I have examined my motives for saying what follows, and I will be fair, and unbiased...
the reffing was poor, that is not sour grapes, it was dire, so many decisions portugals way, yellow cards on us, plain inconsistant, and downright wrong.
cynical hacks by portugal on vassel and others, ought to be sending of a deliberate trip when behind. no arguing
the goal, itself was fine, if you looked at terry, his eyes were always always to the ball, there was no intent of impeding the goalie, and as rightly said, you have to use your arms to jump.
contentious may well be a push prior, cannot comment on that, would explain a lot. Tho if the linesman thought it fair, perhaps it should have stood.
portugal were the better side, ronaldo temperament was superb,no nasty playing, figo has gone down in my esteem for diving, trying to get free kicks for nothing, that's pure cheating. he did this twice.
fair is fair, like I said, they scare me, they play urgently, with brio, with fire, again and I have said it a million times, I am becoming seriously frustrated with england, they just sit back and let them come, give them space, its the worst you can do, a goal WILL always come, period, you can't sit on it and let a storm ensue, you have to finish them, counter fire with fire. I don't think I can watch any more, its so poor.
our play, not brill, gerrard plain dire, passing giving the ball away, schoolboy errors, midfield was at fault. defence great. ours are meant to be some of the finest, household names. They do not play as such. Perhaps they are overtly hyped by the media. I really don't see what is so good about gerrard, and I am a liverpool fan. hesky plain awful, not that he played, thank god.
overall tournament, again defence great, solid, you can't blame them largely, and james coudln't have done anything against zidane's magic.
the fault lies with midfield, beckham was poor, gerrard, too.
I beleive that is 3 not 2 penalties beckham has missed. however what can you do if the ground gives way, and acrobatic barthez saves, it happens, can you apportion blame for that? I don't know.
Conclusions:
1/there needs to be independant verification of fouls, a ref to examine video footage and decide. It all happens to quick for one guy to decide.
With these stakes, this must happen, or the ref revewing stuff himself.
2/more reds for cynical fouls where no attempt is made to go for the ball
if a rule change is neccessary, so be it.
3/ england MUST not do backs against the wall.
4/ they must improve their control, and passing. it is piss poor at times.
5/ the ref was swiss, is that a conflict of interests with us putting them out? hmmm...
6/ penalties are not a way to decide tournaments, extra games should be the way, replays.
7/ if a ref gets if categorically wrong, there ought to be an inquiry, with fifa deciding to change the ruling, maradona's goal should have been stripped and they should have been disqualified for cheating.
8/ we looked tired, they had 3 days to recover, we had two. you cannot have that at this level, is 2 days enough?? I think not.
there is a rumour, that the ref. is getting timeshare in portugal if they were favoured, this seems unlikely, however look at the foulings.
for him to be one of the top refs., he wasn't very good. we needed collina. my fave.
there is so much hoo-haa over the goal, as from all points of view it seemed fair and valid, and from that point we would have won.
bloody hell, when will common sense prevail.
I don't begrudge portugal, they were better on the night,( not like the blasted frogs, whos footballing arrogance I frown on, but who's country and methods I think are superior) but we really need to use technology on rulings, there is too much at stake, and its all a big lottery, it would be fairer for everyone.
all that is by and large unbiased and a fair reflection, I hope.
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