Dullest Tournament

[WullieBroonIsGod]

It's all about expectations vs what's delivered.

If Scotland were in the semi finals, having scored only 3 goals, one a penalty and 2 own goals, we'd all be pished til Christmas.  We expect much, much more from a France side.

 

 

As an aside, it's 10 years ago today that the Germans absolutely hammered Brazil 7-1.  Least we are better than Brazil

[parsforlife]

15 hours ago, Shotgun said:

 

8. Yellow cards and/or fines for diving. Applied retroactively if necessary.

9. Goalkeepers can leave their line the moment the taker's run up starts. If the taker still chooses that stupid stop-start run up, they'll lose any advantage.

.

Fines to be paid in cash in full immediately on the pitch please.

The penalty point absolutely so much this, there is genuinely zero downsides to it.

4 hours ago, GordonS said:

Having full stadiums for every game at tournament finals is a relatively new thing. For group matches not involving the host there were usually big gaps until this century. There's a thesis for someone exploring why in one generation we went from locals not being interested in games on their doorstep even though tickets were cheap, to folk paying 200 Euros to watch mundane group games as a neutral.

Travelling supports are also much bigger now too.

As well as @Skyline Drifter point about corporate tickets I also think with TV audiences massively increasing there's become a massive movement of fanboys that are fans of individuals or leagues as much as teams.

The later point, probably major motivated by budget airlines.

3 hours ago, Swarley said:

100% agree with this. I'd also add that when the referee blows his whistle the taker can kick the ball which would stop some keeper's ludicrous delaying tactics.

They already can. The keeper delaying tactics are largely motivated by them having absolutely every other factor the could previously use taken away from them, even out the odds a bit and we'll see a reduction in it.

[throbber]

I think the new format is shit - you shouldn’t be able to qualify from the group stages if you have lost 2 games and then it throws the knockout stages off balance, was much easier when you knew it was winner of group a v runner up of group b etc.

I think penalties straight after 90 minutes would be a good shout as well so it doesn’t add further fatigue to the players and will encourage more attacking during the 90 minutes.

[Musketeer Gripweed]

I've seen more active walking football matches played by pensioners than most of the games I've watched in this tournament. Pedestrian stuff at best.

[Swarley]

I see they are doing no extra time straight to penalties in the Copa. I'd expect everyone else to follow suit.

[Skyline Drifter]

3 hours ago, Chripper said:

A big part of the problem is the lack of genuine out-and-out number 9s. 

Take the semi finals of this Euros. The projected attacking players will be: Yamal, Morata, Williams; Mbappé, Griezmann Muari; Malen, Depay, Gakpo; Bellingham, Kane, Foden. 

Out of those twelve, only two (Kane and Morata) are strikers. The other ten are no 10s, inside forwards and outside forwards.

Not to diminish your point particularly, but Morata is suspended for the semi final I think.

[Skyline Drifter]

1 hour ago, throbber said:

The thing about this tournament is that we’re at the semi stage and there’s not been a defining moment of the tournament ie something that we’ll remember it by in 20 years time. 
 

2010 might have been a shit World Cup for example but you had Lampards goal that never was or the Suarez handball on the line all before the semi final.

Maybe Jude Bellinghams overhead equaliser might count but it surely looses some points as it was against Slovakia.

But Suarez' handball doesn't because it was against Ghana?

[throbber]

6 minutes ago, Skyline Drifter said:

But Suarez' handball doesn't because it was against Ghana?

Excuse me

[A Diamond For Me]

1 hour ago, parsforlife said:

As well as @Skyline Drifter point about corporate tickets I also think with TV audiences massively increasing there's become a massive movement of fanboys that are fans of individuals or leagues as much as teams.

 

Like that poster on here years ago who was - or who purported to be - a fan of specifically Colin Nish and went to watch whichever club he was signed for.   It was ages ago, and I can't remember if it was an elaborate "character" account for jests and japes of if they were genuinely a fanatical fan of Colin Nish, of all people.

Checked his wiki to see if there was anything about some creepy stalker bothering him and it turns out Nish himself was convicted of assaulting his former partner last year.   What a p***k.

