Team news and previews
England: England will look to be a major force this year by bringing in some new players. Yes, to the commenters, this includes Ronny Torres. They should have a very strong midfield, but a weaker defence, and if this team can figure out how to actually play as a team then they have a good chance of winning.
Germany: Not much news out of the Germans, but they should be back with pretty much the same team. They have a chip on their shoulder after losing in the group stage last year and will be looking for revenge.
Canada: Canada has a new coach this year and a couple roster changes. Losing Eugene Seckler as a coach will hurt them, but they'll probably still do alright. They may be lacking in speed and fitness, but they're always tough and solid and can keep games close.
Jamaica: Jamaica is losing a couple of their best players this year in Justin Manz, Shane O'Gilvie, and Tamon George. The younger players will need to step up in order for Jamaica to keep it's status as a medal contender.
Ukraine: Ukraine has made some acquisitions in the midfield and at keeper that will definitely improve their team. They don't have a particular weakness anywhere, making them fairly solid all-around. They are a quicker bunch that play well as a team and should be a major force.
Laos: Laos will have the same team as last year. They are a very skilled group and very quick, however they might lack an imposing force against the bigger teams such as Republic of Ireland and England. Nevertheless, they will once again be right up there with the best teams.
Norway: Norway will also have pretty much the exact same team, and will be looking to repeat as champions. They won as the underdog last year, and this year teams will be very eager and pumped up to knock off the defending champions. It will be tough for Norway to repeat now that everyone knows how good they can be.
Greece: Greece will be the same team they've been for the last 2-3 years. The Greeks may not have particular stand-out players, but they play very tough and everyone always seems to underestimate them.
Portugal: Much of Portugal's team is playing together this indoor season, so by the time the WCP Cup rolls around, they'll already be well-acquainted with each other.
Italy:Another team playing together this indoor season, Italy will be tough to beat. A younger and inexperienced team, but since they play all indoor together, you never know what can happen. We all know how well Greece and Canada have done in the past despite star players.
Republic of Ireland: Ireland is a major force and will continue to be a major force. They have many good players, but they might be constrained by the star player limit in the rules, forcing a couple cuts, but not enough to severely impact the team. They still have a great defence and playmakers in the midfield and up front.
Nigeria: Nigeria looks to be rising in status. They played solid last year in a tough pool, but weren't able to advance. They kept games very close and had enough chances to win games as well.
Scotland: Scotland played very well last year despite not advancing. They have playmakers on their team, but are lacking a solid defence. If they can shore up the defence, they will be a contender.
Colombia: Tough to say how good Colombia will be. They are sure to have some El Salvador players, but how their roster shapes up remains to be seen.
Chile: Chile may also benefit with the addition of El Salvador players, so their potential is also unknown.
Botswana: Botswana was a huge underdog last year, and will still be this year. They do have the advantage of having more players playing indoor soccer this year and getting into shape earlier, so they're bound to be better this year.
Northern Ireland: Missing some good players last year, Northern Ireland did not fare well. If they get their entire roster together they should also be better this year.
Serbia: Should be the same as last year, but the younger players will have to be workhorses for this team to have a chance and they'll need a better defence.
Poland: Poland was the victim of unfortunate circumstances last year when Ukraine and Canada were forced to run up the score as high as possible in order to advance.
Austria: They were beaten bad last year in a relatively easy group, so they really have nowhere to go but up.
*There are only 19 teams this year unless a team is able to pull together soon and submit the fee, despite being past the due date. From what I gather, one of Serbia, Poland, or Austria will not be submitting a team.
Pre-season rankings
Now for the rankings. Keep in mind, these aren't based on anything on at all, just opinion. I encourage the commenters to pick apart the rankings, but try and show reasons why you feel that way.
1. Republic of Ireland
2. Norway
3. England
4. Laos
5. Greece
6. Jamaica
7. Ukraine
8. Germany
9. Portugal
10. Scotland
11. Canada
12. Nigeria
13. Italy
14. Botswana
15. Colombia
16. Northern Ireland
17. Serbia
18. Chile
19. Austria
20. Poland
The rankings will be adjusted based on exhibition games between two teams or any other roster developments that occur.
233 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 233 of 233They're break-dance fighting!
poor gopher
blackjack!
