World Cup Odds
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I’ve been really enjoying watching the kids gets unleashed by US soccer in the last 2 friendlies. Playing France, a World Cup favorite, to a 1-1 tie was riveting! After years of being let down by Michael Bradley, Altidore and co, these kids played with fire ( always challenging on D, holding form, keeper making huge saves down the stretch) and athleticism, making people pay for mistakes. I’m hopeful for the future. If only we had cleaned house sooner, we’d be in this World Cup.
That said, here are the odds this year. Who else will be watching?
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2018-world-cup-predictions
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There is nothing quite like the WC.
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I will be watching. Brazil is always a favorite and always has talent but it is not always used correctly (see Brazil 2014), Germany is always solid and a true contender, Spain had for many years the best team but it is somewhat down now but still a great team, France and Belgium have very good teams with a decent shot to win it all. Argentina had great talent and the players have been together for a while and has a decent but not a great shot, same with Uruguay and Colombia. The rest are longer shots and the only other team with a shot is Russia who has the home advantage which can be considerable.
In short, if I had to list the top candidate teams in order I would go Brazil, Germany, France and Belgium. All the rest are one step below.
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Can’t wait to watch France flame out again. It’s a great time honored tradition. Also I expect Zidane to be their manager for the next WC.
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Never been able to get into soccer, if I wanted to watch someone struggle to score for 90 minutes, I’d take my friends to the bar.
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You must really hate baseball when both pitcher have no hitters going…
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@kjayhawks funny… without any judgement on soccer.
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@JayHawkFanToo very much so lol
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My own hierarchy is…
Hoops
Footy/soccer
Baseball
Football
Hockey
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@kjayhawks I agree. I doubt I watch one second of the WC. I loved soccer as a kid. I played for 6-7 years and just could care less about it now.
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@kjayhawks My dad really like racing, I couldn’t get into it myself.
Interestingly enough if I was asked even 3 years ago, football would probably have been my top pick. I’ve kinda drifted away from it, I think in part due to how much absolute dead time there is during a game.
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@BShark ya football has faltered a little for me me in recent years. I’m a big fan of college sports so KU not fielding a competitive team in nearly a decade hasn’t helped, that and with the kids I try to just stay engaged to KU hoops because my wife would kill me if I put that much time in anything else lol. The NFL has gotten more lame to me over the years. I used to watch about every Sunday, now I say I watch about 3 games a year.
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Kindle on my phone has helped me fill in the lengthy gaps in action in both football and baseball, although with KC in the dumpster I am not watching any MLB this year. College playoff has been exciting, tho, so I am looking forward to the College World Series this coming week.
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Great game going on between Spain (Adidas) and Portugal (Nike). I wonder how long before the conspiracy theories start flying…
If you can, watch the Telemundo stream in Spanish, the difference is like watching Steve Wright on downers and Robin Williams on speed.
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Amazing game! Well worth the price of admission.
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1 KU basketball
2 KU basketball pre-season
3 KU basketball practice
4 NFL/ Chiefs
5 Royals
6 Olympics
7 strongest man competition
8 Tiger Woods
9 Hockey (mainly ovechkin partying)
10 Fishing
11 KU football (in its current state)
12 NBA finals only
13 women’s NCAA basketball
14 tennis
15 boxing
16 MMA
17 horse racing
18 Logger challenges
19 US women’s soccer
20 racing
21 ruby
22 croquet
23 badmitten
But in all fairness I could fill all 23 slots with KU basketball related stuff.
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Agreed. One of the better opening games I remember. Spain should have won but Ronaldo had himself one heck of a game. The first goals for Spain by Costa and the last goal for Portugal by Ronaldo were things of beauty. This could well end up being the best game of this World Cup.
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@JayHawkFanToo Do you have a specific team you cheer for? Might have missed it earlier.
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Not in this cup specifically since the US team is not there. I tend to cheer for the Latin American teams and, from the European teams, Spain would me my favorite.
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Spain Portugal was muy bueno. Iran leads the pod and could spoil the hopes of one of those two teams now.