[parsforlife]

4 minutes ago, A Diamond For Me said:

Like that poster on here years ago who was - or who purported to be - a fan of specifically Colin Nish and went to watch whichever club he was signed for.   It was ages ago, and I can't remember if it was an elaborate "character" account for jests and japes of if they were genuinely a fanatical fan of Colin Nish, of all people.
 

I remember that, it was genuine despite how mental it seems.

[Chripper]

3 hours ago, Skyline Drifter said:

Not to diminish your point particularly, but Morata is suspended for the semi final I think.

Oh really? D'oh! Blame Sofascore for that Intel.

Edit: Despite reports he was booked, he actually wasn't.  Phew!

https://talksport.com/football/1953775/alvaro-morata-not-suspended-france-euro-2024-semi-final/

 

 

Edited July 8 by Chripper

[McGlovin']

8 hours ago, Alert Mongoose said:

Was any particular reason given for this? I don't remember noticing it at the time but seems pretty incongruous now.

Others have touched upon many of the the reasons but I'll chuck my tuppence worth in.

As touched on, it was still the time of no or very early days of budget airlines. I'd wager that for average Romania/Bulgarian/Russian etc the cost of flights, accommodation, tickets would be pretty steep or prohibitive. Although I remember the Croatian contingent looking like they'd just demobbed...Buying tickets was seemingly quite tricky, pre-Internet it was a case of dialling a premium line phone number to make an enquiry - joke in there somewhere. There was still also the post Heysel/Hillsborough hooligan panic too, so it wasn't possible to buy tickets on the day. I think that helped dampen any hype too - with the hope that things would just pass off peacefully.

English football and culture was also still in the early days of gentrification so buying a ticket in advance wasn't super common, beyond seasons. Although Euro 96 helped turbo charge what had started with Italia '90 and $sky's whole new ball game shtick , looking at the straight line of football's new found acceptability from WC 90 to Euro 96, it's easy to forget just how poor England had been at Euro 92 and them missing out entirely on WC 94. You also had the fact the English clubs were still struggling for the most part in European competitions, with success like Arsenal's in 94 being based on stout yeoman of the guard types defending bravely.

There was also likely still a lack of interest and knowledge in non-English football. Football Italia had been going for a couple of years I suppose but wasn't particularly mainstream. Listening back on some of the commentary for the tournament, the Brit telly announcers are saying stuff like "Hristo Stoickhov is very highly rated and has signed for Spanish giants Barcelona." Nowadays I reckon there's an assumption that even the average viewer knows about the superstar players of most teams, they didn't really need to tell you about Jan Oblak this time. Back then I reckon there was more an attitude of why would you pay to watch Romania vs Bulgaria or Czech Rep vs Russia, even if on your doorstop, which allied to the lack of hype likely contributed the lack of fans.

[Cheese]

Robèrt Guillaumesòn

[GordonS]

2 hours ago, McGlovin' said:

Others have touched upon many of the the reasons but I'll chuck my tuppence worth in.

As touched on, it was still the time of no or very early days of budget airlines. I'd wager that for average Romania/Bulgarian/Russian etc the cost of flights, accommodation, tickets would be pretty steep or prohibitive. Although I remember the Croatian contingent looking like they'd just demobbed...Buying tickets was seemingly quite tricky, pre-Internet it was a case of dialling a premium line phone number to make an enquiry - joke in there somewhere. There was still also the post Heysel/Hillsborough hooligan panic too, so it wasn't possible to buy tickets on the day. I think that helped dampen any hype too - with the hope that things would just pass off peacefully.

English football and culture was also still in the early days of gentrification so buying a ticket in advance wasn't super common, beyond seasons. Although Euro 96 helped turbo charge what had started with Italia '90 and $sky's whole new ball game shtick , looking at the straight line of football's new found acceptability from WC 90 to Euro 96, it's easy to forget just how poor England had been at Euro 92 and them missing out entirely on WC 94. You also had the fact the English clubs were still struggling for the most part in European competitions, with success like Arsenal's in 94 being based on stout yeoman of the guard types defending bravely.

