It's a Wrap on the 2022 World Cup

The 3rd Place and Championship match for the 2022 World Cup went pretty much as I expected (Croatia over Morocco for 3rd Place and Argentina over France for the championship) though I had hoped otherwise. The championship game was a classic with Argentina dominating the first 70 minutes of the match and having a 2-0 lead. It was at the 70 minute mark that France had their first shot of the match which is pretty crazy. But from that point until the end of regulation France created many opportunities and they ended up converting two of them with a penalty kick made by Mbappe and then a beautiful goal also by Mbappe. The match then went to extra time as it was 2-2 at the end of 90 minutes. Unfortunately in the extra 30 minutes France backed off and stopped playing with the intensity that got them back into the match (the exact same fate as the Netherlands against Argentina in the quarterfinals). Argentina scored around midway through the extra time to go up 3-2 and it was only then that France started pressing and with just a few minutes left in the extra time Mbappe got his third goal to tie it up 3-3. Just like the Argentina-Netherlands game the match ended tied up and went to penalty kicks and just like the previous match Argentina came out on top. It was pretty anticlimatic after such a great match but Argentina won 4-2 on PKs after France missed two of their first 4 where Argentina did not miss any.

Overall it was a great tournament and a great final with Messi (2 goals) and Mbappe (3 goals) shining the brightest in the final match. The Golden Boot award goes to the top scorer in the tournament and it went back and fourth between the two of them multiple times during the match until the very end when Mbappe got his final goal which put him at 8 goals in the tournament compared to the 7 that Messi got. So Mbappe got the Golden Boot but Messi got the bigger prize with the World Cup championship trophy (the first in his career) as well as the Golden Ball for the most oustanding player in the tournament.

New Favorite Hot Drink of All Time

December in Illinois tends to be pretty cold. It is not as bad as January/February but still cold. Last night I was feeling the coldness and decided to have some hot chocolate. I am not a coffee or tea drinker so I don't do hot drinks very often. Sometimes when I have hot chocolate I will add chocolate chips just because you can never have too much chocolate. Last night I didn't see any open bags of chocolate chips in the cupboard but I did see some butterscotch chips that my wife had used for baking recently. So I thought that I would toss some of them into my hot chocolate instead. Oh my gosh. It was so good. Just saying. And I may or may not have had another cup of it this afternoon...

World Cup Semi-Final 2 - France vs. Morocco

Morocco gave it their best but it wasn't enough today against France as they lost 0-2. France scored very quick (in the first 5 minutes) and then Morocco looked like the better team for the next 75 minutes of play but could never get the ball into the net. And then France scored again at the 80 min mark and the match was pretty much over. Morocco had a huge crowd (both their own fans as well as others that had jumped onto their bandwagon) and they made themselves heard. But it didn't make a difference as France was able to finish their chances with goals when Morocco could not. This was a record for Morocco as the first team from Africa to make it to the semi-finals and they beat some highly ranked teams in Belgium, Spain and Portugal on the way.

So now we have France vs Argentina in the finals. At the start of the tournament I think that these 2 teams were in many people's top 3 (along with Brazil). It should be a great match and features two of the best players in the world in Lionel Messi for Argentina and Kylian Mbappe for France. They are teammates in club play with both playing for Paris St. Germain. Not only will they be playing for the World Cup trophy but they will also be playing for the Golden Boot award as they are currently tied with the most goals in the tournament with 5 apiece.

I will be rooting for France on Sunday but I feel that Argentina looks like they are in better form and should be considered the favorites. France's defense held Morocco without a goal today but overall they have been giving up a number of goals in the tournament. I think that both teams have great goal scorers but the difference for Argentina will be their better defenders. My guess is that Argentina wins 3-1 and Messi gets both trophies...

There is a 3rd place game being played on Saturday and I predict that Morocco will win it in penalty kicks against Croatia. Croatia got 2nd place in the World Cup 4 years ago and I don't think that they will be super motivated for the 3rd place game whereas I think that Morocco will continue to try to set records for African teams with another win.

World Cup Semi-Final 1 - Argentina vs Croatia

Well, as expected this has been all Lionel Messi and Argentina today (Argentina won 3-0). Messi had a goal (from a penalty kick) along with an assist. The difference between Messi and Ronaldo is that Messi makes the others around him so much better and serves up assists on a plate.

It looks like the final will be either a David and Goliath story (if Morocco makes it through tomorrow) or will be two heavyweights (if France wins as expected tomorrow). Either way it should be entertaining. I am not the biggest Argentina fan but they play very entertaining matches with lots of goals scored. I thought that Croatia might slow them down today but Argentina got the early penalty kick and then scored again quickly after that on a counter following a Croatia corner. The last goal was Messi magic after the Croatia defense had loosened up as they were playing from behind and needing to have more players forward.

Croatia will play again in the 3rd Place game and it will likely be Luka Modric's final World Cup match as he will be 41 in 4 years when the World Cup comes to North America. He has been fun to watch for a number of years but Argentina played their best soccer in this tournament today and Croatia had no answers.

