World Cup 2018 FIFA World Cup Draw-December 1

[Zidane98]

Need a new manager hired ASAP who will also commit to Asian Cup 2019.

 

[hawkman]

You can bitch about Saudi Arabia, Syria, Honduras performances all you like. But it was literally less than 5 months ago that we came within a bees dick of getting a result against Germany, and we drew with (and should have beaten) the South American champions.

The counter argument to that is that it was against a 2nd string German team and a draw against a team not qualified for the world cup

 

[TheGreatBarryB]

I know the reasoning behind it, but it wasn't going to work for us. Back 3s rarely work in international football in general.

Our whole group used last WC. International football usually lags a bit behind club football tactically so may see more of it next June.

It also suited our team so not that unusual Ange used it. Created plenty of chances bit of course our finishing let us down time and time again.

Ange is a big loss

 

[Pessimistic]

The issue for us now is (just to state the obvious) we don't know who our next manager is, when he is to be appointed, and then how much time he has to implement his strategies. Really, whether anyone of us were pro Ange or not, he has put us in a tricky if not desperate situation.

On the other hand the job is just as attractive as it could be right now

 

[nobbyiscool]

I tend to think that, if the FFA weren't so busy desperately clinging to power, finding a coach who wants to play 3 at the back would be the approach they would take. Plainly for the reason that it allows us to fit more of our best players into the 11, and it hides the fact that we don't have a right back to play in a 4-3-3(/4-2-3-1). If the World Cup started tomorrow, and if we were playing 4 at the back, I think we'd literally be relying on a 36 year old Luke Wilkshire at right back, cos unless you put Milligan in another unnatural position (for him), I can't think of anyone better. Risdon certainly doesn't fill me with confidence!

 

[Stevi_Tigers]

really happy with the draw almost as good as we could of asked for france will be tough but peru and denmark are beatable

 

[Cruyff14]

I tend to think that, if the FFA weren't so busy desperately clinging to power, finding a coach who wants to play 3 at the back would be the approach they would take. Plainly for the reason that it allows us to fit more of our best players into the 11, and it hides the fact that we don't have a right back to play in a 4-3-3(/4-2-3-1). If the World Cup started tomorrow, and if we were playing 4 at the back, I think we'd literally be relying on a 36 year old Luke Wilkshire at right back, cos unless you put Milligan in another unnatural position (for him), I can't think of anyone better. Risdon certainly doesn't fill me with confidence!

The FFA are ******* donuts.

 

[Holden Hillbilly]

Rumour that Jurgen Klinsmann - coach of Germany, Bayern and USA has been sounded out.

 

[drd23]

Rumour that Jurgen Klinsmann - coach of Germany, Bayern and USA has been sounded out.

Pretty sure a fair bit of the criticism of him when he was fired by USA midway through qualifying was much the same as the criticism of Ange - poor results in games they should have won, using a back 3 that wasn't quite working, playing players out of position, feuding with the media etc

Plus there's the criticism that's followed him around for quite a while that he's not that tactically astute, and that during his time with Germany, Joachim Low (who was his assistant) handled all the tactical stuff

 

[FreoRicci]

Actually look at the Asian countries that qualified before us.
South Korea has Sweden, Mexico and Germany. Damn!
And Iran with Spain Portugal and Morocco. Japan drew Poland, Senegal and Colombia. Iran and Korea will be massive underdogs to go through their groups
Actually think Australia has the best group of the Asian teams. Funny that.

 

[TubbsFarquhar]

Actually look at the Asian countries that qualified before us.
South Korea has Sweden, Mexico and Germany. Damn!
And Iran with Spain Portugal and Morocco. Japan drew Poland, Senegal and Colombia. Iran and Korea will be massive underdogs to go through their groups
Actually think Australia has the best group of the Asian teams. Funny that.

Japan has the most even group. Poland would be the favourites to top it but you could make a case for any of those teams to progess.

 

[John H]

Death group: Chile - USA - Netherlands - Italy

 

[Gavin Excell]

Gee, the French have think they have won it already.

Nth Africa, sorry i mean France, are one of the best teams in the world

 

[KingNothing]

Actually look at the Asian countries that qualified before us.
South Korea has Sweden, Mexico and Germany. Damn!
And Iran with Spain Portugal and Morocco. Japan drew Poland, Senegal and Colombia. Iran and Korea will be massive underdogs to go through their groups
Actually think Australia has the best group of the Asian teams. Funny that.

Saudi Arabia are part of the weakest WC group of all time. They’ve definitely got the easiest group of any Asian qualifier.

