Ah come on, Hieronymous. You know the people gloating at Italy aren't exacgtly the most partisan of England fans. Join the party. Tuck into some olives. It would be rude and anti-social not to.

Good God. A limited side who lack guile because they just don't have the players, attempt to play to their strengths by containing the opposition, and they're held up as some evil force and a blot on the beautiful game.

People here need to get over themselves.

And don't give me any guff over Di Natale. He's not the only person in this tournament to attempt to cheat the game.

E10 Rifle wrote:

QUOTE:
Ah come on, Hieronymous. You know the people gloating at Italy aren't exacgtly the most partisan of England fans. Join the party. Tuck into some olives. It would be rude and anti-social not to.

Nah, I'm not buying into this one. The Italian national team are a totally different animal from what Serie A has become. What little good football there was in the last World Cup, they provided a big chunk of it against Germany and Ghana and the Czech Republic.

Let's not kid ourselves here. As if Spain don't ever dive, or didn't execute any dives tonight, or haven't been renowned for diving over the years. And on the only occasion that they have ever got anywhere in a tournament in modern times (1984), they did it by brutally hacking the shit out of superior, more talented teams like Denmark and West Germany. The only reason that someone like Victor Munoz doesn't have the same reputation in the English-speaking world as Claudio Gentile is because Euro 84 wasn't televised in Britain.

Italy had to play a deep-lying game tonight because Pirlo wasn't there. In earlier matches they attacked, specifically against Romania and France, and also in patches against the Dutch. But even if they had played Arshavin-style football in all their matches there would still be people on here willing them to lose. That's fine, we all have our own prejudices, but don't dress it up as some kind of moral crusade. If you were making a league table of entertaining football at Euro 2008, Italy would be about 7th out of 16.

QUOTE:
What little good football there was in the last World Cup

I think Argentina, and even Germany, might have things to say about that - not to mention the role played by Italy's other actual opponents whom you mention.

But of course there's prejudices kicking in, based on the times Italy have been negative and nasty and thrived, notably in 94 and - to a slightly lesser extent - 2000. These things linger, just as Greece's negative triumph four years ago did after all eh?

I have to laugh at the sight of English posters slagging off Italy for being too craven and shit.

I'm an English poster ? I'm an English supporter ?

BWWWWAAAAAAAAAAAAA HAAAAAAA HAAAAAAAA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Here's what I heard from H of H's post:

Blah, blah'h blah blahing blahto blah blah. Blah Blahian blah blah blah blahhy blah blah blah blah Blahblah Blah blah blah blah. Blah blahblah blah blah blah blah blah blah Blah Blah, balh blah blah blah of it blah blah Blahblah and Blahblah and Blahblah.

Blah'h blah blah blah blah. Blah blahblahblah (1984) blahblah 7 of 16 blahblahblah.

Fuck that shit. Italy sucks, they've sucked since Baggio left, and they suck and they suck.

I wasn't talking about you.

I didn't read your post, I just saw a load of song lyrics in bold type and skimmed past it.

OTF has gone to pot.

OTF is smokin pot tonight.

And I do find it slightly odd that HofH wouldn't countenance any excuse for a very limited Greece squad being cautious and defensive four years ago, yet when an alltogether more talented and varied Italy squad loses one player their lack of adventure is OK.

You're not seriously comparing the way Italy have played in this tournament, over their four games, to the way Greece played in 2004?

Euro 2004 was a strange tournament. At least 6 teams in that tournie were capable of beating Greece, but due to superior tactics (mostly defensive) and a bit of luck, they managed to squeeze past teams they really shouldn't have.

It'd be like Barnsley beating Chelsea and Liverpool thru sheer strength of character. Oh hang on, didn't......

QUOTE:
You know, Schadenfreude is never as rhetorically impressive as people want to believe it is

I think most people just think it's enjoyable and don't do it for external reasons. It's taking pleasure in others' misfortune, not taking pleasure in others misfortune in order to impress others.

BurroMajorca wrote:

QUOTE:
You know, Schadenfreude is never as rhetorically impressive as people want to believe it is.

You really want that pomposity award this year, don't you?

NetzerHölzenbeinHrubesch wrote:

QUOTE:

QUOTE:
You know, Schadenfreude is never as rhetorically impressive as people want to believe it is

I think most people just think it's enjoyable and don't do it for external reasons. It's taking pleasure in others' misfortune, not taking pleasure in others misfortune in order to impress others.

No, sorry, posting something in a chatroom is by definition done for external reasons.

Juallaterpe wrote:

QUOTE:
BurroMajorca wrote:

QUOTE:
You know, Schadenfreude is never as rhetorically impressive as people want to believe it is.

You really want that pomposity award this year, don't you?

If I affected not to seek it, would that seem pompous enough to make me more likely to get it?

Nah, it would just look like you were trying to fit in with the rest of us . . .