does anyone really think that the U.S. are going to beat Italy? i know italy always are a let down but the u.s. team is not that good, i mean i am american i wish they were, but lets be realistic, the reason they werent seeded and mexico were was because mexico enter all the Major tournaments and play top teams like Brazil (which they beat recently), the u.s. doesnt. look at the u.s. top player landon donovan he was a flop in europe and then he comes back saying that the MLS is a top league and he should never have left because going to europe wont help his development? you dont flourish playing against less talented players you have to go against the best to get better, now anyone can win a friendly here or there and maybe win a big World cup game, but to make it to the Semi's? thats a joke
Football Hooligans poll...US further than England?
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the main reason i dislike american football is that it's the only 60-minute game that takes 3 hours to play.
AgentWood wrote: the main reason i dislike american football is that it's the only 60-minute game that takes 3 hours to play.
i did like football when i was a kid, it was more classy, now you get a guy than pushes somebody out of bounds on a meaningless play and him and half the team do a celebration dance.
Al Jarvis wrote:
jesse steichen wrote: american football is actually quite an intricate and entertaining game..
Er, if any of this were actually true don't you think many other countries would've picked up on the spectacle by now?!
jesus christ, what kind of an argument is that? it is an intricate game, with each play set up with meticulous detail... and it regularly gets high, high ratings on us television, so someone must be entertained by it, not just me... i'm not even a big football fan, but i can appreciate it for what it is.
al, you're always down on america. it's almost to the point that it sounds like something terrible happened to you a long time ago and some american did it... for all americans, i apologize for being american, if it makes you feel better. personally, i don't give a fuck what nationality i am, and i'm not nationalistic enough to care about bashing another nation just because i feel bad about something. what is it?
frank smarra wrote: World Cup to Argentina!
Let them have the world cup, no probs.
but they aint getting the falklands!:evil:
matthew doig wrote: Seeing as the world cup draw was announced i would like to get some feedback on who will go further.
Even though the US has a far harder group i think they'll get to the semi's and the brits will go out in the round of 16 (as always!)
Stick to the cuntry music matty dog.
What a bollocks post!
I think uzbekistan will win it!
jesse steichen wrote: american football is actually quite an intricate and entertaining game..
al, you're always down on america. it's almost to the point that it sounds like something terrible happened to you a long time ago and some american did it... for all americans, i apologize for being american, if it makes you feel better. personally, i don't give a fuck what nationality i am, and i'm not nationalistic enough to care about bashing another nation just because i feel bad about something. what is it?
But you started your earlier post "All you English.."!
American Football I've never understood I'll admit and to me its not watchable, just stop-start and no flow, drowned in statistics. You'd probably find Jukskei the same if you came to SA though. American Football is your game but football or soccer is the world's game and its called 'the beautiful game' for a reason! Italy are a tough team to beat, they always have been...
Calm down USA boys - please. All I said was that you will never understand football ( not "soccer" - the word is football ). How can you understand it when only school kids and teenagers play it in the US ( not including the terrible professional league where ex footballers go to earn a few quid when they are in their late 30's ).
I think one thing could qualify this - a US football owner can move a team to the other end of the country - what is that all about. You would have a national outcry if Arsenal Rovers were suddenly to move from London to Newcastle ( that's in the north of England ) - would never happen.
As for the US beating Italy - please - that would be like my mates and I beating the NY Yankees at baseball !!!
Arsenal Rovers? WTF? It happened with AFC Wimbledon dont forget...they became Milton Keynes Dons by moving across to the other side of London.
Apologies - Arsenal Rovers was an attempt at a little comedy - as in US stlye non-irony - never mind.
I hardly think Wimbledon counts as a football team - probably an unfair comment - but as the worst supported team in the world nearly ...... ( I have seen them at the National Hockey Stadium in MK and they are terrible - as is the ground. I even did a Gazza there a few years ago and tore my cruciate ligament - before the Dons used the place ).
Back to business - A little more comedy - if the USA can enter the World Cup then I think Wigan Athletic should be able to enter the World Series !!!
:) No they didn't play against Arsenal, Reading had a kind of second string side out as well for that game.
Well they counted when they beat my team in the FA Cup all those years ago! You can call them what you like, they'll always be boring bloody Arsenal to me...
jesse steichen wrote:
Steve Campbell wrote:
Suck at Rugby: strap on pads and create American football
dude, i don't think you understand what a 375 pound linebacker would do to a pasty brit if they met up. american football players wear pads because the players are so massive. also, because of the forward pass, the game is more open than rugby, which leads to harder collisions. the pads and helmets were introduced because people were dying on the field:
"Columbia, Rutgers, Princeton, and Yale Universities met in New York City to formulate the first intercollegiate football rules for the increasingly popular game. These four teams established the Intercollegiate Football Association (IFA) and set 15 as the number of players allowed on each team.
