Ork1927

Potentially gone from boring one sided World Cup final to one of the best ever as who knows what could happen now. Any scenario - score seems possible.

The answer is yes

A wild ‘contest’ appears. Can the World Cup of great twisty endings deliver for the last time?

Also now scored same amount of goals as Pele in the World Cup (12).

So 20 odd minutes gone and Mess has broken the World Cup appearance record, become the first player to score in every round in the same World Cup and is currently taking home the Golden boot.

Not the best day for Cardiff today -should have been out of sight at half time against a poor Blackpool team, then our former mega flop, Gary Madine gets their equaliser and we were lucky they didn’t make the long drive north with all 3 points. And we are now confirmed to be under a transfer embargo as Tan refuses to pay up for Sala despite us losing all the appeals.

Wasn't the original plan for it to be in the summer which I'm sure the players will be happy about as a load more club games that are glorified friendlies in the summer is just what they'll want.

What a fucking idiot - he has decided 4 groups are actually good because this time round, less teams won the first two games. I’m sure they’ll be just as good if he keeps them for 2026 when 1st, 2nd and 8 of the 12 3rd place teams can go through so we can all enjoy a confusing mess in the final few groups trying to figure out who might go through and a likely lack of any sort of jeopardy for the big teams.

Avatar 2 Long review in its own thread. Very short version - looks lovely, I engaged with it and really enjoyed it and didn’t actually find it too long(?!) Somewhere between 3.5 and 4 stars/5

I’m just out of Avatar 2. Haven’t seen the first one since it’s original cinema release and was pretty much ‘meh’. Never got round to showing my kids the original and not knowing if we find the time to watch it before Christmas (or they want to go and see what the sequel if they didn’t like the first), I went to a 9am screening this morning at Cineworld because why not. 3D but not super screen as the heatings broke, but a decent sized screen. Only me and one other guy in there. I assumed I’d start my review with ‘obviously it’s too long’, but while it could obviously have been trimmed down, it didn’t drag at all and it was always moving forward/every scene (while sometimes long) had a purpose. Cons - dialogue/narration is a bit ropey at first, but you sort of tune it out. You don’t need to have seen the first one recently (or maybe even at all), but it might be worth watching a quick recap. Occasionally the CGI speeds up a bit and it looks a bit jarring or you can’t entirely follow who is who - but that’s an exception. If by the half way mark, you aren’t engaged with the characters (and creatures) then the rest of it is going to continue to be a real slog. However, pros... I really enjoyed it. It looks great. The sea and its creatures are fantastic and there isn’t bits where you miss plot because you are looking at fish, but there are long scenes where you are supposed to just be looking at fish. The plot is pretty clear and established early on. There is enough characterisation of the main cast that you care about them and crucially their creatures. The bad guys are bad enough so when the third act rolls around their are stakes and you are invested in the outcome. Third act is a little dragged out, but easily one of the best for a few years in a blockbuster. Obviously CGI heavy, but it’s well done and much better than say BP2. Im not sure if it’s 3.5 or 4 stars, but I will go and see it again if the kids want to watch it and I’m now looking forward to seeing what happens with the 3rd one. For me it’s his best film since T2, but I have no affection for True Lies.

I think I’m willing Morocco to score more than I was Kane on Saturday.

Problem here is like previous rounds - Morocco look really good and you are screaming for them to score or shoot, but this time they are 1-0 down not 1-0 up

Messi breaks the record for most games played in the World Cup on Sunday after equalling it last night with Lothar Matthaus (25 games each). Its going to be an intriguing final whatever happens tonight Messi's last dance vs the first African team to reach the final or vs the defending champions (with Messi vs Mbappe golden boot as well).

It’s going to be France battering Morocco tomorrow and then Messi getting injured early on in the final and France winning a bad tempered, roll around on the floor final 1-0 to ensure no-one is happy bar the French.

Who knows in the World Cup but given Argentina have just broke twice and scored twice on the trot and they are going to get loads more breaks in second half then I can’t see it either.

5 stars from Empire but the review doesn’t entirely read like a 5 star review . They also echo one of those tweets from earlier in the week that you might get distracted looking at fish and miss plot points. It does sound like you HAVE to go best screen possible and if you aren’t quickly wowed by the visuals on a decent screen then it’s going to be a very long 3 hours.

My kids still haven’t watched first one and I dunno when we’d fit the 3 hours plus trip in over Christmas anyway so I was going to go to an early morning show Friday to get it seen. But Cardiff Cineworld is shut due to heating issues plus train strike if it does reopen so I dunno now. Want to go see it as I’ve seen pretty much everything else at the cinema this year, but that long runtime is a real pain especially as it seems pointless to not see it on a decent sized screen.

I meant to write about this when I saw it at the cinema a while ago - but agree that it was really good.

I think - as the 48 team Word Cup appears set in stone then the 16 3rd place teams that get knocked out should go into a World 'Trophy' knockout - scrap the 3rd/4th place game in the World Cup and play the trophy final in its place the day before the final. That way - all the qualifying teams still get 3 games as opposed to 2. Not the best idea I know, but one of the main problems with this 48 team thing is team potentially get to the World Cup - play the first 2 games and get knocked out even if they don't lose both games while sitting in their hotel watching the other two teams play the third group game.

Everyone on the Morocco train now??

Surely not.

Kane’s going to end up breaking the record against something like Malta away now in the Euro qualifiers and will probably just have a cry remembering when he should have broken it.

This will be a new way for us to go out with penalties involved.

So will it be a third 1/4 final with an injury time equaliser to go to extra time??

Kane scoring or Loris saving it or it hitting the post I wouldn’t have bet against, but no way did I think he’d sky it.