What's going on with different teams this year? Let's take a look...
Ireland- Lost top strikers David Brown to a knee injury, Jay Tomchuk and Brett Levis to Poland, and a couple other key cogs...is this finally the year Ireland crumbles? Knowing Ireland, they'll replace the players with some quality players and keep it going. It will be interesting, since they play Sudan right at the beginning, and won't have a difficult challenger until the playoffs.
El Salvador - Could be losing a key defender in Jordian Farahani and striker in Jerson Barandica-Hamilton to teams in the United States where they have tryouts scheduled. Remains to be seen how those tryouts go. Still, this is a team that took Ireland to shootouts last year. They'll still be quite strong.
France - France is another team that will be missing some key players. Losing striker Brett Bachelu and defendersYianni Harbis and Mason Bulych will hurt the most, but France is replacing them with top players. The Patterson twins were in talks to join France, but it appears they'll remain with Germany this year. Expect France to be a top team and challenge El Salvador for Group D.
Poland - It's easy to see why Poland is this year's most exciting team. With strong additions at striker and defence, a strong fan base, Poland has to be the most dangerous team in the tournament.
Germany - Assuming they can keep the Pattersons, Germany has added a couple more players from Regina and Saskatoon. They still need to find some consistency, but they're going in the right direction.
Serbia - Serbia is looking to add some former Ukraine players, and could a surprise contender in their group with Ireland and Sudan.
Canada - Look out for Canada this year. They've added a strong midfielder in Ahmed Shirif, and replaced a couple other players with good players. Definitely a strong team.
Colombia, Greece, Nigeria, Hungary and Northern Ireland are all taking part in the RSA Tournament at the end of February, this should be a decent indicator of what each team will bring to the WCP Cup.
Anything else?
Ireland- Lost top strikers David Brown to a knee injury, Jay Tomchuk and Brett Levis to Poland, and a couple other key cogs...is this finally the year Ireland crumbles? Knowing Ireland, they'll replace the players with some quality players and keep it going. It will be interesting, since they play Sudan right at the beginning, and won't have a difficult challenger until the playoffs.
El Salvador - Could be losing a key defender in Jordian Farahani and striker in Jerson Barandica-Hamilton to teams in the United States where they have tryouts scheduled. Remains to be seen how those tryouts go. Still, this is a team that took Ireland to shootouts last year. They'll still be quite strong.
France - France is another team that will be missing some key players. Losing striker Brett Bachelu and defendersYianni Harbis and Mason Bulych will hurt the most, but France is replacing them with top players. The Patterson twins were in talks to join France, but it appears they'll remain with Germany this year. Expect France to be a top team and challenge El Salvador for Group D.
Poland - It's easy to see why Poland is this year's most exciting team. With strong additions at striker and defence, a strong fan base, Poland has to be the most dangerous team in the tournament.
Germany - Assuming they can keep the Pattersons, Germany has added a couple more players from Regina and Saskatoon. They still need to find some consistency, but they're going in the right direction.
Serbia - Serbia is looking to add some former Ukraine players, and could a surprise contender in their group with Ireland and Sudan.
Canada - Look out for Canada this year. They've added a strong midfielder in Ahmed Shirif, and replaced a couple other players with good players. Definitely a strong team.
Colombia, Greece, Nigeria, Hungary and Northern Ireland are all taking part in the RSA Tournament at the end of February, this should be a decent indicator of what each team will bring to the WCP Cup.
Anything else?
14 comments:
what about Laos, Norway, and Jamaica?
Saw Serbia in a friendly a in late December...VERY unimpressive...they too Scotland to about a 8-7 game and they had the better of the Scotland GK's playing for Serbia as theirs no showed. They would have to add 3/4 of the Ukraine team to make a competitive game with ROI/Sudan.
Don't forget about Botswana. I sat and watched their tryout of like 40 guys. Alot of the players used to play with them and some from that old team Sierra Leione from last year. They have quite a few new additions and some quality players. Don't be surprised if they make it through the group with Ireland. They just have to pick the right players.
That would be the surprise of the century if Botswana made it out of their pool. The only bigger surprise would be if Scotland does...they've made a lot of new additions and trimmed some fat as well.
friendly updates:
Nigeria 3-2 Scotland
Poland 2-2 Afghanistan
Yo Riley, do you watch any of the soccer at all? You say Poland the most dangerous team. Why do you speak this nonsense and have nothing to back it up. I don't think your correct at all. I hate this blog for that reason. The trash that you put is not even backed up.
I said they've made strong additions at striker and defence, which they have. With a very strong fan base and and an improved team, I consider the third-place finishers from last year to be the most dangerous team.
I'd say that's not nonsense at all.
I am going to have to side with the comment above Clock Cleaners. I watched the Afghan vs. Poland friendly and Poland was nothing special at all. It's going to be an interesting tournament. These teams are fairly even this year. No one will walk away with it, that's for sure.
Don't base all your judgement about a team on one meaningless exhibition game.
A third place finish last year and with the strong additions to the team this year it would be an upset not to see them in the final. They have one of the best goalies in the tournament last year and this team has more heart and determination than all the teams combined!
^ What Clock Cleaner said. Word.
Something like 8 important players from Poland were involved in the RSA Adult tournament that weekend as well. They had the final game immediately following the exhibition game. Like others were saying, there isn't a lof of valuable info to take a lot out of a friendly - especially this one
Don't take any exhibition games too seriously. Most teams are not playing with their full rosters - or have picked up players just for that game. Some haven't even finalized their rosters yet. Teams will show their true metal starting March 30.
Botswana Vs Germany tonight @10pm
K.B
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