What are your 5 best Football World Cup Finals ever?

[OlympicsFan 858]

What about the 1954 final? Maybe i am biased, but i think most people who were already alive back then agree(d) that it was a very exciting match.

[thepharoah 2,405]

5 hours ago, OlympicsFan said:

2018 was pretty boring for me (not only because Germany got eliminated early), in my opinion 2006 was clearly better. It just doesn't feel right when none out of Germany/Spain/Argentina/Italy/Brazil makes the semifinal.

These teams didn't succeed to make it to Semis because they were simply not good enough and only Germany and Argentina had good results in their last major tournaments before WC out of this group , yet Croatia and England qualifying to Semis were big surprise but this's always WC,  for me Russia 2018 was simply amazing many matches to remember Spain Vs. Portugal, France Vs.  Argentina,  Belgium Vs.  Japan,  Belgium Vs.  Brazil,  Croatia Vs.  Russia,  Croatia Vs.  Argentina,  Croatia Vs.  England, Germany Vs. Sweden,  Germany Vs.  Korea, Uruguay Vs. Portugal and many others also it was one of the balanced WCs ever because almost each team participating except 2 or 3 teams had world class player(s) something like WC in 1994 

[Monzanator 4,503]

I watched every World Cup live since 1990 and quite frankly 2010 and 2014 in particular were the worst since 1990 indeed. I think the Brazilian heat & humidity had a lot to do with that. 1994 & 1998 were the two best ones followed by 2006, 2002 & 2018. Then 2010, 2014 and poor 1990 that was too tactical and had the ugliest World Cup final I can remember. Argentina in particular looked old & tired and even Maradona couldn't save them. I really liked the German uniforms from that era with the extra black, gold & red stripes. The vintage white & black that followed from Euro 1996 are kinda bland tbh.

 

 

[LDOG 2,418]

hace 5 horas, Monzanator dijo:

I watched every World Cup live since 1990 and quite frankly 2010 and 2014 in particular were the worst since 1990 indeed. I think the Brazilian heat & humidity had a lot to do with that. 1994 & 1998 were the two best ones followed by 2006, 2002 & 2018. Then 2010, 2014 and poor 1990 that was too tactical and had the ugliest World Cup final I can remember. Argentina in particular looked old & tired and even Maradona couldn't save them. I really liked the German uniforms from that era with the extra black, gold & red stripes. The vintage white & black that followed from Euro 1996 are kinda bland tbh.

 

 

 

Our team had 4 players suspended from the semifinal and Maradona had a severe ankle injury. He wouldn't have played in any other circumstance.

[kungshamra71 892]

20 hours ago, heywoodu said:

 

Reminds me of the same World Cup, but the QF between the Netherlands and Brazil. My Brazilian ex was here and went to another city to watch the match with some other Brazilians. Came back after the match and I've never seen anyone in my life so pissed as that day, as if Satan himself had taken control. 

 

Have a similar story to share. On that same World Cup I was invited, in Lisbon, by a couple of Erasmus german friends I helped to integrate in my university, to watch the game between Spain x Germany.

 

I was supporting Spain (because Portugal was already eliminated). The interesting part is that the invitation was to watch the game.... at the German Embassy 

 

So I watched the game in the middle of all the germans, drank their beer, got some nice pretzels that they offered me, and then... celebrated spanish victory haha  

[OlympicsFan 858]

9 hours ago, thepharoah said:

These teams didn't succeed to make it to Semis because they were simply not good enough and only Germany and Argentina had good results in their last major tournaments before WC out of this group , yet Croatia and England qualifying to Semis were big surprise but this's always WC,  for me Russia 2018 was simply amazing many matches to remember Spain Vs. Portugal, France Vs.  Argentina,  Belgium Vs.  Japan,  Belgium Vs.  Brazil,  Croatia Vs.  Russia,  Croatia Vs.  Argentina,  Croatia Vs.  England, Germany Vs. Sweden,  Germany Vs.  Korea, Uruguay Vs. Portugal and many others also it was one of the balanced WCs ever because almost each team participating except 2 or 3 teams had world class player(s) something like WC in 1994 

I guess we won't agree. For me it was a really boring world cup. Russia wasn't doing a bad job as a host, but for me it is always better to have a world cup in a country with a lot of tradition and in addition to that after the group stage it was already more than obvious that France would win the tournament (because none of the other major countries were at their best), so there was never really any excitement.

 

You also seem to have a very interesting definition of "world class players". Which of the following teams had at least one world class player?

 

Russia

Saudi Arabia

Iran

Morocco

Peru

Australia

Nigeria

Iceland

Switzerland

Serbia

Costa Rica

Sweden

Mexico

Tunisia

Panama

Japan

 

In my opinion the absence of Italy, Chile and the Netherlands also didn't help the overall quality.

