Could've called that...

In a lot of people's eyes, America have done very well for themselves this World Cup. They held their own and played possative football.

You really think so? I'm so used to seeing us fail at this that I can't really tell what's good and what isn't. I also don't know enough about the sport or pay enough attention to it to determine this, either. I almost always expect to get mocked in some way or another when it comes to this, especially by the other nations, that I've almost given up entirely on hoping for any sense of respect in the eyes of the rest of the world.

That you think we've done well is encouraging and makes me feel a little better about the whole thing. I mean, it's like... sure we got further this time than we have in a long while, but it doesn't really matter in the face of all the mess ups we've had in the first half of almost every game played. I just wish we could be solid throughout; then I could have confidence that we really did our best.

That being said, we did MUCH better this time around than in 2006, so I guess I shouldn't complain too much, haha.

USA have done well. Don't forget that they topped the group, which was unexpected. They were unlucky against Ghana I thought. Could have gone either way.

No one is going to be laughing at the USA. It's much more satisfying to laugh at the failures of France and Italy.

I've been smug for days over Italy and France.

Earlier on, I even smiled. When no one was looking.

Uruguay look good. Suarez and Forlorn is a strike partnership that most countries would long for.

So we performed unusually well, got our fans' hopes up and bombed at the last minute? Welcome to Philadel--

Oh.

Hopefully some of this losing will rub off on the Yankees tonight!

I'm sometimes accused of looking down on Americans, so I suppose I can't miss an opportunity to state it: the US played an excellent tournament. This last match was touch and go. It could easily have gone their way.

Yeah, agree. I hate everything about the US out of habit :p, but they did have a very good tournament. Lots of positive and very good football. When things worked in the team, it was really fun to watch. Positive football.. as in creative and team-oriented. Wish more teams played like that.

Wow. I really appreciate all the kind words here. Thanks! I expect that you'd all understand our position better than we do, especially since it's been established that America as a whole really doesn't pay enough attention to this to know it ourselves, so all the praise helps me to understand it better as well as lose the frustration and whatever else I was feeling yesterday.

Truth be told, I was really in a horrible mood to begin with yesterday, so that undoubtedly affected my attitude after watching the game, so I do feel a bit bad about coming off so negatively (though I often am negative about this sort of thing... It's a really bad habit I need to break. Seriously).

I don't know if I expected us to get to the final. Probably not in all honesty, but I was at least hoping we'd get to the quarters. And, well, as I said earlier, my sheer ignorance on how much our team stacks up against the rest of the world also likely contributed to my feelings on the turnout.

In any case, I feel a lot better about it now. I didn't really even think about Italy and France, though that's not surprising because I really haven't paid much attention to the rest of what's been happening. I guess anything really can happen with this.

On that note, I never really expected England to lose, or at least not as badly as they did. I was really hoping I'd be wrong when I made that prediction, but there you go I guess. I even dreamt that they'd win 1-0, which is kind of funny. I guess it also shows that when it comes to bad calls, the refs aren't as seemingly biased as circumstance once made me think. =P

Think I'll stop predicting now, though. I'm afraid of being right now. XD

Haha. Yeah, that's exactly how I feel. Most of the teams I wanted to win so far have lost, too (I also wanted Mexico to win). I'm still pulling for Spain, but they're facing Portugal, and Portugal has historically (in my opinion anyway) been very good.

Maybe these instances with England and Argentina will finally get FIFA to wake up and allow video technology. If that happens, we can at least feel better that something good came of these mistakes.

I don't want to say much about England's actual performance since, well, I don't feel like I should be judging these sorts of things. Though I will say that it looked as if they'd just sort of gaven up during the second half and it was rather sad to watch.

Maybe next year I'll be off from work and will have the time to watch the World Cup. I do find soccer/football to be an interesting sport, actually, moreso than hockey and even American football. I'm just not big on watching sporting events unless there's a crew of people around me or I have some expectation that it'll arm me well for water cooler conversation the next day... and there are no water coolers around here. The sport that I do tend to watch the most around here is NBA basketball, which I quite enjoy when my schedule permits it... but even basketball can be a dull game if the team seems to have given up on things or if they're not fairly evenly matched.

I had USA losing to South Korea next round. I'M DOING SO WELL THUS FAR, AREN'T I?

At least I didn't bet any money this year.

I hate everything about the US out of habit :p

Um, thanks.

I tend to hate a lot of things about the US out of experience, but home is home.

Hey, so long as I can strike killer deals on video games on my annual visit, the US is okay in my book!

Um, thanks.

Sorry, running joke. Things are a lot better now that I'm not involved in politics any more. :p