19 November 2007

Fox Soccer Report.



Fox Soccer Channel's nightly news program Fox Soccer Report [FSR], tells us that England striker Peter Crouch has scored 13 goals in 23 appearances. This is in connection with England's upcoming final European qualification match in England against Croatia in which England require a draw or a win to qualify for the Finals. England national team supremo Steve McClaren is likely to use a 4-5-1 formation given injuries to his back line as well as the need to prevent the Croats from scoring. Bobby McMahon, FSR's Scottish pundit tells us "a braver man would play 4-4-2".
In addition, Bobby says "the real minnows" of European competition should be required to play extra qualification matches to earn the right to play the larger fish because "the Andorras, the San Marinos [..] are rubbish." Yes, tell that to Holland to struggled to beat Luxembourg 1-0 in their last game. We at watchsoccer wonder what the exact criteria would be used to define a "minnow". May we suggest Greece, the current holders of the UEFA European Football Championship? Or how about also-ran teams such as England? No chance of an upset by a small team if there are no small teams taking part. This push toward increasingly strict seeding will take magic out of the game in our humble opinion and would like to see UEFA as well as FIFA commit to taking steps to abolish seeding in its entirety and change the major competitions to a knock-out format from the beginning. No playing for draws, and no collusion between teams - remember the Anschluss - to keep third countries from qualifying.
One last thing. Bobby made the comment that in scoring the winner, Israel's Golan "reached new heights". His fellow commentators didn't get the joke, though.

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