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World Cup 2026 Thread

Was in Mexico for the last few days. Managed to squeeze viewing of a couple of the matches on Friday and yesterday but missed the first one today. Lots of folks going on about how poor Endrick was, but in the end, Haaland was Haaland and that's often enough. His ability to score never ceases to amaze.

I brought my England kit in case we decided to stay in San Diego to watch the match but headed home instead. But when we were about to cross the border my wife turned to me and asked "so honey, why aren't you wearing your England kit (at least she calls it by the proper name now. 😁)?" I'm worried my wife might want to see me dead. 🤪
 
Wow, what a match. Full credit to England for their defensive work. Mexico with a kind of baffling decision to spend the last ten-fifteen minutes just trying to play the ball wide and then cross it. Down a man, they're still favored to win every ball since Tuchel brought a massive squad for just this reason and this way they can conserve energy. England just dropped into a super low block and Mexico switched from trying to play through England and feeling like a third goal was inevitable to playing right into England's hands and it seeming very unlikely they were going to score.
 
With Jude and Harry playing as well as they can, England can go far. I get the Quansah decision but that didn't pan out. So of course Spence comes in and redeems himself.
Still, England has looked so wobbly at times, I wonder if they can continue like that
 
And Belgium has been granted the right to appeal Balogun’s red card rescission.
 
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On the US/Balogun thing … this is going to end up being a game-time decision if they keep screwing around with it, and 90% of the comments about the issue are unhinged. Oh, and Sepp Blatter can get effed ever talking about governance again. Of anything. You corrupt bag of refuse. I wouldn’t trust him to manage a crosswalk in the quietest corner of Hobbiton

On England/Mexico … yeah, that was wild and fun and all but what the heck was Aguirre playing at once they went up a man? The SINGLE thing England is absolutely, 100% going to do well is defend the box in the air. It’s what their defenders do from birth and they’re both taller and bigger than your guys. I get the approach if you have a Haaland/Dzeko kind of guy. You don’t. What you do have is multiple quick little crazy legs guys. Try attacking in space with speed and force those English dump truck CBs to run. They should fire him immediately. Oh wait … they already did that twice before. Instead, maybe try not hiring him again. That federation is just SO stupid.
 
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Sepp Blather (autocorrect, but I’m just gonna allow it) grew a conscience? I guess that bribe money dried up.

You knew the hot takes were going to go nuclear the moment it came out that you know who got involved. And there are a lot of parties who were oddly quiet when FIFA just hand-waved away Ronaldo’s suspension that have developed very strong opinions on this one (cough cough UEFA).

I’m just waiting for some NCAA level nonsense like them deciding on the appeal after the game and then retroactively declaring a Belgium win.
 
The amount of guys talking out of both sides of their mouth on this Balogun thing is truly surprising, even for soccer. Every single one of these holier than thou coaches would be pressing every button within reach to get their No. 9 reinstated if it was even halfway possible. And everybody involved knows it. It’s just theatrics, and not very good theatrics.
 
Everyone when it happened: I cannot believe they gave a red for that. VAR absolutely screwed up and that's atrocious.

Everyone when the suspension got suspended: I cannot believe corrupt FIFA would overturn an obvious red card like that!


The optics are weird and anything to do with FIFA is going to be questionable at best and of course grifter hitler is going to do what he always does and take credit for something he had nothing to do with, but any rational person knows that wasn't a red. People are mad because plenty of wrong decisions in the past weren't fixed, but this situation is different. It would be one thing if the ref had just given a red card on the field, it would have still been an atrocious call, but those things happen. This was a VAR official breaking protocol to create a red card. I don't think I've ever seen that.
 
While it might sound curious, Belgium really didn’t have any standing in that complaint other than self interest. They weren’t involved in the game in which the foul either occurred or did not occur and even a body as screwed up as FIFA doesn’t need to be wading into complaints that are lodged purely out of a team’s interest in meeting the weakest possible version of their opponent. I mean, do you really think they would have lodged that complaint if it was Pepi or Wright involved instead of Balogun? Not a chance
 
Either way, there’s going to be WAY more bad blood tonight than would otherwise have been the case. The Belgians feel slighted and the US feel insulted by the whole mess. Right or wrong go out the window once the game starts. And either way, there’s legit bad blood in game one between Spain and Portugal. It’s gonna be hard to top yesterday’s chaos but today’s slate seems willing to give it a try.
 
What could be more American than looking at a day full of international soccer chaos that shouldn't be topped and then asking the world to hold our beer?

I'm just glad that I nuked my Facebook years ago and am thus no longer involved in group chats with my Belgian in-laws.
 
I'm excited to see what countries golden generation Roberto Martinez is going to get a chance to ruin next! Nothing like having the best midfield on earth and being forced to play basically ten on eleven with no real plan. Can you believe he actually subbed Ronaldo off once in this tournament????
 
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