WORLD CUP FINAL: France v Croatia, 4pm BST, BBC and ITV

[Özim]

Why do you lack the simplest ability to think in any other ways than black and white?
Giroud is not "rubbish", but he's not World Class. He's not the sort of player who will drag you to a title, or a World Cup.
As a squad player he did a good job for us, he scored a load of goals coming off the bench.

I don't rate the guy, went missing too often, went long spells without scoring goals, he scored the odd spectacular goal I'll grant you that, but just not my kind of player.

Good job is debatable, I think he missed key chances that cost us personally and when we needed him the most he usually went missing. Not his fault of course he can't help that's he's very limited, but just should have never been anywhere near this club IMO, somehow we manage to pick the players from small clubs who never amount to anything most of the time.

[Letters]

I don't rate the guy.

Noted.

[Mac76]

By whom and to what end?

maybe i didn't really mean it...?

[Letters]

Maybe. But when it's just a string of words on a computer screen it's not easy to tell.

[Mac76]

Don't really agree with this, Croatia did well in the first half, penalty for me was a tough one could have gone either way, he seemed to stick out his hand, but then it was also close. 2nd half France controlled it and had 2-3 more opportunities they should have scored, Croatia only scored through luck when Loris made a mess of it when France were cruising.

Best side (on the day and in terms of quality) won, I agree with MO their side of the draw was easy no big teams at all in the knockouts, that's unheard of in the World Cup, in all honesty they laboured through that side of the draw, even England could have beaten them if they'd put their chances away in the 1st half when they were on top.

They did well and all that but no doubt the better team won on the day, more quality, more goal threat, more chances.

"more quality" - maybe on overall quality of the side, but take out Mbappe and Croatia's players weren't far off - not just Modric but Strinic, Rakitic, and many others really stepped up though i would admit they wasted some chances

"more goal threat" - no, not until they went 2-1 up thanks to the ref and they could then pick off Croatia on the break

"more chances" - ditto the above

anyway if England had pubbed their way to the title most of you would have said 'we deserved to win, we won through on the day' even though France woudl have been far the better team, so why is it that when it's Croatia that doesn't count for anything and it's all 'oh well France is the better team so that's that'?

Tell you what, why bother holding a tournament, why not just get a panel to assess the quality of each player in every squad and award the trophy to the one that's most highly rated????

[Özim]

"more quality" - maybe on overall quality of the side, but take out Mbappe and Croatia's players weren't far off - not just Modric but Strinic, Rakitic, and many others really stepped up though i would admit they wasted some chances

"more goal threat" - no, not until they went 2-1 up thanks to the ref and they could then pick off Croatia on the break

"more chances" - ditto the above

anyway if England had pubbed their way to the title most of you would have said 'we deserved to win, we won through on the day' even though France woudl have been far the better team, so why is it that when it's Croatia that doesn't count for anything and it's all 'oh well France is the better team so that's that'?

Tell you what, why bother holding a tournament, why not just get a panel to assess the quality of each player in every squad and award the trophy to the one that's most highly rated????

France have so much quality, look at some of the players they have, yes Mbappe is outstanding but they also have Griezmann, Kante, Pogba, Varane, Mendy, Matuidi, Dembele, Lemar, Fekir, Loris ignoring Payet who was injured and the others who weren't picked!

Doesn't matter when the goal threat came, a game is 90 minutes, France came out in the 2nd half and controlled the game and won it fairly easily in the end, they missed a 2-3 chances they were casual with that you'd expect them to put away if they weren't cruising as well, Croatia barely had a sniff in the 2nd half.

England were never going to win it, they might have got to the final because of the favourable draw but in the final they would have lost, everyone knew the winner would come from the other side of the draw.

Croatia had a good run, worked hard and did well to get to the final, for me though the game against England showed that whilst they're a good side they aren't a top side, they have a few standout players (all into or almost into their 30s) but lack a real goal threat.

[Letters]

Ok. OK. This is a sentence I don't think I've ever typed before and didn't think I'd ever have cause to, but...
Zim is right.

France were the best side in this tournament, they had a tough route to the final and had England stumbled their way through to the final France would have torn us apart.
England aren't a top side. We were better than I expected us to be and I actually enjoyed watching us play. But the draw did open up for us, had we played anyone that good before the semi-final we wouldn't have reached it.

Slightly changing tack, it's a complete joke that Kane got the Golden Boot. Half of them were penalties. He wasn't a standout player of the tournament, he wasn't even a standout player in the England Squad (Trippier and Pickford, for me)

[GP]

Ok. OK. This is a sentence I don't think I've ever typed before and didn't think I'd ever have cause to, but...
Zim is right.

France were the best side in this tournament, they had a tough route to the final and had England stumbled their way through to the final France would have torn us apart.
England aren't a top side. We were better than I expected us to be and I actually enjoyed watching us play. But the draw did open up for us, had we played anyone that good before the semi-final we wouldn't have reached it.

Slightly changing tack, it's a complete joke that Kane got the Golden Boot. Half of them were penalties. He wasn't a standout player of the tournament, he wasn't even a standout player in the England Squad (Trippier and Pickford, for me)

Worst golden boot ever.

[Letters]

Worst golden boot ever.

By a mile. He really wasn't that good in this tournament.

[Özim]

Ok. OK. This is a sentence I don't think I've ever typed before and didn't think I'd ever have cause to, but...
Zim is right.

France were the best side in this tournament, they had a tough route to the final and had England stumbled their way through to the final France would have torn us apart.
England aren't a top side. We were better than I expected us to be and I actually enjoyed watching us play. But the draw did open up for us, had we played anyone that good before the semi-final we wouldn't have reached it.

Slightly changing tack, it's a complete joke that Kane got the Golden Boot. Half of them were penalties. He wasn't a standout player of the tournament, he wasn't even a standout player in the England Squad (Trippier and Pickford, for me)

Oddly enough, I agree about Kane!

I know they all count, but most of them were against Panama who were terrible and probably the worst team in the tournament. Penalties are an odd one as clearly they're easier to score than most goals, but I guess you can't discount them totally. Maybe they should have a rule where either they only count if you won them yourself (as in the player that scores them won them) or that only the person that wins it can take the penalty.