SimonB wrote: ↑Thu Nov 17, 2022 13:07
I see that Ghana have defeated Switzerland 2-0 in an early kickoff match today. Seems a little surprising, but I know nothing about the match except the score and the starting players. Obviously there is a danger of trying to read too much into friendly results.
It's very surprising to me. Look at Ghana's recent results:
I was expecting them to just be fodder at this World Cup. I saw them in qualifying, they were blunt up front.
Ghana will be fodder, or they'll be the surprise package. No middle ground imo. They have talent in their team, and Uruguay is a massive grudge match so they might raise their game significantly? But I have them as third likeliest African side to produce a shock after Senegal and Morocco. I give Cameroon and Tunisia little to no chance.
No, that's not a "go bet on Tunisia for the last 16 with Michael's prediction record"...
Michael S Collins wrote: ↑Thu Nov 17, 2022 20:21
Ghana will be fodder, or they'll be the surprise package. No middle ground imo. They have talent in their team, and Uruguay is a massive grudge match so they might raise their game significantly? But I have them as third likeliest African side to produce a shock after Senegal and Morocco. I give Cameroon and Tunisia little to no chance.
No, that's not a "go bet on Tunisia for the last 16 with Michael's prediction record"...
Who knows? They must be the African team with the most participations without ever producing some remarkable result, it's due.
BTW, after checking Wikipedia, it seems the only Ghanaian "survivor" from the 2010 squad will be André Ayew, who's also the captain. The responsibility to arouse the team vs Uruguay will be mostly his, I guess. From Uruguay, all four of Suárez, Cavani, Godín and Muslera repeat. Maybe Luis should recuse himself from starting in this particular match?
wannabeontop wrote: ↑Thu Nov 17, 2022 09:52
Anyone saw Poland-Chile in its entirety? How did Poland do? I only saw the goal. Nice atmosphere for a friendly. Eastern Europe
I did. Chile were by far a better team and dominated in this match. For Poland, substitutions helped a bit, but it was a very lucky win. Anyway, this is something we are already used to. I don't expect anything else at the tournament, as this style of playing is preferred by the coach.
Iceland won the Baltic Cup, in their first ever appearance as a guest nation, beating Latvia in the final on penalties. Estonia beat Lithuania in the third place match.
The Baltic Cup started in 1928 between the three Baltic nations. It was on hiatus during the years of Soviet occupation. It was revived after their independence, and is now played every two years.
In total, Latvia won it 13 times, Lithuania 10 times, and Estonia 4 times. Finland also played twice as guests, but never won it.
There is also a women’s tournament, with Estonia most success with 11 titles, while the other two both have 5 titles. The Faroe Islands also played three times as guests and won 1 title.
Potential friendlies in march.
MATCHDAY 1:
Group A: Georgia
Group B: Republic of Ireland
Group C: Ukraine
Group D: Latvia
Group E: Albania
Group F: Estonia
Group G: Hungary
MATCHDAY 2:
Group A: Cyprus
Group B: Greece
Group C: North Macedonia
Group D: Armenia
Group E: Faroe Islands
Group F: Belgium
Group G: Lithuania
30 teams went home, but Senegal still want to play football! They had a 2-2 draw with Algeria, and they're going to play Morocco tomorrow, who played a full 7 games and a friendly before the tournament!
Lorric, these friendlies are mere preparation matches for the 'B'-teams of Algeria, Senegal and Morocco for the upcoming African Nations Championship next month. Or how do you call such teams with only players from domestic leagues involved ?
Ed wrote: ↑Tue Dec 20, 2022 13:28
Lorric, these friendlies are mere preparation matches for the 'B'-teams of Algeria, Senegal and Morocco for the upcoming African Nations Championship next month. Or how do you call such teams with only players from domestic leagues involved ?
The African Nations Championship (often abbreviated as CHAN) is a tournament held every two years (between the African Cup of Nations) where teams can only field locally based players.
While in effect these teams are “B teams” (or probably even worse), all tournament matches are classified as FIFA A-friendly matches and count in the FIFA rankings (but I’m not sure whether the pre-tournament friendlies you mentioned count in the FIFA rankings).
amenina wrote: ↑Tue Dec 20, 2022 13:47
While in effect these teams are “B teams” (or probably even worse), all tournament matches are classified as FIFA A-friendly matches and count in the FIFA rankings (but I’m not sure whether the pre-tournament friendlies you mentioned count in the FIFA rankings).
Yes, that's another FIFA ranking anomaly. These matches with (for some countries) quite severe restrictions on players that can be selected for it, do count for the FIFA ranking. Strange !?
Well maybe not so strange, because for a lot of other African countries the selection for A-international NT-matches consists frequently of locally based players only (think of CHAN-participants like Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda, Madagascar, Angola, Mozambique). They can field their (almost) strongest line-up in CHAN-matches.
Preparatory friendlies of such CHAN-teams will most probably not count anyway.
Last edited by Ed on Tue Dec 20, 2022 14:08, edited 1 time in total.
