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Originally Posted by davenotdead
no, that game was bullshit. spain got way more calls. they got way more free kicks in the 2nd half, when it mattered. i have no reason to root for the dutch, aside from spain being full of chodes. everyone i watched it with, people who regularly watch the premier league, felt the same way i did.
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Thanks for noticing. Last night, in the heat of the moment, I felt exactly the same thing. In the last hour Webb was giving nearly all the 50/50s to Spain, giving a couple of soft yellows to the Dutch while similar fouls and theatre from the Spanish went unnoticed.
But imo Holland can't blame the referee for their loss. They had surely used up all their credit in the first half. Van Bommel and De Jong could've been sent-off before half-time. The only reason the ref didn't, was probably because - as !@#$%! said - it's the final and that's supposed to be an entertaining game. I'm sure Webb was told by the FIFA before the match. The Dutch took full advantage of Webb's leniency in the first half, which wasn't pretty.
By the way, I just saw that Puyol-Robben challenge back and I might have to agree with you after all. If he had gone down as easily as Iniesta did again and again, then that probably should've been a 2nd yellow for Puyol, being the last man and all. It surely wasn't any less than Heitinga's 2nd booking on Iniesta. (oh well, I'll still be rooting for you in the CL, Andres!)
Once again I don't want to sound like a sour loser,
so I can't stress this enough, Spain were the better team and well-deserved champions.
But I do have a bit of a problem with the imagery of "Beauty vs The Beast" that seemed to prevail in a lot of international media (BBC for instance) afterwards. Sure, the Dutch played it nasty, but Spain are really no saints indeed. As far as diving and complaining goes, they surely weren't outclassed by the Dutch. Remember they got opponents sent-off in their games vs Chile and Portugal too.
It might telling something that the winner of the golden ball went to a player whose team didn't reach the final.
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i understand you guys are fans of the game and want to try to remember it fondly. but the fact is that it was a shitty final to what was overall a shitty World Cup. the highlights being Uruguay with the great play of Suarez and Forlan. and almost every game that Germany played. [and I guess the US... even though the games were mostly ugly, they were very exciting]
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It was a shitty final, yes, most definitely. But then I can't remember seeing a decent world cup final in my lifetime. I guess 2002 and 1998 were alright at least. Supposedly 1982 and 1986 were really good ones, but I'm not old enough to have seen either of those.
Despite Spain's tiki-taka being pleasing to the eye, they've only scored 8 goals, so I have to agree with Germany being the best team to watch (that's quite something coming from a Dutchman!). Always disappointed about their defensive style of football in the 90s/early 00s, now they are playing attractive attacking football that is a joy to watch. I hope Loew decides to stay and they keep that going. Their midfield with Mueller, Oezil and Schweinsteiger is amazing. It's a shame I really don't like the clinical but oh so boring Miroslav Klose ("let's have another header, shall we?"), but he probably won't last that long anymore anyway.
As for Holland, I hope we'll see a more skillful player (Van der Vaart?) in the role of defensive midfielder over De Jong, who could've been sent-off already in the first game against Denmark and who broke a USA player's leg in a friendly match this March.