Within a decade, concern over the increasing brutality of the game led to its ban by some colleges. Nearly 180 players had suffered serious injuries, and eighteen deaths had been reported from the brutal mass plays that had become common practice. So in 1905, President Theodore Roosevelt called upon Harvard, Princeton, and Yale to help save the sport from demise." --www.hornetfootball.org/documents
american football is actually quite an intricate and entertaining game. it translates well to t.v. because of the colors and the glitz, but what doesn't translate is the speed and brutality of the game. comparing rugby to american football is like comparing (in no particular order) a steak to ground beef. sure, they both come from the same source (which is where soccer comes from as well), but they are not the same thing.
I remember a documentary a few years ago, where a UK kids' TV presenter called Lionel Morton (remember him?) was involved in an 'exchange' where he went to the USA to play 'American Football'. He ended up with a cracked rib about halfway through, but at least he got on the pitch and had a go.
In the 'exchange' part, three 'American Footballers' came over to the UK to try their hand at rugby league.
The pansies' response was:
'Hey, I ain't goin out there without no pads'
'Sheeeeiiiit! that stuffs dangerous'
Q. 'Has anyone been killed doin this stuff?' A. 'Yeah, but not often' 'I ain't doin that man'
So, the Brit with the crap afro got padded up for a game of 'Let's play True Faith Video' and broke a rib. Enjoyed his game and brought the yanks back. The yanks then wimped out - Northern England's just too hard for them...
I witness that Docco too, hilarious. The yanks just looked fuckin incredulous...."errrrrr no!"
Better was Giles in Buffy.... "it epeaks volume about the state of american manhood that they feel the need to strap on 40pounds of padding just to play rugby"
Ever noticed BTW, than when they suck at a sport and invented their own version....it's always stop start stop start...net ball, rounders, rugby, all the same....even their cars races have full course yellows every 5 laps.
jesse steichen wrote:
Al Jarvis wrote:
jesse steichen wrote: american football is actually quite an intricate and entertaining game..
Er, if any of this were actually true don't you think many other countries would've picked up on the spectacle by now?!
jesus christ, what kind of an argument is that? it is an intricate game, with each play set up with meticulous detail... and it regularly gets high, high ratings on us television, so someone must be entertained by it, not just me... i'm not even a big football fan, but i can appreciate it for what it is.
al, you're always down on america. it's almost to the point that it sounds like something terrible happened to you a long time ago and some american did it... for all americans, i apologize for being american, if it makes you feel better. personally, i don't give a fuck what nationality i am, and i'm not nationalistic enough to care about bashing another nation just because i feel bad about something. what is it?
(I hope one of our mods is gonna edit some of the quotes here cos this thread is looking unreadable. However...)
It's a perfectly valid argument, I would have said. One country in the world watches 'American football'. One. Yours. It may well be intricate and entertaining. To you. And it may well get high TV audiences. In the US. But it simply hasn't travelled well whatsoever. At all, in fact. I've heard watching American football is akin to watching chess played, but at least chess has travelled and has been universally adopted as a game. I, personally, cannot see the attraction of your variation of football whatsoever. And that's obviously not just me. Arguing that your countrymen enjoy such a spectacle isn't a valid argument either. The world doesn't start and stop at your state borders. Nor along your coastline.
Steve Campbell wrote:
Better was Giles in Buffy.... "it epeaks volume about the state of american manhood that they feel the need to strap on 40pounds of padding just to play rugby"
finally...a buffy reference.
I never worked out if you're into buffy cos.... She's a strong female roll model, indepented, intelligent and so on. Or You want to fuck spike to within an inch of his life.
FWIW before I ever bothered lookin at yer pic...I always imagined you as looking a bit like SMG for some reason???????
And thanks for not embarassing yourself like so many of you compatriots by trying to denounce rality on this thread.
Steve Campbell wrote: I never worked out if you're into buffy cos.... She's a strong female roll model, indepented, intelligent and so on. Or You want to fuck spike to within an inch of his life.
FWIW before I ever bothered lookin at yer pic...I always imagined you as looking a bit like SMG for some reason???????
