Zoob

Watching England is like nothing else I've experienced in football. I did want them to win, but I found their loss and the manner of their loss really funny. Hope Spain win, cos Argentina just have so many horrible players.

Was smart by Yamal as he could see he was gonna get clattered, so just got any touch on it. (looked like combo of arm and back, but arm was by his side)

Fifa have changed their mind and said it didn't happen. And they'd never lie to anyone.

I feel more positive about England when they don't show any of their fans.

The non foul against Salah is what their bench was so angry about. I don't think it was a foul - but it really was similar to the one on Martinez - but one was given, one wasn't. Was the fact that Mo was in the area, so had to be a pen if a foul was given that meant they obviously weren't going to apply the same sort of logic. Was Marmoush I think. Just terrible terrible play by him (unless there was another similar break that I missed)

Fantastic goal. And sign Salah.

Excellent!

It was prob a foul, but he was already taking a dive. And VAR again s***ting on the game, because that was a fantastic goal

You still hate Pickford right? How can anyone not hate him? Even his mum probably hates him

That was pretty intense. I watched it with the Spanish commentators, and even they were saying the Kane one wasn't a pen. It's one of those seen em given types, but again, not what VAR should be about. Amazing to perform like that at altitude with 10 men for so long. They must be knackered. Still absolutely daft that TAA isn't in the squad.

Would have to have been all the officials then, including VAR. Think they were all just useless. Per Hanlon's Razor "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity"

Yeah, they were just getting a bit more bold cos the ref was letting them get away with it all. Ref should have put a stop to both teams being snide and diving around but Paraguay were defo starting to just kick and foul more.

Still wouldn't surprise me to see one of these French players getting seriously injured before the end.

Sounds kinda stupid, but every time I see Portugal play, there's a part of my brain that instinctively wonders if he's playing, and then the reality catches up with me.

Impressive how we get to the knockout stages and almost every game has a dumb VAR decision. This one maybe was less stupid than some of the others, but it's still ruining football, and not being used how it should be. Brutal for Croatia.

Red card in the US game was also absolutely daft. He couldn't possibly have meant that and wasn't looking. Looked bad on a freeze frame, but you can see from one angle, that all he's dong is trying to put his foot back on the ground, and the Bosnia player was just unlucky to get caught. So that was 3 terrible decisions/non decisions in 3 games yesterday.

Feel terrible for Senegal. Shouldn't have let a 2 goal lead slip with 5 mins left, but that pen was a terrible call and another example of VAR being used all wrong.

Yeah, might be a bit more than 1 in 100 who make it, but there's definitely confirmation bias where the ones that do excell stand out, and the dozens that don't are easily forgotten. That said, we had a period of being pretty good at signing players for amounts that weren't peanuts, but also weren't as eye watering as some of the figures being bandied about for the likes of Diomande.

Yeah. Carrying Ronaldo is like playing with 10.5 players. Spain are decent too, but still think a fair level below France.

Really interesting how far behind the likes of Germany and Netherlands appear (same re Italy, who can't even make WC these days). And then France just seem so far ahead of any European team. I wouldn't be surprised to see another France vs Argentina final cos both of those seem a level above any of the other teams.

I really didn't think it would be possible to find someone more stupid sounding than Warren Barton, but Owen Hargreaves somehow manages it. Quite an achievement. And I wonder if "Fletch" is the only person willing to have him as co-commentator. Every time Hargreaves says "Fletch" I just want to punch him in the face.

Pickford lucky not to get sent off, lucky not to have injured himself or the Ghana player. Dire match, but I half expect Slot to come out and complain about a low block.

Almiron being sent off - I can completely understand the reasoning behind the rule about not covering your mouth, but there's also something dumb about it because sportsman - across multiple sports - have been covering their mouths while talking for years, so it's hard to break that habit. And the ref in the Turkey game seemed particularly delighted and excited about sending someone off for that.

Mostly I had just forgotten what it looks like in a game of football when people actually run around and play with some intensity.

That was pretty good. I know England have been getting decently far in tourneys, but it's like they've done it without playing particularly well. But today I thought they played some decent football. Maybe watching us in a season of Slothball has just lowered the bar considerably.