem a team of great individuals but that's exactly that, individuals, not a good TEAM". How good was Ochoa last night?! Safe to say he won't be a free agent for long once the world cup is over, that single performance has guaranteed him a contract with at least a good European club. Amazing what the world cup can do for players. My prediction of Fred being top scorer looks a poor one, he's been shocking and wouldn't surprise me if he gets dropped in their 3rd game.
Our players are almost always going to be from the range 20-50 in the world in each position as we are not in the top 10 clubs worldwide. It is almost impossible to tell the difference between the world numbers 20 and 50 in any sport over a short time period. Its particularly hard for young players - Bentaleb might disappear without trace and could be the best player in the world - only time will tell. Bale was being described as 'clueless' on here when he was the same age.
It's early days - many teams win the World Cup after struggling in the group games. I think there is a reason for this: to beat the highest quality teams in the later rounds you need skilful players, but these traditionally are also the most unpredictable - think Hazard. In the group stages the poorer teams do well as they pick solid players who won't let them down, whereas the better teams pick their best players to make sure they are ready for the business end of the tournament but risk uneven performances. England is a very good example of this: always pick the solid performer over the mercurial genius (think Wilkins over Hoddle) and qualify but get no further. This year I think Hodgson is doing his best to think like a winner: the team he had out for the last few minutes against Italy had our six most skilful attacking players. He runs the risk of not qualifying but I think they could surprise a few teams if they do get through.
I think with the players we have, our best chance of progressing is to "go for it". I'm not overly convinced with our defensive players, Johnson isn't a top standard international RB, Baines is good in the Prem yet hasn't really done much in a England shirt for me, Cahill and Jagielka are an ok pairing but there a far better CB partnerships in this tournament than those two where as Hart can be brilliant or shocking. We also don't have a Barry or Parker, a true DM, to sit in front of the back 4 and protect them so I'd rather Roy play our best attacking line up and aim to outscore our opponents as that's where we're strongest in my opinion. Sturridge is a predator, Rooney on his day is superb (though yet to show that in his World Cup appearances to date), Welbeck gets stick but is a great work horse and actually has a half decent strike rate for England and then we have Sterling who tore Italy a new one. Add Lallana and Ox to that list and we have a good bunch of attacking players there, supported by Gerrard, therefore I think Roy needs to stick/ go with an attacking game plan as playing it safe for England, is actually probably more riskier than going gun-ho so to speak.
Belgium seem to be making a bad attempt at fitting a lot of good individual players into a team framework. They got out of jail against Algeria because of a individual skill rather than team cohesion. I can't see them suddenly gelling as a team in time to be a threat in this WC. England may not be very good and may have few players capable of producing moments of individual brilliance, but at least Hodgson has a decent idea of his formation and personnel and has a gameplan.
Going back to what I was saying about Brazil taking to the pitch under the belief the shirt is worth a goal before a ball is even kicked, looking back at some of the performances at Euro 2012 and last year's Confederations Cup it wouldn't surprise me if Spain were developing a similar attitude.
No good having that attitude if the opposition can score at least two, hbic. Will be interesting to see what happens if Croatia win their next game.
This game will almost certainly see Holland progress and the Aussies eliminated. Anything other than a comfortable win for the Dutch would be a shock, especially after their mauling of the Spanish. Only complacency can cost them this game, I think.
