Football Thread

[Mingle]

How can a country of 3 million be so good in sport?? Croatia is good in mma. Kickboxing. Football and Basketball

Tennis and water polo too.

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[Thambi]

How can a country of 3 million be so good in sport?? Croatia is good in mma. Kickboxing. Football and Basketball

croatia raises no failures.

[grecoroman]

Tennis and water polo too.

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Croatia doesn't have good tennis players!! Only serbia has good tennis players (Djokovic)

[Mingle]

Croatia doesn't have good tennis players!! Only serbia has good tennis players (Djokovic)

Do you follow tennis at all? You've never heard of Čilić or Karlović?

[Mingle]

No one reaches world class category without working for it. You think talent finds a way for everything, but it's a myth.

100% agreed! There is no such thing as "natural talent". Messi has been playing football since he could walk, competitive football since he was 6, and was part of La Masia before he even became a teenager. Not to mention that he is from a country which has an extremely high quality of football. It sounds like he trained/played like a monster to get to where he is. Same with Ronaldo too of course. Football is a sport invented by man, you can't have a "natural talent" for something like that.

Your genetics help you in some ways (only to a degree) such as speed and endurance, but it isn't enough to get you anywhere close to Messi. Messi is a result of pure lifelong hard work, passion, and dedication.

The reason many people say that Messi is natural whereas Ronaldo is hard work is because of their playing styles, Messi is a better dribbler than Ronaldo. Ronaldo's shooting is a bit better though, Ronaldo is also faster/runs more. But both players are in the top tier. Nobody, past or present, comes close to them.

[Cernunnos]

How can a country of 3 million be so good in sport?? Croatia is good in mma. Kickboxing. Football and Basketball

Any Socialist or former Socialist country has that culture of showing to the world how competitive they are, former Yugoslavia was always very good at sports, they even used to rank top 10 in the Medal Count of the Summer Olympics.

The post Yugoslav countries seem to follow that tradition, I bet Croatia alone since 1992 Barcelona or 1996 Atlanta has already earned more golden medals than Portugal in all of it's history of Summer Olympics.

[Cristiano viejo]

I was zapping and casually I arrived to see the awards gala when they were going to give the prize to Modric. It was nice to see a madridista winning it.
Modric wanting to speak in Castilian touched my heart... that little pony...

[Jana]

Croatia doesn't have good tennis players!! Only serbia has good tennis players (Djokovic)

Croatia is in Davis Cup final this year with chance to win it

We already won that tournament in early 2000s, and played another final two years ago I think. Croatian male players won Wimbeldon (Ivanisevic) and US Open (Cilic), and our female player won French Open (Majoli)
Tennis have pretty strong tradition here, too.

[Sebastianus Rex]

Not being dishonest, I do support Ronaldo because he is Portuguese but also because I believe him to be the best. He is not only one of the best football players in the history of mankind, he is equally the most hated football player ever.

The question is that after 10 years of complete domination by CR and Messi, everyone seems to be eager to give those individual prizes to other players even if everyone else is still not quite on their level. They don't judge other players by the same standards as those 2. Modric scoring 1 goal and 2 assists in CL and winning the UEFA player prize is just ridiculous (CR 15 goals, 4 assists). The FIFA award is debatable, imo Modric was not even the best Croatian player in the WC.

I think both Ronaldo and Messi should have attended the ceremony. The reason they didn't is because both of them are sore losers and egoist bastards, but that's what makes them great too: they aren't happy being number two.

I agree, for the good and bad they are how they are. But if I was Ronaldo I would shit on that ceremony also, not giving him even the Puskas award for best goal of the year (of course the bycicle kick vs Juventus) just tells alot about how arbitrary the decisions were this year. Everyone talks about that goal (and will be remember for many years to come), nobody talks about that Salah goal vs Everton or whatever.

[Jana]

Bale bycicle kick in CL final was no less attractive than Ronaldo's , and it was far more important game.

Btw, again this ridiculous comparison of CMF and CF ?? lol

How many of Ronaldo's goals were created by Luka and Toni ? And yes he was best Croatian player on WC by far.

I expected more from some of you...