THE MIKE SWEENEY CHRONICLES:
Good news, Mike Sweeney is free! He turned himself in to authorities and demanded an early trial date regarding his 17 murder charges. As only Mike Sweeney can, he acted as his own lawyer and had all the charges thrown out due to his brilliant legal arguments. He got off even though they found the blood of all 17 of his victims in his teeth.
But Mike Sweeney may not be able to attend the World Cup. He has petitioned NASCAR to allow him to race. But unlike other mortal men, Mike Sweeney does not want to race in a car. To make it interesting, he wants to run the race on foot wearing only football equipment! In a test lap Mike Sweeney set the record for fastest lap while also sending two other vehicles off the road using his incredible strength and broad shoulders.
Is it possible that Mike Sweeney could race in NASCAR and still make it to Regina for the World Cup? Only time will tell and if anyone can do it, Mike Sweeney can!
haha funny, but alright...that's about enough. This joke is on the verge of being killed.
I agree.. the first was funny, the second was pretty much on the border of being tolerable and just plain annoying..
I cannot disagree with you more but feel free to post something funny yourself! It kind of gets boring talking about rankings, rumours etc. all the time. It also is stupid to have people whine and complain all the time about other people's comments but not adding anything to the conversation except saying, you are stupid. Spice things up a bit with jokes and if they are funny, no one will write about Mike Sweeney anymore.
By the way, contrary to what I just said about it being boring talking about rankings, I promised to give my rankings in parts so here is the second part. These teams are all capable of winning the whole thing but are longshots:
6. Greece - some may question this pick but Greece was not only lucky last year, they were good. They finished second in the Group of Death and had a better goal differential than Laos. They also lost by one goal to the champs. It looks like they have picked up the Saskatoon leagues top striker as well which will help to make up for the lack of skill they had last year. They seem to be well organized so I wouldn't doubt if they have one or two other skilled players joining their team.
7. Jamaica - this could be my dumbest pick considering that Jamaica has been in the top 4 for all 3 years of the World Cup. I base my opinion on rumours that they have lost a few of their top players and we haven't heard of any top replacements. The reason I don't have them rated lower: do you think Hollness would have a weak team in the tourney? My guess he will pick up some top players because no one has contacts like he does.
8. Canada - the same comments I made for Jamaica apply to Canada. There could be a fall from grace or Canada could be laying in the weeds ready to prove they are a contender again. Key losses and no word on whether they have replacements lead to this conservative ranking.
9. Scotland - we shouldn't forget that Scotland had a 3 win 1 loss record last year in an admittedly weaker division. Portugal advanced ahead of Scotland to the quarter finals but I doubt Scotland would have been crushed like Portugal was by ROI. Solid team of hard workers that will make any opposing teams life difficult.
10. Germany - not knowing the full roster of Germany I am putting them as number 10 based on others comments. They have a solid team with some good players but you can't ignore the fact they finished last in their pool with a minus 5 goal differential. The fact they were in the Group of Death last year has to be taken into account but if they can't finish ahead of any of those teams (none of which made it to the final) than they can't be rated any higher.
who is the top striker from saskatoon that greece picked up?
Steven DeLong. He led the Div 1 boarded league in scoring and is one of the top scorers (if not the top scorer) in the 7 v 7 league. Plays for Yorkton in PSL.
i thought it was sean riggs they picked up?
laos did pick up players 2 guys from toon and 3 guys from regina soo all in all 5 new players i heard
Damn, there sure a bunch of soccer players from Laos around Saskatchewan!
who are these 5 players?
laos has adam aislby... he's by far the best player in the tournament. no one can compete with laos if he's playing
I assume you are joking jjbb but who is Ailsby? Who does he play with regularly?
I can not believe that more people are not upset about Laos and the number of foreign players they have
yeah when you got something like 6 white people IN YOUR STARTING LINEUP...I mean c'mon...at least make an attempt to look like you're not cheating. They're just embarrassing the tourney everytime they play.
although true, it's not as if every other team is following the rules. Really, how many Norway players have norwegian heritage?
I agree that Laos should be allowed all people with heritage in Asia as their heritage players, and then they should follow regular rules. EX. 5 Star players.
Screw that, Laos shouldn't be allowed to have all of Asia, that is a complete frickin joke! I know our society is based mostly of white people of European descent (not being racist, but that is the truth) so the European countries have somewhat of an advantage but to allow all of Asia, talk about overcompensating. Last time I checked Asia was the largest continent and I may be wrong but doesn't it have a fairly large population? I know it isn't as large as Australia or Antartica but it is the 3rd largest behind those 2 isn't it? Botswana doesn't get all of Africa does it? Chile doesn't get all of South America does it? Actually, maybe they do. Anyways give Laos the southern half of Asia maybe but don't allow Russia and Japan and other countries because it kind of gets silly.