Day 2 of the World Cup Quarterfinals

Once again I got one out of two right in today's World Cup Quarterfinals with me picking France over England correctly but missing the Morocco over Portugal win. Both matches were clean (compared to the Argentina/Netherlands match yesterday) and fun to watch. Though I had picked Portugal over Morocco, I was rooting for Morocco to pull off the upset. They did it with great defense and a well executed header for the only goal in their match.

So the semifinals are now set for Tuesday and Wednesday (12/13 and 12/14)

Argentina versus Croatia
France versus Morocco

I am guessing that Argentina and France will both win but I will be rooting for the underdogs (Croatia and Morocco). Once again I am mostly hoping for fun "beautiful" soccer with matches decided in regular time or extended time (but not via penalty kicks). PKs are exciting but I much prefer goals scored in regular play.

RIP Grant Wahl. Your writing will be missed.

Day 1 of the World Cup Quarterfinals

Well, I was one for two on my predictions today and almost zero for two. Brazil's loss to Croatia was hard to foresee based on how well Brazil had been playing. At one time I thought that Spain was the most likely team to win the tournament but once they lost I was convinced that Brazil would win. Shows how little I know about this.

One thing that I do know though is that the Argentina win over Netherlands today was brutal to watch. There were 18 yellow cards given out with 16 to players (including some on the bench) and 2 to coaches. Despite all of that the referee managed to miss two very obvious yellow cards where he swallowed his whistle on Messi's intentional hand ball and Paredes kicking the ball into the Dutch bench. I think that everyone was unhappy with the referee when the match was over, the Argentina team, the Dutch team and the fans that had watched the match that was totally out of control. Hopefully the two matches tomorrow (France/England and Portugal/Morocco) will be a return to the "Beautiful Game".

2022 World Cup Quarterfinals Set

The round of 16 for the 2022 World Cup completed today and the quarterfinals will begin on Friday 12/9/2022. The big surprise from this round was the win of Morocco over Spain today in a penalty shootout. My neighbor's son, a 16 year old soccer player, and I spoke about a week ago (after the first round of the group stage) and both of us agreed that Spain at that time looked like a team that could win the whole thing. Since that time Spain had a draw with Germany, lost to Japan and now lost to Morocco. After the Japan loss I thought that Spain was actually in a good bracket location that would favor a long run but it was not to be.

So in the quarterfinals there are 5 European teams (France, Portugal, England, Croatia and Netherlands), 2 South American teams (Brazil and Argentina) and one African team (Morocco). I have listed each of these groups in what I think is the order of strongest to weakest teams though as the previous rounds have demonstrated anything can happen in this tournament. My predictions for the next set of games are:

Agentina over Netherlands on Friday
Brazil over Croatia on Friday
France over England on Saturday
Portugal over Morocco on Saturday

If it does turn out this way then we should have some great semi-final matchups with the two South American teams meeting on one side of the bracket and two European powers meeting on the other side of the bracket. I can't wait to see all of these games!!

End of the run for USMNT in 2022 World Cup

The US men's team lost to the Netherlands 3-1 today to get knocked out of the 2022 World Cup. The US team is very young (second youngest in the tournament) and it seemed to show in today's match against the experienced Dutch team. Both teams made mistakes on defense at times but the difference was that when the US made the mistakes the Dutch were very quick to put the ball in the back of the net whereas when the US had opportunities they were not able to finish off the chances. The one goal that the US did score was kind of a miracle goal that was deflected off a US foot with a spin that put it into the net but it was more fortune than it was a great shot. On the other hand the 3 Dutch goals all seemed so easy for them to score after the US defense failed to pick them up.

Hopefully the US team learns from this and in 2026 when the World Cup is in North American they will be able to make a long run in the tournament.

This World Cup had 8 teams from Europe, 3 from Asia (Australia isn't actually part of Asia but they participate in the Asian qualifications), 2 from South America, 2 from Africa and the US from North America in the round of 16. My guess is that it is going to be 6 from Europe (Spain, Portugal, France, England, Croatia and Netherlands) and 2 from South America (Brazil and Argentina) in the quarterfinals but I hope that I am wrong and one or more of the Asian/African teams (South Korea, Japan, Australia, Morocco and Senegal) will advance and play the part of a Cinderalla team. Most of all though I am hoping to see exciting soccer as I have seen the past few days.

Another Day, Another World Cup Post

Well my favorite team (Germany) is now officially out of the tournament. They won their game today but needed help and were doomed when Japan knocked off Spain. I am disappointed but this is mostly from the earlier game where Germany lost to Japan 2-1 after being up 1-0 at half (the same outcome in the Japan/Spain game today). After that earlier defeat and a later draw with Spain, Germany no longer had control of their own destiny and needed a favorable result from the Spain/Japan match that didn't happen. I now need to figure out who to root for in the tournament beyond the US team. (Answer -> US, Portugal and England). Hopefully it will continue to be exciting "football" with all of the games after tomorrow being "win or go home" games.

Germany is hosting the European Championships in 2 years and the World Cup will be in North America in 4 years so maybe the home field advantages will help going forward.