that'll be me supporting the u.s. at least one game in the summer then.

[daschoo]

best of luck against england in south africa boys

 

[MC KAos]

i saw mexico in the same group with south africa and i got upset they got the easier draw than we did! then i saw the rest of their group and suddenly im not so upset, lol

 

[CATCH17]

Cant wait.

Ill be rooting for USA and Brazil.

 

[MC KAos]

ill be rooting for the US first and foremost and after that all the teams on this side of the "pond", Argentina, Brazil, Honduras, etc

 

[daschoo]

first and foremost i'll be supporting the germans, always have since italia 90 and been to the country a few times.
secondly i'll be supporting the u.s., algeria and slovenia for the group stages and then we'll take it from there

 

[Arch Stanton]

It looks a favorable draw for England. Fortunately we have a manager that will not allow the team underestimate anyone. Fingers crossed for no "I*******'s" before the start of the World Cup.

One team I'd like to see come unstuck would be France and Henry. I hope they get beaten....hands down.

 

[CATCH17]

Did you guys see that world cup trophy yesterday?

Wow. It looked like some hidden treasure you would see in a indiana Jones movie.

 

[Ren]

first and foremost i'll be supporting the germans, always have since italia 90 and been to the country a few times.
secondly i'll be supporting the u.s., algeria and slovenia for the group stages and then we'll take it from there

How can you support Germany? :laugh2:

You must really love you some 1-0 and 0-0 games

 

[daschoo]

How can you support Germany? :laugh2:

You must really love you some 1-0 and 0-0 games

remember watching the world cup in italy when i was 8. lothar matthaus was my favourite player, remember running about the back garden with a white t-shirt on kicking a ball past my four year old brother pretending to be him, and i've always supported them against anyone bar scotland since then.

 

[Ren]

remember watching the world cup in italy when i was 8. lothar matthaus was my favourite player, remember running about the back garden with a white t-shirt on kicking a ball past my four year old brother pretending to be him, and i've always supported them against anyone bar scotland since then.

Fair enough, the first world cup i can remember was 86 so i've always had a soft spot for Argentina

Kinda similar i guess

 

[daschoo]

on a more immediate note celtic have all of a sudden turned up after a horrible start under our new manager. sitting top of the league with three good home wins in the last 8 days including dismantling an aberdeen side today who beat rangers last week. played some great stuff today, won 3-0 but could have been 6 or 7. most entertained i've been at the football this year. really looking forward to travelling through to motherwell next saturday now.

 

[UKCowboysFan]

first and foremost i'll be supporting the germans, always have since italia 90 and been to the country a few times.
secondly i'll be supporting the u.s., algeria and slovenia for the group stages and then we'll take it from there

I suppose you get used to having to support someone other than your home country.

Even when Scotland do qualify, they always seem to forget that the tournament is supposed to last more than 3 games


As for the draw, good for both the US & England really.

Algeria are the weakest of the African teams & Slovenia one of the weaker European teams.

 

[daschoo]

I suppose you get used to having to support someone other than your home country.

Even when Scotland do qualify, they always seem to forget that the tournament is supposed to last more than 3 games

always think these big tournaments are all hype. who actually wants to qualify and play on the grandest and most watched stage in sport? or at least i assume that was the sfa thinking when we hired george "oh go on then i'll just have a small whisky... leave the bottle there son!!!:angryno: " burley

 

[UKCowboysFan]

always think these big tournaments are all hype. who actually wants to qualify and play on the grandest and most watched stage in sport? or at least i assume that was the sfa thinking when we hired george "oh go on then i'll just have a small whisky... leave the bottle there son!!!:angryno: " burley

I think one of Scotland's biggest problems with qualification now, is the fact that there has been a general increase in the quality of the other smaller (in terms of population) nations, and also the break up of the old communist countries which has led to more countries that have the ability to compete.

Take this World Cup, we will have Serbia, Slovakia and Slovenia from the old Eastern bloc, and that's without Croatia, Russia & the Ukraine.

And I guess add to that the fact that the Premier League is now full of players from other European and African countries, this has reduced the number of top quality players that Scotland have.

