WORLD CUP 2018

Teetonetal

p90fool said:

England's progress this time had less to do with one or two key moments in a match than one or two key moments in the draw if we're being honest. 

Even losing in the group stage to the only decent team worked out perfectly.

They're unlikely to get that lucky again. 

Maybe, but then you can only play what's in front of you. Football is a low scoring game where mistakes (both payer and ref) as well as skill matter and often make the difference. 

But were the teams England beat so bad?

France lost to Sweden in the Qualifiers and lost to Columbia in the warm-up. 

England played well, were close to getting to the final, got the Golden Boot, won a shoot out and for the first time in years, looked like a football team.

In the next 4 year cycle, most of that team will still be available, new players will force their way in and you have to say the future looks brighter than it did at the end of Euro 2016.

Unless you want to be needlessly hyper negative, this was a very successful tournament for England. 

p90fool

@Teetonetal I agree England have done pretty well this time, with a positive and refreshing attitude and a little less pressure from the media, but I'm willing to bet that their group in the Euros will be a bastard compared what they just had. 

ourmaninthenorth

This was a very successful tournament for Football...enjoyed the whole thing enormously. 

IvanMC

Somewhat disappointed here since I would've liked Croatia to lift the cup. They've played a world cup semi before, so this performance won't be a one-off. No longer underdogs. They'll command great respect from now on. Congratulations to France.

guitars4you

glad Modric got the top player award

Rocker

Why do I keep thinking that the powers in FIFA don't want "small country" teams to win the World Cup? Griesmann clearly dived to win the free kick that resulted in France scoring. And how the referee came to the conclusion that a penalty was justified for what was clearly ball to hand escapes me. And this was after reviewing the incident on VAR.

Despite those two wrongs, it was one of the best World Cup Finals ever. Good to see Pogba scoring as he has a torrid time at Man Utd. Credit too to Croatia who played attacking football right to the end. Was I imaging it or did Greismann look a bit sheepish before the medal presentation? Perhaps he felt like the golfer who recorded a 4 on his card when he actually took 6 on the hole. Winning by cheating is not very fulfilling after all. Ask Greismann.

warhead

¸Guess Croatia beat itself, with a bit of referee help....