FIFA World Cup 2006 [R]

Ha! This in the news today:

"Several German politicians want to haul the coach of the national football team in front of a parliamentary commission.

Jürgen Klinsmann should come and explain his training methods, they say.

Representatives of social-democratic and christian-democratic colour have found each other in common indignation about the results of the German team. The Germans are not doing too well in the run-up to the world championships in their own country. [..]

"It would be good if Mister Klinsmann would unfold his concept about how he will win the world cup", said Norbert Barthle (Christian-Democrat). "I want to hear from Jürgen Klinsmann how he creates a strong basis for the team", says Reinhold Hemker (Social-Democrat).

The opposition is joining the pact. Miriam Gruss of the Free Democrats: "The world cup is of national importance. Klinsmann must stop with experimenting and inform the commission about his plans."

(My translation from Dutch)

Actually, the Bundestag soccer team (all players are members of our parliament) isn't so bad at all ... perhaps, they want a replacement?

Perhaps, Walter, but who's going to play on the left wing?

It's their team captain, Klaus Riegert, a conservative member of parliament (sometimes, Joschka Fischer relaces him on the left - their are a couple of former members/famous former members substituting the team on special occasions.

Seriously, this team always has had a better left than right wing!

Actually, Irish politics resembles our football team. No left wing to speak of, the right wingers never want to be seen on the ball and everyone crowds up the middle in the hope of confusing the opposition.

LOL, good one lmur

When's it start?

Here'a a link with the match schedules, Wilso.

Australia are in Group F.

http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com/06/en/w/schedule.html

Has anyone else finished their Germany 06 Panini sticker album?

To me, the Panini sticker album is THE signal. It's already World Cup time.

what's a panini sticker album?

This thing is a Panini World Cup sticker album. They're these books you can get which contain loads of information about the tournament, the players, the schedules, the history etc. They also have spaces throughout the booklet as each team is covered in depth for you to collect stickers of the player pictures to add into the booklet. It's a collectors hobby like any other really, you generally buy the stickers in packets which hold 6-7 randomly chosen stickers, hence the appeal of swapping etc.

I used to collect these things all the time when I was younger, as a kid we used to save up our pocket money and trade it for every sticker you could get, sometimes you end up with just a few stickers in the entire collection eluding you. I'm not sure about the Panini WC albums but for the Premiership ones they hold this event at various locations around the country for people to travel to which hold all the stickers available to allow people to try and complete their collections as well as lots of other stuff available as well. Good fun.

Oh, ok... I've seen them. But I'm a new football fan so I didn't pay much attention to them, and I didn't know they were a worldwide phenomenon.

Ah! The Panini stickers... brings me "oh so fond" memories from yesteryear. I remember my first World Cup as a rational human being: Italy 1990, at 4 years old. That, of course, was my first collectible stamp book. I didnt know a thing of the guys I was stamping, but who cared! I think I remember that Cuba was there...

Didn't buy the 2002 edition though

I must have it stored in a cardboard box.

Cuba? You sure it wasn't a baseball players album?

Oh ok... It was Costa Rica. Haha... memories...

Whoever wins, let's hope we get loads of this.....


http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6063478215160948442

Amen. We'll see a lot of Ronaldinho. I've heard from a friend that Henry doesn't perform well in international games. Is that true?

Bookmarking this, ahead of attending a game I care about SO much more, in Paris - the final of the European Champions League (Barcelona v Arsenal).

I hope that on this occasion, at least, Henry outshines and outscores Ronaldinho!

Come on you Gunners!

Seconded, Pete.

I came here becaise I suddenly realised that there may be some football fans who were interested in THIS......

http://www.able2know.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=74683

(Yes, Steve, I'll admit it...I'm still excited!)

For the Trainspotters:

The first team to set up camp in Germany was....




<<Drum>>










TOGO!!