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Messi plays at 8am EST. Also looking forward to Germany Mexico. should be a good game. Looks like renaldos gunning for James Rodriguez’s golden boot award!
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Iran got lucky; Morocco should have won the game.
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Some great upsets today. Mexico beating Germany was amazing. Mexico looked like the better team. Their offense was electric consistently getting downfield faster than the Germans. The Swiss tying Brazil was also a surprise. Neymar seemed to feel the pressure as much as Messi did yesterday.
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@approxinfinity My 5 year old nephew just got back from a couple year stint in Germany. Little guy can dribble the ball
️ quite well now. It’s impressive what he picked up on recess while over seas.
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approxinfinity said:
Some great upsets today. Mexico beating Germany was amazing. Mexico looked like the better team. Their offense was electric consistently getting downfield faster than the Germans. The Swiss tying Brazil was also a surprise. Neymar seemed to feel the pressure as much as Messi did yesterday.
Yeah Mexico shredded German’y midfield. It’s Low’s own fault really for playing Khedira…
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Japan has stunned Colombia 2-1.
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When you start the game 1 goal and one man down it is uphill the rest of the way, even more so at a World Cup level. Colombia still was the better team but they seemed to be happy with a tie and stopped attacking and cost them the game.
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@JayHawkFanToo Well, the red card was very deserved. That guy lost his mind.
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Judgment call for the ref and if he determines the hand was intentional then it is an automatic red card. If the player is facing the ball and the arm is not tight against the body it will always be called, although apparently there was an almost identical play in the previous World Cup (by a Netherlands player???) that was not called.
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Senegal takes the lead against Poland 1-0! A win or tie against Poland would be huge for Colombia (same pod)
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James started that Colombia game on the sideline with an injury, then played second half but did not do much. I wonder if they will regret not starting him with 20/20 hindsight. Quintero played in his place and did score the penalty (under the wall) so there is that…
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With James healthy, Colombia is a very different team with a top notch finisher.
Lots of surprising results so far. With Germany losing, Argentina, Portugal, Spain and Brazil tying, France and Belgium appear to be the favorites now. Of course it is way too early and even a loss in the first game does not eliminate a team.
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@JayHawkFanToo thus far, I believe in Belgium, Spain, and Mexico.
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Belgium is so good. Lukaku is a beast! Not only are they timing their passes perfectly going downfield, they’re avoiding offsides, then getting 5 steps past their defender and then breaking down the goalie 1v1.
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approxinfinity said:
Belgium is so good. Lukaku is a beast! Not only are they timing their passes perfectly going downfield, they’re avoiding offsides, then getting 5 steps past their defender and then breaking down the goalie 1v1.
They could have legitimately scored 8 or 9 goals today. I can appreciate that neither team camped in that game.
Belgium are firmly my 2nd choice team, just love how they play. Plus the whole country is barely more populated than the NYC area which makes their depth of talent quite remarkable.
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Interesting game. Tunisia dominated the first part of the second half and with a little luck the score could have been 3-2 or even 3-3. After Belgium settled it missed at least 3 more point blank goals. It would not have surprised me if the final score was 7-3.
Next, Mexico to prove if it is a contender or just another team with a lucky win over a powerhouse.
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Mexico should absolutely beat South Korea.
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goooooooooooolllllllll
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Mexico needs to stop settling for haymakers outside the box. 2 for Chucky 1 for Chicharito
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They’re faster than this team. Do them like they did Germany
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S Korea getting nice opportunities here. Mexico looks tired. Could be a comeback brewing.
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Nevermind
Gooooooooooollllllllllllllllll
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Uruguay wins big over Russia; I though the game would be closer. Past the stage where the crowd is a big help and now contender move ahead of the pretenders.
Interesting factoid: Out of 23 players for the Iceland team 22 players (except for the backup goalie) have last names that end in “son.”
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@BShark this was a fun read.
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MOROCCO!!!
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approxinfinity said:
@BShark this was a fun read.
Yeah it was quite good. I think @mayjay would appreciate it.
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@BShark I have saved it and will check it out soon!
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@approxinfinity What is this World Cup you speak of??
