h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hello Zorpheus

Do you mind if I come in?

Wanted to ask why I amuse you so.
Rather than start bickering on the thread - just wanted to ask you, as I may have caught the wrong end of the stick.

I'm not trying to be confrontational - but am genuinely curious.


GWL

Hey Lettuce,

All are welcome.

To what exactly are you refering to? The What's Wrong With Americans thread? That whole discussion amuses me.

If I offended you in some way, I'm sorry. Twas not my intent.

Spot on.

No offence taken.
Didn't know if you were referring to the previous posting (which was mine), or not.


Hope you are enjoying the World Cup as much as we are over here.

Oh hey, Now I think I know what you were refering to. My last post on that thread? It wasn't replying to you, I was replying to someone who said that I only posted to derail the conversation.

The world what?

I follow who wins and some highlights, but don't get to excited about it.

I never got into Soccer/Football that much.

Aaaahhh.

It all becomes clear now.
Blimey - you really have to study the backlog religiously.

You'd be surprised how quickly football (sorry I will always call it that ) can take off in countries.

In Ireland, about 15-20 years ago, no-one cared about it and hardly anyone played it. Now you should see their fans. They and the English fans are probably the wildest out there. It's great to see.

You never know. Ireland today - the US tomorrow.

Well they do say that Soccer/Football is the fastest growing sport in the US right now. Paintball being the second. So there might be hope for us yet.

A question for you Lettuce,

Why after someone scores a goal does the announcer have to scream out GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!, for 10 minutes? Then everyone on the team that scored has to hug and jump on everyone?
Here in the US we just give a high-five, and continue playing the game.

It is a bit annoying.

The GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLLLL!!!!!!!!!!!!! bit is a South American thing. The British commentators don't tend to get quite that excited. Although there was a great piece of footage when Norway first beat England in the 80s, the commentator went mad and started screaming
'Maggie Thatcher, Lady Diana, Winston Churchill, You boys took one hell of a beating, You boys took one hell of a beating'. You will probably find numerous references to this around the site. It really was incredible.

The hugging thing is something that I don't understand. My guess would be that the atmosphere and passion of the game gets to the players and the adrenalin gets going. From what of seen of the US Major League, the crowds aren't too big, and the stadiums are quite large, so the atmosphere is probably quite cold. Whereas scoring a goal in a packed out stadium where thousands of fans are going mental probably does strange things to you.

I don't know about the mob mentality thing. In american football, hockey, baseball and basketball, the crowds are quite large and usually always filled to capacity and they don't do it (then again in baseball and basketball the game doesn't stop when you score).
I wonder if it is just a tridition type of thing? I have started to notice that ever since the olympics when the US womens soccer (football) team won and what's her face stripped off her shirt, that everyone does that now (I say everyone but I don't watch it enough to know if it is a trend, but I usually always see it in the highlight footage).

Yeah, I saw THAT penalty.
If that doesn't attract people to watch football, nothing will.

The thing about footy is that it sometimes only takes 1 goal to win a match that could be invaluable. Most US sports have plenty of scoring in so the value of the touchdown/home run/basket isn't as much.
I've seen a little ice hockey and they tend to all crowd each other to try and congratulate the scorer in that, from what I've seen anyway.

But the scoring of a goal when the fans are sometimes only a couple of yards from the pitch, when you're playing your arch rivals must be one of the best feelings ever. There's nothing I wouldn't give to be able to score for Tottenham (my team) past Arsenal (their bitter rivals from 2 miles down the road). After going to watch the game last season - the atmosphere was something else.

Players only really tend to go mad when they score a vital goal. At the world cup - every goal is vital.

Ahhh, good point!

Another question (who know's this info might get me to watch more), How can you play a game and have it end up as a tie? (never liked that in hockey either) I take it there are only a set amount of overtime (is there any overtime?). What happens if at the end of the world cup both teams are tied?

The world cup is a pretty difficult tournament to have to explain in this respect but I'll give it a go.

The first phase (the Group stage) - which will end today (when the US play their final game against Poland) consists of 8 groups of 4 teams each.

In each group, all 4 teams play each other once (3 games). A win is worth 3 points, a draw (tie) is worth 1 point, and you get no points for losing. The two teams with the most points after these 3 games progress onto the Knockout phase.

If teams are level on points then the goals they have scored and conceded are added together to make a 'Goal difference' i.e. the difference between the total amount of goals scored and the total amount of goals conceded. The team with the better goal difference will go above the other team in the table even if they have the same amount of points. If the Goal difference is the same then the team who has scored the most goals will finish higher.

To illustrate this there was a classic in the 1990 world cup when the group that England were in, including Ireland, Holland and Egypt was unable to be decided. Basically every game finished 1-1 in the group except England beat Egypt 1-0. This left Holland and Ireland with the same amount of points, the same amount of goals scored and the same amount of goals conceded. Seeing as how they needed to be seperated, this was eventually done by drawing names out of a hat to see who finished above the other.


Anyway....
After the group stage comes the Knockout stage.
In this, the teams who qualify (the top two from each group) are paired up against teams from other groups and play a one-off match. If the score is tied at the end of 90 minutes, 30 minutes extra time is played. The first team to score in extra time will win via the 'Golden goal' rule. But this rule is pretty new and is not used in domestic English football (bluff old traditionalists that we are). In our footy we just play extra time and more than one goal can be scored, it just depends on what the score is at the end.

If the score is still tied at the end of extra time then a penalty competition is played. Each team taking 5 penalties and whoever scores the most wins. If after 5 penalties the score is STILL tied, they just carry on taking them 1 at a time until one team scores and the other misses.

It is a bit of an anti-climax (especially when it decided the final in 1994), but it is exciting and it beats tossing a coin to see who wins, which is what used to happen.

Extra thing to note - England are terrible at penalty shoot-outs, so are Holland. If either of these teams ends up in a penalty shoot-out bet against them - you will win.
Germany and Argentina are good at them. They have both beaten England via this method in recent years. Germany denying us in the semi-final in 1990 and in the European Championships in 1996 (which was in England - god that was awful). Argentina knocked us out in 1998 via penalties as well. That is why we were so pleased to beat them this time around.

Hope this helps. There are plenty of world cup bits and bobs around the site as well that might be worth checking out if you have more questions.

Wow, Thanks!

That did clear things up a bit.

Right now the US is losing to Poland

It's all elementary as Portugal lost too.
So the US goes through.

*cue party poppers and fireworks*

Will they be partying on the streets of Chicago tonight?

I don't see why not, there is always partying on the streets of Chicago.

The news has been brodcasting that this is the first time since ?? that the US teams has gotten past the first round.

YAY!