 

[Coolangatta]

Hypothetically, if you could make the WC as even as possible by replacing the weakest teams who qualified with the strongest teams who didn't qualify, who would you swap? Italy, Netherlands, Chile in, Panama, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia out? Wouldn't really be fair to kick the Saudis out instead of the Socceroos as they finished higher than us, but if you wanted to base it on the strongest 32 teams I'd imagine you'd drop a few from the weaker continents and in our case, we'd want to be there.

 

[Fryer Tuck]

You know, those are some really even groups in this WC. It's weird, but I don't even really rate the Spain-Portugal group for some reason. The Germany-Mexico group is the group of death, of course.

Argentina and Nigeria... 5 times in the 6 times Nigeria qualifies? I bet you those Nigerians are getting real sick and tired of that. That's about the only predictable thing in the draw.

As for us, I think we're in a real shout for 2nd. While both nations can be tricky, Peru are massively overrated with their inflated rank and home ground reliance, and Denmark are as middle of the road as you can get (World Class keeper though).

Don't underestimate those sides (Denmark especially), but at the same time, I think we're in for a good shout for 2nd!

 

[Andonis1997]

Argentina and Nigeria... 5 times in the 6 times Nigeria qualifies? I bet you those Nigerians are getting real sick and tired of that. That's about the only predictable thing in the draw.

And if Greece went in instead of Croatia, Nigeria, Argentina and Greece would have been in the same group altogether for the second time (But Greece and Argentina together for the third?)

 

[TubbsFarquhar]

You know, those are some really even groups in this WC. It's weird, but I don't even really rate the Spain-Portugal group for some reason. The Germany-Mexico group is the group of death, of course.

Argentina and Nigeria... 5 times in the 6 times Nigeria qualifies? I bet you those Nigerians are getting real sick and tired of that. That's about the only predictable thing in the draw.

As for us, I think we're in a real shout for 2nd. While both nations can be tricky, Peru are massively overrated with their inflated rank and home ground reliance, and Denmark are as middle of the road as you can get (World Class keeper though).

Don't underestimate those sides (Denmark especially), but at the same time, I think we're in for a good shout for 2nd!

Agreed, I don't rate Portugal that highly, especially with Ronaldo on the way down. Some may argue he was still banging in goals for them in the qualifiers but they played Andorra, Latvia, Hungary and the Faroe Islands. It was by far the easiest group and now will have to play Spain. Morocco are no slouches either and Iran have a very sturdy defence (only conceded twice in their qualifiers and that was in the last game against Syria when they had already qualified).

Germany, Mexico and Sweden are the group of death IMO and South Korea really copped the rough end of the stick. Gotta feel for the Uzbeks though, once again they were literally one goal away from qualifying. All they needed was just one goal against the Koreans and it would be them in the group of death. That means we would've played SK instead of Syria which, some may have thought would be really tough, the fact is their form had been worse than ours. We had some frustrating draws but they lost to China and Qatar. Pretty terrible. They'd want to improve or else they'll get embarrassed in this group.

As for our group, Denmark have some good players (how could you leave out the best young CB in the world?) but they rely on Eriksen too much. They may have beaten Poland 4-0 and Ireland 5-1 but Eriksen had a huge influence in those games. A hatty against the Irish and was involved in all 4 goals against the Poles (a hatty and an assist). They also lost to Montenegro 0-1 at home, drew with Romania twice and scraped past Armenia 1-0. Eriksen's influence was restricted in these games and they really struggle without it. However, if we let him run loose he'll just carve us up. That's why they're a one-man team.

In the end, it should make for a very interesting group stage and 6 months is too long to wait. I love a good tournament, bring it on!

 

[Fryer Tuck]

And if Greece went in instead of Croatia, Nigeria, Argentina and Greece would have been in the same group altogether for the second time (But Greece and Argentina together for the third?)

Three times actually:

1994 - Arg, Nig, Gre, Bulgaria
2010 - Arg, Nig, Gre, South Korea

Greece's 3rd time in 2014 was not part of that group.

So had Greece qualified instead of Croatia, it would've been 3 times.

2018 - Arg, Nig, Gre, Iceland

Agreed, I don't rate Portugal that highly, especially with Ronaldo on the way down. Some may argue he was still banging in goals for them in the qualifiers but they played Andorra, Latvia, Hungary and the Faroe Islands. It was by far the easiest group and now will have to play Spain. Morocco are no slouches either and Iran have a very sturdy defence (only conceded twice in their qualifiers and that was in the last game against Syria when they had already qualified).