All joking aside, I do think it's a shame that none of the other home nations currently seem able to qualify for major tournaments.

 

[daschoo]

I think one of Scotland's biggest problems with qualification now, is the fact that there has been a general increase in the quality of the other smaller (in terms of population) nations, and also the break up of the old communist countries which has led to more countries that have the ability to compete.

Take this World Cup, we will have Serbia, Slovakia and Slovenia from the old Eastern bloc, and that's without Croatia, Russia & the Ukraine.

And I guess add to that the fact that the Premier League is now full of players from other European and African countries, this has reduced the number of top quality players that Scotland have.

All joking aside, I do think it's a shame that none of the other home nations currently seem able to qualify for major tournaments.

scotlands problems? where to start!

firstly, i think to be honest we always punched above our weight. people forget that we are a nation of around 5 million people. yes we have produced world class players like jimmy johnstone, dalglish, sounness (didn't feel good typing that) baxter, law, billy bremner etc but the problem is we're always going to build teams around these guys that are just simply not in the same class.

plus when we was the last time we produced anyone genuinly in that league? i'll get back to that later but the only three you could really argue are top class, well below world class, are gordon, fletcher and mcgeady. one of these guys is a keeper, one a midfield anchor who will always be better with better players around him rather than bring the best out in those around him and the other elected to play for ireland. mcfadden in his moment can beat anyone as he has shown against france, ukraine and holland but its far too rare and fleeting to rely on him.

you're definately right about the break up of the eastern bloc making it harder for us to qualify. also the globalisation of the premiership and la liga as these eastern bloc teams now have guys that are experianced playing in massive games at the biggest stages which obviously helps them when they're playing vital qualifying games for their country.

the declining standard of the spl. within the last ten years you've gone from having guys like laudrup, gazza, van bronkhurst and the de boers at rangers sutton, lambert, lennon, petrov, moravcik (one of the most technically gifted players i've seen) and of course the king himself henrik at celtic and even dundee had guys like claudio cannigia. now look at the state of rangers, the standard of player has gone incredibly downhill and they are effectively being run by the banks. being honest we've struggled to be much better and allthough i definately think we're better man for man than rangers compared to our side of a few years ago we've gone backwards. the rest of the spl now tend to be filled with players picked up from league 1 or 2 clubs. while you can argue that this should give young scots more first team chances, and it is at clubs like aberdeen and the edinburgh clubs, they are playing in a far poorer league which isn't preparing them for the step up to international level.

the whole infrastructure in this country is a joke. a nation of 5 million and we're trying to maintain a proffesional league of 42 teams? we have 3 governing bodies overseeing it? whats the point of sacking managers when its the same idiots overseeing everything else? berti vegts came in and started overhauling everything with rainor bonhoff as his head of youth development. vogts struggled badly as craig brown had left an aging team with no young players blooded and ready to step in and was sacked. the set-up he installed allowed smith to come in and mould that team into one that very nearly qualified for the last world cup. more importantly though with the set-up the germans brought in we got to the european under-21 final and world under-19 final. thats final of the tournament not qualified for the tournament. yet now we're back to where we started when vogts came in. a first team that has several aging players with no obvious replacements and a stuttering youth set-up with the same men in suits talking of the need for the new manager being able to oversee a complete overhaul yet not looking at themselves.

at least we have seen some investment in facilities, for example the recently opened million pound plus all weather training pitches at hampden (which are excellent - i play there on a tuesday night) but there needs to be a change in the entire culture.
years ago kids would be out in the streets playing football from getting in from school till dark, even when i was a boy we played whenever we could. these days they're more interested in computer games, drinking or gangs.

sorry to go on, went a lot longer than i meant to but its something that gets me worked up

 

[Cochese]

As a USA fan who goes to every game within 300 miles, I did the moonwalk when I saw this draw.

I dont wish to jinx it, but besides England we got 2 of the worst teams of the 32 in our group. Even England are beatable.

I am SO pumped for this. Too bad Charlie Davies is hurt.

Oh and if the yanks should fail, Im going with my family history and backing the oranje.