There was also likely still a lack of interest and knowledge in non-English football. Football Italia had been going for a couple of years I suppose but wasn't particularly mainstream. Listening back on some of the commentary for the tournament, the Brit telly announcers are saying stuff like "Hristo Stoickhov is very highly rated and has signed for Spanish giants Barcelona." Nowadays I reckon there's an assumption that even the average viewer knows about the superstar players of most teams, they didn't really need to tell you about Jan Oblak this time. Back then I reckon there was more an attitude of why would you pay to watch Romania vs Bulgaria or Czech Rep vs Russia, even if on your doorstop, which allied to the lack of hype likely contributed the lack of fans.

That's all fair enough, but still, there were 10,000 empty seats in Old Trafford for the Czech Republic v France semi final. They didn't sell out Elland Road for France v Spain in the group stage. That's amazing today - there were more than 50 million ticket requests for the 2.3 million public tickets for Euro 2024. 

As others have mentioned the cost of flights has fallen dramatically, and relative to income the cost of accommodation has too. But I think the bigger factor is gentrification, with the middle class getting into football in a way that never happened before.

[GordonS]

30 minutes ago, Cheese said:

Robèrt Guillaumesòn

I'm sure the sponsors and organisers love that.

I'll be at a game tomorrow night, I'm not wasting time watching some of the best players in the world attempt to shitfest a 1-0. If France or England are in the final I'll go for a walk.

[Latino Lover]

Re euro 96 I was 13 at the time and my season ticket at St James’ couldn’t have been much more than £150 - I distinctly remember it being £80 ish in 92/93 but that was the championship or division 1 as it was known then. Anyway tickets for my same seat here were about £25 which was a fortune at the time. I queued up round the block for free tickets from the local paper but it wasn’t to be. Anyway I think pre internet there was a lot less of just going for the sake of going, and to say you’ve been etc unless you were really bothered. 
 

the euros at that point were maybe yet to explode as well, at least in the uk. I’d argue for years now it’s been viewed as almost equal to the World Cup, maybe that’s dropped off a bit lately due to expansion. Certainly watching highlights of Euro 92 when it was repeated during lockdown it just felt like some twee exhibition at the end of the season. 

[accies1874]

Hopefully Yamal's goal will be the defining moment of this tournament. While it has been poor for the most part, I suppose we may look back on it in the future as the beginning of this new Spain side. Otherwise, it'll be remembered for unthinkable reasons...

[Ya Bezzer!]

On 08/07/2024 at 15:32, throbber said:

I think the new format is shit - you shouldn’t be able to qualify from the group stages if you have lost 2 games and then it throws the knockout stages off balance, was much easier when you knew it was winner of group a v runner up of group b etc.

I think penalties straight after 90 minutes would be a good shout as well so it doesn’t add further fatigue to the players and will encourage more attacking during the 90 minutes.

Agree on format but I think going straight to penalties will just further encourage teams to play for penalties.

Maybe you could have one period of extra time that's 20 minutes long to reduce playing time.

[RandomGuy.]

Its not the format or anything thats made this boring, its just the way football is played now. Any "top level" game is the same, where two teams scared of giving away a chance pass the ball sideways endlessly "probing" (terrified) and its stale pish.

Every tournament will be like this until someone steps up, has success with a free flowing attacking style, and everyone jumps onto that particular bandwagon.

England winning the thing with a negative, safety first, approach might genuinely kill the game entirely as everyone in England will copy that and that seeps into the worldwide game. Spain winning might create sides who play with genuine wingers again.

Edited July 10 by RandomGuy.

[velo army]

15 hours ago, RandomGuy. said:

Its not the format or anything thats made this boring, its just the way football is played now. Any "top level" game is the same, where two teams scared of giving away a chance pass the ball sideways endlessly "probing" (terrified) and its stale pish.

Every tournament will be like this until someone steps up, has success with a free flowing attacking style, and everyone jumps onto that particular bandwagon.

England winning the thing with a negative, safety first, approach might genuinely kill the game entirely as everyone in England will copy that and that seeps into the worldwide game. Spain winning might create sides who play with genuine wingers again.

The 1982 world cup is often presented as defining for exactly this reason. The Brazil team was obviously feted for their entertaining football but the fact they lost meant they changed their style to a more pragmatic approach. Imagine if they'd won it, it would have defined football for a generation, instead of fucking Italy winning it.

Anyway. Spain winning it this year would certainly shift the narrative away from this being a dull tournament.