Germany, Mexico and Sweden are the group of death IMO and South Korea really copped the rough end of the stick. Gotta feel for the Uzbeks though, once again they were literally one goal away from qualifying. All they needed was just one goal against the Koreans and it would be them in the group of death. That means we would've played SK instead of Syria which, some may have thought would be really tough, the fact is their form had been worse than ours. We had some frustrating draws but they lost to China and Qatar. Pretty terrible. They'd want to improve or else they'll get embarrassed in this group.

As for our group, Denmark have some good players (how could you leave out the best young CB in the world?) but they rely on Eriksen too much. They may have beaten Poland 4-0 and Ireland 5-1 but Eriksen had a huge influence in those games. A hatty against the Irish and was involved in all 4 goals against the Poles (a hatty and an assist). They also lost to Montenegro 0-1 at home, drew with Romania twice and scraped past Armenia 1-0. Eriksen's influence was restricted in these games and they really struggle without it. However, if we let him run loose he'll just carve us up. That's why they're a one-man team.

In the end, it should make for a very interesting group stage and 6 months is too long to wait. I love a good tournament, bring it on!

Pretty well summarised, especially about South Korea. You thought we had coaching and selection issues, South Korea had it worse. I beleive that if we switched groups, South Korea probably wouldn't have made it. It was all on the Uzbeks to get it done. But yeah, if the Uzbeks did make it, they would've been in hell with that group.

Still, better to be Uzbek, than to be Kazakhand be ranked amongst the minnows. Hell, with Iceland doing better... you've got to feel a little sorry for them (I wonder who people think are the better nation between Uzbek and Kazakh...)

 

[Cemos]

I feel like people are saying that because Peru drew with NZ in NZ. Peru absolutely dominated that game but somehow didn’t score, and dominated the second game even more-so.

These are way better teams than us. I want to do well at this WC I really do, but we’re gonna get ****** up.

Disagree, Peru were gifted all the play by a NZ team that, in much the same vein as the 2010 WC, didn't really try to play football and instead parked the bus for much of the 180 minutes, but even then they really struggled to fashion that many clear-cut chances and never looked like they were going to run ragged.

Also, their squad isn't that impressive imo, on a superficial level it's not much better than ours. It's wrong to say that they're a way better team than us (on paper at least).

Don't get me wrong, i'd still back them to get over the top of us (if i had to pick a winner), but not by much - they're very beatable imo.

Denmark scare me more, the key of course will be to shut down Eriksen who scores three worldies against Ireland in their second leg playoff win on the back of being given a little space outside the box a few too many times by the Irish defence. Would do well to get a tie with them, would be amazing to get a win.

 

[In The Rod We Trust]

We are a great chance to get out of the group but realistically in second spot which would mean most probably Argentina in the second round.

 

[SM]

We are a great chance to get out of the group but realistically in second spot which would mean most probably Argentina in the second round.

If they don't s**t the bed.

 

[Coolangatta]

All this talk about Denmark being a one man team but from what I saw in the qualifiers you could say the same thing about us and Cahill. Okay sure, the WC is an entirely different ball game but we'd want to improve on the qualifiers because we're lucky to even be there. Who knows what might have happened if Syria didn't go down to 10-men. The Saudis according to the bookies are weaker than Denmark and Peru and we couldn't get the job done against them so I'm far from confident we'll get into the second round.

 

[SM]

All this talk about Denmark being a one man team but from what I saw in the qualifiers you could say the same thing about us and Cahill. Okay sure, the WC is an entirely different ball game but we'd want to improve on the qualifiers because we're lucky to even be there. Who knows what might have happened if Syria didn't go down to 10-men. The Saudis according to the bookies are weaker than Denmark and Peru and we couldn't get the job done against them so I'm far from confident we'll get into the second round.

Us and Cahill? Did Cahill score the hattrick to get us through to the WC?

 

[KingNothing]

All this talk about Denmark being a one man team but from what I saw in the qualifiers you could say the same thing about us and Cahill. Okay sure, the WC is an entirely different ball game but we'd want to improve on the qualifiers because we're lucky to even be there. Who knows what might have happened if Syria didn't go down to 10-men. The Saudis according to the bookies are weaker than Denmark and Peru and we couldn't get the job done against them so I'm far from confident we'll get into the second round.

That talk makes me chuckle.

For one, saying they’re a one man team really makes light of Schmeichel and Christensen.

And secondly, we’re a no-one man team. We don’t have anyone like Eriksen, not even close.