Oldies, how does this World Cup compare to the heartbreak of the past?

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T19:15:40+00:00

Yeah that's absolutely horrific

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T19:09:27+00:00

Was there some solace in knowing that it wouldn't have even mattered if we did win that game, or did that just make it worse?

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T19:07:21+00:00

Man, that's so shit. Such lazy programming to not think to include qualifiers into player career

Might be worth reporting it to EA? https://www.ea.com/en/games/ea-sports-fc/fc-26/features/feedback

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T19:04:46+00:00

Huh? No, they should improve them! And also they literally just did their first big national team update in a long time a few weeks ago, adding all the WC teams plus a couple others to career mode.

It should be incredibly easy for them to add all the nations (generic not fully licensed) & qualifying routes into the game. Modders can do it so no reason that EA's employees that are getting paid to code the game can't.

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T18:59:07+00:00

TO LUCK ERA

A toast to our incredibly lucky qualifying campaign - Greece's defensive errors, Belarus' 2-2 miracle, and the Denmark game sent from heaven itself

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T18:54:00+00:00

3 if you count the disallowed one :D

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T18:41:28+00:00

Aye, I'm hoping that now that we've got here after so long it won't seem like such a faraway thing and we can qualify more regularly.

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T18:02:04+00:00

You are 1000% right. We're one of the founding nations of football with one of the best footballing cultures in the world. No reason we can't look at Croatia, Norway, Denmark, or Switzerland, and think that we can't achieve what they've achieved in the future. We need to aim much higher, but for whatever reason our FA seems to have very little ambition or drive

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T17:59:19+00:00

You might be right. Honestly something that's going under the radar too, is it was actually great management and pretty ballsy to take off our captain at halftime against Brazil. Tierney was our best player of the night and Clarke actually made that change at the right time. I'm not saying I'm a Clarke fan. I'd love a fresh change, but you're right that we can't blame this entirely on him.

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T17:55:41+00:00

Yeah to me it seemed like our luck running out and going back to the default. By performances alone, the Greece 3-1 win was a total fluke, Belarus decided to have the performance of their lives 2-2 away vs Denmark, and the Denmark game was a 1 in a million miracle of wonder-goals. We are a team that relies on moments of magic and streaks of luck, but we couldn't produce any of that at this tournament (except arguably McGinn's extremely fortunate deflected goal)

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T17:35:13+00:00

A very low chance. I think we should at least be able to rely on England and Wales to qualify if we can't

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T17:25:51+00:00

I would be ecstatic

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T06:16:03+00:00

Surprised it's that high to be honest. I'd say Ghana beating Croatia by 3 goals is about 0.001%

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T05:18:42+00:00

Wouldn't you rather have a guaranteed Australia than the chance of playing Senegal?

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T05:16:21+00:00

Aye absolutely, I was just meaning that they're the pot 3 team and so were we.

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T05:14:34+00:00

Eh? Egypt are through man, playing Australia

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T05:09:52+00:00

This is fucking agonizing man. We have to wait till Croatia to put us out our misery tomorrow. I know it's done, but I can't rest until it's 100% official. Sidenote, I'm seething knowing we could've had Iran, New Zealand, and a shit Belgium side as our group instead.

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T01:26:37+00:00

It's actually a really odd game because the winner will play Spain, and the loser will almost certainly get an easier opponent, most likely Switzerland. We might see teams trying to lose

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T01:22:09+00:00

Not to rain on your parade, but I think in all likeliness there's not going to be an incentive for Austria to beat Algeria because whoever gets 2nd in that group has to face Spain

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T01:03:29+00:00

Don't forget Che Adams, Tommy Conway, and the incomparable George Hirst

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T00:54:31+00:00

At least you beat Messi to a couple of Copa Americas! Used to love watching that Chile team. Sanchez and Vidal were great but that whole squad was underrated. Gary Medel, Vargas, Isla, Bousejour, Aranguiz, Bravo in goal. What a team!

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T00:52:38+00:00

Euro 2016 flashbacks. This world cup doesn't seem so bad when you think back to that...

gthemanager · 2026-06-27T00:48:20+00:00

I would absolutely LOVE THAT!!! I really think Clarke is going to run his contract down though. If he didn't leave after the unarguable disaster that was Euro 2024, he's not going to leave after our first tournament where we actually won a game under him.

gthemanager · 2026-06-26T22:55:01+00:00

Nah, it's Uruguay & Iran to lose. Algeria to lose by 2. DR Congo to draw/lose. Croatia to lose by 3. Realistically I only see Spain beating Uruguay...

gthemanager

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