[Shade]

To be fair, he screwed over Portugal first by letting the dutch slaughter Ronaldo for just a yellow card. I think that's what led to the bloodbath... players saw that and realized just how much they could get away with, not to mention wanted revenge since the ref didn't administer justice properly. Ended up with an 'eye for an eye' situation with the ref unable to do anything about it. Most entertaining, yes

[Edit] Is it just me or is it really hard to tell that Italy are in fact down to 10?

[Edit] Penalty? Penalty?!? No way... that defender was lying down 10 minutes before the Italian went out of his way to trip over him. Should have been a yellow card for faking it. And 1-nil Italy. Of course, the red card was wrong too, and Italy would be ahead if they'd had 11 on the field given their play with 10 so the result is not entirely unfair, but still... lousy ref.

[vaang]

what the hell just happened?
a penalty 10 seconds before the end of the game...
now guess who was in the kitchen to get some food and drinks to prepare for the coming 30 minutes 

[karajorma]

Let's face it, the quality of the refereeing this tournament has been abysmal.

[Kie99]

The Quality of diving has been excellent, unfortunately.

[karajorma]

Well actually it's been rather unimpressive. They only got away with it because of the poor quality of the refereeing in most cases.

[Kie99]

They fooled the ref, that's what counts, even if he is awful.

FIFA should impose penalties after the match on players who dive, at the moment the worst you can get from a dive is a yellow, and the most you can get is winning the match for your team, like today.

[karajorma]

Problem is that unlike pulling shirts (which does carry a fine) it's a matter of judgement as to whether the player dove, fell or was fouled.

[aldo_14]

Christ, this is boring.  I've resorted to playing Metroid DS now......

[Shade]

Yeah. With only 1 yellow card after 88 minutes at this world cup, you just know neither team is really into it At least I had time to make dinner. Curry = Good.

[Edit] 102 minutes, and we get the first offside of the game. The first. What kind of game doesn't have a single offside until 12 minutes into the 3rd half?

[DaBrain]

What's up with this game?!?

117:00 ....

At least they started playing a bit.


Edit: Yeah... now they all fall on the ground... 

Edit2: If you ask me... they should both get kicked out. 

[Shade]

I bet they won't even be able to decide it on penalties. 3am this morning it'll be 47-47 and still going. *yawn*

[Edit] Or 0-0, it turns out. They can't even score on penalties...

[Edit] The Swiss really seriously suck at penalties. 3-nil Ukraine, who missed one as well.

[vaang]

switzerland misses all penalties 
that means the most boring teams Italy and Ukraine will meet in the quarterfinals 

[Col. Fishguts]

urgh .... now that was a uneventful game. And we really, really do suck at penalties.

From a neutral POV,  both teams didn't deserve to get to the next round.

[DaBrain]

Well... you could say they were so extremely evenly matched, that the games just had to turn out boring...

On the other hand both teams seemed to be a bit unmotivated. The last twenty minutes were most interesting imo.

[ToecrusherHammerjaw]

Let's face it, the quality of the refereeing this tournament has been abysmal.

Very true. It's really the reason I quit playing football/soccer/whatever around age 13. I'm too emotional when it comes to competitive sports. Ask anyone who's ever seen me at a Penn State home game. Basically, if I was subject to a moronically called red card the way some of these players have been, I would basically get a second one on purpose after I go up to the ref and go "Hey listen you f**k, you're an idiot!!".

That aside, some of these matches have been very good. My brothers and I are watching every one. I'm pulling for either England or Italy, but both my brothers say neither's gonna happen.

[karajorma]

England has players capable of winning the World Cup. Something went horribly wrong when trying to make them into a team though.

If England can play above the level they've shown so far then they stand a chance. But unless they can raise their game in the same way that Mexico did against Argentina (even though they lost) then they have no hope.

[Shade]

Probably won't need to raise it too much against Portugal. Those guys will be mortally afraid of tackling, as pretty much every yellow they get means a match ban Wonder if they'd actually be allowed to start a semi-final with 8 players instead of 11...

[aldo_14]

1-0 Brazil.  Great finish by Ronaldo.

[Night Hammer]

what a goal. he broke the record with that one didnt he?

[Shade]

Yep, 15 now. And what a goal to do it with. PS, nice to see a yellow card for diving. Those have been sorely missing lately.