The Soccer Thread (Version 13) — Winter World Cup Edition

Whew, 3-0 just 28 in. Brazil gets to rest up the remainder of the match.

 

Brazil feverishly avoiding the upset.

 

4 in 36!

 

My goodness, the 3rd and 4th goals.

 

그만, 그만, 그는 이미 죽었어.

 

That wasn't the eye that got hit.

 

HOT TAKE: This will not go to penalties

 

Fox Sports’ US World Cup coverage is an unmissable abomination | Aaron Timms

As negative reviews go, this certainly is one of them. The thing is there's almost nothing here that should be in any way surprising other than perhaps some of the unprofessional graphics problems (some of their live Matchday 3 tables were wrong and they've had multiple large screwups on the graphics side) and technical errors (some of the experts have been ripping them for clearly cheaping out on transmission quality like ESPN does for some of their lower college football and basketball outings). Fox has, for at least a decade, had an institutional insistence on presenting an unapologetically American soccer product. That's why they tried to turn Gus Johnson into a soccer guy and why John Strong/Stuart Holden is their A broadcast team. I don't feel strongly about either of them. They're trying to do a job, but I don't think they'd be my first pick, probably because I've been "raised on" an essentially European presentation.

The studio show is just unapologetically blunt. Lalas basically exists for hot taeks and #AMERICA!, which has been his role for 10 years. He's playing a part and everyone knows it. I wish he'd bring the goatee back to complete the ensemble. As for Landon and Dempsey, neither of them are really TV people, which you'd know if you'd followed their entire careers. The annoying thing is Landon is knowledgeable and has said some smart things. However, he has no affect whatsoever, so he uses the same tone to describe a Messi run that he does to describe a good taco. It was less than five years ago that Dempsey basically had to be dragged kicking and screaming into television. They are there to play the role of "American Soccer Player You Might've Heard Of."

And Rob Stone is who he is. He exists to play traffic cop, whether it's here or college football or whatever. I haven't watched one minute of Chad Ochocinco so it's probably not necessary to comment other than we should probably just be thankful they didn't bring Skip over.

The Qatar stuff is also deeply predictable. Partially it's about not shitting where they eat and creating moral ambiguity inside their own showcase event, but since they don't have to look real journalists like Bob Ley and Jeremy Schaap in the face, now isn't the time to grow morals. So when it comes to this coverage, the only uniquely negative thing I have to say is that it is as predictably Fox as I would have expected it to be.

 

Whoa!



Also, Spain-Morocco to PKs!

 

First time I’ve ever seen a bunch of young men from Spain who can’t score.

(Tearing up my 9-1 Spain ticket)

 

Adios!

 

Clint Dempsey is the soccer version of Jason Garrett in SNF. He’s awful.