And thanks for not embarassing yourself like so many of you compatriots by trying to denounce rality on this thread.
why do i like buffy? well, the latter reason, mostly. no...it's a well-written show with interesting plots and dark humour.
and why on god's green earth would i defend american football (unless it's the denver broncos, and that's a hometown thing)? now tiddlywinks on the other hand, don't dare mess with that fine sport!
yeah but if "y'all" sucked at that, you'd create the "tiddlyfreedoms world freedom series"
Sorry, can't help it. it's the only place on the net you can find Americans you can take the piss out of without getting death threats :D
Al Jarvis wrote:
(
It's a perfectly valid argument, I would have said. One country in the world watches 'American football'. One. Yours.
Just asking in a general sense Al, I've seen NFL scores on the bottom ticker, as well as being announced, on Sky Sports News, they wouldn't do that unless there was a fairly sizable audience for it over there, would they? 
About the only mainstream (i.e. ESPN) overseas football coverage to most Yanks here is for the World Cup, plus the showing of a very few Champions League matches on ESPN2 (gotta give them credit though for sticking last years CL final on ESPN Classic immediately that day, as well as replaying it in its entirety just a couple of hours later).
[darkgreen]Green[/darkgreen] wrote:
Al Jarvis wrote:
(
It's a perfectly valid argument, I would have said. One country in the world watches 'American football'. One. Yours.
Just asking in a general sense Al, I've seen NFL scores on the bottom ticker, as well as being announced, on Sky Sports News, they wouldn't do that unless there was a fairly sizable audience for it over there, would they?
About the only mainstream (i.e. ESPN) overseas football coverage to most Yanks here is for the World Cup, plus the showing of a very few Champions League matches on ESPN2 (gotta give them credit though for sticking last years CL final on ESPN Classic immediately that day, as well as replaying it in its entirety just a couple of hours later).
To be fair sky sports news shows about 30 secs of NFL about once a week when they've run out of football/cricket/rugby/darts/racing/football mascot racing news to talk about.
Fair point about moving clubs...my local Earthquakes (MLS team) just got moved today to Houston.
Just because not all of us understand some of the nuances of the game as well others who have grown up with it all their lives a the primary sport in their country....doesn't mean that we don't enjoy the game and aren't ardent supporters of our local teams.
I'd trade 5 world cups to have my Quakes back here.
[darkgreen]Green[/darkgreen] wrote: Just asking in a general sense Al, I've seen NFL scores on the bottom ticker, as well as being announced, on Sky Sports News, they wouldn't do that unless there was a fairly sizable audience for it over there, would they?
Over where? Over here? NFL scores are surely covered globally because Americans are in all corners of the globe? I don't think there's any groundswell of English support for the sport, although we did briefly have some sort of league a few years back. We may still do, I don't know. It's never taken off. But then we have basketball and ice hockey leagues too, but again they're very much minority sports.
matthew doig wrote:
Even though the US has a far harder group i think they'll get to the semi's
when did the US metamophasize into a wolrd force at football?
or will freddy adu single handedly get them there?
I watch most 'football' codes. Here's my take.
Many of you probably sneer at AFL ("Aussie Rules") football but we love it. Once you learn the rules - which I admit are a real obstacle to the outsider - it's a thrilling game. Fast, rugged, skillful and there's a position on the ground for all body types. It draws the really big crowds here.
My second love is traditional football, or 'soccer' as it's known in these shores as well. Don't think it's worth getting too uppity about use of the term 'football', I always respected the English term while in the UK but it simply creates too much confusion using it in the US, AU, etc, where there are competing 'football' codes. Our long-awaited return to the WC Finals may herald a renaissance for the world game here.
Rugby is traditionally strong and popular in several northern states here, although often playing second string to League, which personally I find too one-dimensional and monotonous at times (my least favourite code).
I find NFL ("Grid Iron") really entertaining although it suffers from the delay factor. It really takes a long time to play out compared to everything else. But once you commit to learning the layers of rules and plays, it's a real spectacle.
The world game will always have the advantage of being the dominant entrenched game throughout most of the world. It's unlikely anything's going to come along and topple it from its perch of popularity, no matter how good the code may be. It's also the most easily initiated game. All you need is a handful of kids and a ball and you've got a game. In any street, in any country. The lack of contact makes it even more accessible. The other football codes can't really compete with that.
:\pimp3:
i have never understood afl. i think it works much like netball ie if you catch the ball you get a free kick.
depthcharge wrote: My second love is traditional football, or 'soccer' as it's known in these shores as well.
Football?! Soccer?!! Thought you lot had another, marginally less flattering, name for it over your way, DC?! 