[SalamAkhi 317]

2 hours ago, OlympicsFan said:

I guess we won't agree. For me it was a really boring world cup. Russia wasn't doing a bad job as a host, but for me it is always better to have a world cup in a country with a lot of tradition and in addition to that after the group stage it was already more than obvious that France would win the tournament (because none of the other major countries were at their best), so there was never really any excitement.

 

Yes it was really obvious after the IMPRESSIVE French performance in the group stage 

You're obviously demonstrating the concept of teleological bias  Analysing facts as a function of the already known ending of the story.

You know that France won, you think that this tournament was boring (partly because Germany was eliminated early) so you argue that it was destined to be and that everyone should come to this idea. Except it was not.

The fact that major countries were not at their best is not an explanation. As you say it, I understand that only big countries can win and if all but one are eliminated then the only that remains is already assured of winning  But Belgium or Croatia also can be strong and have the potential to go all the way.

[thepharoah 2,405]

3 hours ago, OlympicsFan said:

I guess we won't agree. For me it was a really boring world cup. Russia wasn't doing a bad job as a host, but for me it is always better to have a world cup in a country with a lot of tradition and in addition to that after the group stage it was already more than obvious that France would win the tournament (because none of the other major countries were at their best), so there was never really any excitement.

 

You also seem to have a very interesting definition of "world class players". Which of the following teams had at least one world class player?

 

Russia

Saudi Arabia

Iran

Morocco

Peru

Australia

Nigeria

Iceland

Switzerland

Serbia

Costa Rica

Sweden

Mexico

Tunisia

Panama

Japan

 

In my opinion the absence of Italy, Chile and the Netherlands also didn't help the overall quality.

 

Costa Rica : Navas the goalkeeper for Real Madrid for years

, Morocco : Zeyach one of the best players in dutch league and benatia ex bayern and was a juve player at this moment

 Russia : Denis Cheyshev former Real player and a very good player at Villareal

 Australia : without a doubt Tim Cahill even if he's a substitute and old but he's still a big figure for the Australian team

 Peru : Rafael Guerrero : ofc he's a world class player and very well known in Europe after his years in Germany and farfan as well

 Nigeria : Alex Iwobi and Ahmed Musa IMO is a very good player

 Iceland : Sigurdsson on of Everton main stars for years so he's definitely a real god player

 Switzerland : Shaqiri ofc , Xhaka is also a good player and a defender played for years in Juve Stephan Lichtsteiner

 Serbia : Kolarov a very famous player that played for years in Lazio and Man City and Mitrovic a previous star in NewCastle

 Sweden : Emil Forsberg one of the stars in Bundesliga and Leipzig 

 Mexico : Chicharito ofc

 Japan : Honda , Kagawa , okazaki very well known players abroad

 Iran : Azmoun is somehow known in Europe and he's a high quality player in Russia

 Tunisia : Wahbi khazri one of the well known players in France

 KSA and Panama nothing 

Edited April 8, 2020 by thepharoah

[LDOG 2,418]

Eh I thought Brazil was going to win the cup..

 

I still don't know how they lost that game with Belgium, they had just so many chances.

 

France wasn't that good in the groups, they played a fine game with Peru, were unconvincing with Australia, and had a joke game in the last one. 

 

 

About the world cup in itself, I didn't enjoy the large amount of penalties, own goals, etc early on. There were nice knockout games though. It was the opposite of 2014 which had awesome groups but was not great after that.

[OlympicsFan 858]

3 hours ago, thepharoah said:

 

Costa Rica : Navas the goalkeeper for Real Madrid for years

, Morocco : Zeyach one of the best players in dutch league and benatia ex bayern and was a juve player at this moment

 Russia : Denis Cheyshev former Real player and a very good player at Villareal

 Australia : without a doubt Tim Cahill even if he's a substitute and old but he's still a big figure for the Australian team

 Peru : Rafael Guerrero : ofc he's a world class player and very well known in Europe after his years in Germany and farfan as well

 Nigeria : Alex Iwobi and Ahmed Musa IMO is a very good player

 Iceland : Sigurdsson on of Everton main stars for years so he's definitely a real god player

 Switzerland : Shaqiri ofc , Xhaka is also a good player and a defender played for years in Juve Stephan Lichtsteiner

 Serbia : Kolarov a very famous player that played for years in Lazio and Man City and Mitrovic a previous star in NewCastle

 Sweden : Emil Forsberg one of the stars in Bundesliga and Leipzig 

 Mexico : Chicharito ofc

 Japan : Honda , Kagawa , okazaki very well known players abroad

 Iran : Azmoun is somehow known in Europe and he's a high quality player in Russia

 Tunisia : Wahbi khazri one of the well known players in France

 KSA and Panama nothing 

Sorry, but there is EXACTLY ONE player on that list who might have been world class in 2018: Keylor Navas

Kagawa and Chicharito were world-class a long time ago (maybe Lichtsteiner and Kolarov too)

Ziyech was world-class last season, but this was the only season when he ever was world class

If this is your definition of world-class, then there are probably a couple thousand world-class players ...