** World Cup 2026 - USA, Canada, Mexico Thread **

lol

Damn, I was looking forward to this France v Norway game but there's 10 changes from Norway including Haaland and Odegaard to the bench. Looks like they are accepting 2nd. Skull.emoji.

Resting players is probably the right decision from Norway, given the circumstances. It's a problem with groups of four. Bummer for those who shelled out hundreds of dollars to end up watching Norway's second XI.

yeah doesn't seem like it matters

somehow beat france and you still probably get germany r16
finish 2nd play ivory coast and then probably brazil r16

might as well just rest up

i guess senegal/iraq could be fun because both need to win and score as many goals as possible

Maybe it's just me, but I think rest will be huge as this tourney will be an absolute gauntlet of matches, with most in hot weather. As such, if I'm Deschamps, then not a single one of my players would've gone more than 180 group minutes. Especially now when you're for sure through and the 2 paths are very close in difficulty.

I'm actually kinda shocked that Norway's manager understands that point, but not surprised in the least that Deschamps is too stupid.

5 France shots on target first 10 min. Game might be very exciting to watch but for different reason lol.

Red for Iraq. Rip

Oof, shirt pull on Mane who was clear on goal.

Gonna be red.

Norway defense not understanding it's not a good idea to let Dembele shoot.

Reminds me of Argentina's first game when Messi had all the time in the world to take a shot.

At least we got a Norway goal. Wonder if he will even bother bringing Haaland and Odegaard on.

Doubt it. They would have started if they were going to play imo.

Norway isn't very deep so they have more to lose if they get injured.

Dembele wants the golden boot too.

The fans at least are getting an opportunity to see a lot of goals.

ET OUSMANE BALLON D'OR

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another idiot who prioritizes aura over scoring a peno - the success rate of those kind of pens is so low yet any randoms keep trying to imitate it because it was cool when neymar & hazard were doing it

It was lol bad. Switched to Senegal Iraq where Iraq have had to sub in their 2nd choice keeper as well as being 10 men down.

Penalties are game theory.

Hazard and Neymar were early adopters of the stutter step, and had great success with it.

Then hordes of other players copied it, like Ramos, Jorginho, Bruno Fernandes, Lewandowski, etc...

Now keepers expect it, so it's less effective. They know you're sacrificing power and accuracy by stutter stepping.

Just picking a corner and kicking it hard is once again more effective, as that punishes keepers who don't dive early. Victor Gyokeres has scored how many in a row now? Over 20 I think?

In theory, both strategies should work as long as some keepers dive early and some don't.

Been watching the Senegal game cause they're playing for something. They were kinda awful for 50 min and then scored 2 in 2 min. Might score 2 more the way this is going now.

That's bad news for Korea.

Senegal just moved ahead of them.

27! Our striker! Top scorer next season.

The luxury of subbing Olise and Dembele to bring on Cherki and Barcola. Man what a team.

It would be lol if Norway got knocked out by Ivory Coast after throwing this match to play them next.

Are they really doing it to play Ivory Coast, or is it just that they don't think the difference between playing Ivory Coast and Sweden is worth going all-out against France?

SEN taking IRQ to the woodshed

this is something else

Yeah agreed it's likely not specifically for the Ivory Coast. I'd guess it's just to rest players and maybe for a specific side of the draw overall.

It would still be funny though. They've definitely thrown this game.

This is shooting practice for Senegal.

3 hrs for the next games damn