I heard Argentina picked up Bart Voswinkel..... Wait a minute, Argentina doesn't even have a team! What on earth is Mr. Holness up to that little chocolate covered strawberry!
Thanks for the geography lesson, however inaccurate it may be, but really Laos is no worse than most of the good teams.. just because some of their differences are physically noticable shouldn't make it worse.
Look at ROI.. Bachelu, Manz, Benno.. and several other starters are not Irish but because they are all white it doesn't look as bad. Laos still has 10 or 12 Laocian players.. and a few other Asians that are not from Laos..
Do you really think Botswana has all Botswanian(??) players? Not likely..
But ROI and England still follow all the rules shouldn't Laos have to?
Because the Torres brothers are so British.. apparently Laos still meets the requirements so they are just as legal as the others.. people would complain a lot more if england filled all their non-heritage spots with black guys or hispanics or asians because they don't look british.. but because most of their non-heritage players still look like they could be british it is less of a problem..
pffff does it even matter guys? We all know Laos ain't gonna win, so whats the point in criticizing them? It's just beating a dead horse.
On the other hand, let's have blood testing and hire experts to determine where everyone is from.
Also, yeah the only reason people are complaining about Laos is because it's physically noticeable. If this is as close as we can get to the actual World Cup, let's at least try and look like the teams are real.
yeah I'm not too worried about laos. They've got a good goalie and like 5-6 decent players. I hope I get their pool!
So let's shoot to change the rules then.. Rather than going by heritage, let's just go by skin color that way everything looks good. This was Laos can have all of asia, because even though they don't look exactly the same, other asians look closer to laocian than any other ethnic group in the tourney. And anyone black can only play for Nigeria, Botswana, or Jamaica.. As for white people, well they can pretty much play for any of the European teams, or team Canada..
So should we vote that guys like Rattan and Cash should leave team England? I mean they are actual heritage players but they don't look british so really they shouldn't be allowed to play with them right?
PS.. This was complete sarcasm if you could not tell, but I am pretty sure I laid it on pretty thick. Come on people get real, different coloured people can come from a the same country. I am not saying that all of team Laos are heritage even though they don't look it, but the rules don't call for that yet. 12 heritage players on a 23 player roster. That means 11 non-heritage players. As this tournament grows, the rules will get more strict and in the mean time, accept the fact that this is the best we can do to be able to make 20 different teams that make the heritage requirements or at least come close to doing so.
Everyone shut up about race, that is not the issue! This came up because someone informed us that Laos has a heritage exemption that allows anyone with a heritage from Asia to play for them. Colour of skin has nothing to do with it! There are many Asian countires that have people who are predominantly white. The problem isn't skin colour, it is allowing Laos to pick up players who have Asian (meaning the continent!!! not what is sometimes used to describe oriental people) descent. I would complain about it if it was England and they were allowed a heritage exemption to pick up players from all over the United Kingdom! It has nothing to do with race so shut up already. We already have one debate going about woman's rights we don't need to have another intellectual topic. I hate thinking!
That's probably best for the blogsite.. let's just tell everyone to shut up unless you have a mindless comment about nothing to make. I know what the problem is but people veered away from that and started saying that teams should at least look like the real team. That is what set me off.
Man...that was a sarcastic comment. I thought it was pretty obvious. I'm surprised you didn't make a comment about how blood-testing would be ridiculous and the cost-effectiveness of hiring experts to research heritage isn't feasible.
You're way too uptight about these things. Lighten up.
You must be the guy who's posting on the other topic.
The real problem is that if they allow all the Asian players to play for one team what inspiration do they have to create a team China or Japan?
As well it is not a question of how Laosian players they have everyone knows they have 12 but they also have about 9 premier players that are not Laosian which is a clear violation. If ROI and England could pick up 9 premier players that were not of heritage plus the ones that are of heritage there would be no tournament. The line has to be drawn somewhere.
this is also getting bland!
i don't see why everyone is complaining about laos. their team has a serious size dis-advantage and half of their team is going to get hurt in the first 2 games they play anyways and we won't have to worry about them any longer.
Once they lose there excuse will be "some of our players were injured thats why we lost"
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