this post was submitted on 05 Jul 2026
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submitted 17 hours ago* (last edited 17 hours ago) by Faithless@lemmy.world to c/world@lemmy.world
 

So.. after the ridiculous peace prize trump is now even forcing FIFA to manipulate the game in their favour.

If Europe had any balls we would just go home and start a new organisation to replace the corrupt FIFA. We should have never even accepted to play in trumpistan

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[–] SwingingTheLamp@piefed.zip 63 points 16 hours ago (4 children)

What a shitty thing to do to the U.S. team. Now, there's no way that they can have a clean victory, if they win. It's tainted with the smell of corruption.

[–] MrNesser@lemmy.world 2 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago)

I'm forseeing boos the next time the US team gets on the field, no fan present will accept this.

The only way to salvage this is to keep Balogun on the bench.

[–] fizzle@quokk.au 43 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

A concept completely lost on Trump.

[–] tacoplease@lemmy.world 8 points 11 hours ago

A concept normal to Trump

[–] justOnePersistentKbinPlease@fedia.io 17 points 16 hours ago (2 children)

The US should have no path to victory.

That they made it this far has everything to do with biased picks for the initial rounds.

Canada, US and Mexico were all all but guaranteed to get into the round of 32, the US was functionally guaranteed to get into the round of 16.

[–] LincolnsDogFido@lemmy.zip 7 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

I'm going to preface this with a disclaimer that I despise the capitalism and fascism the United States government and by extension a significant portion of our population currently represents.

But your take is just biased opinion of hatred for the current administration or our bandwagon of ignorant fans that have no respect for the game. Anyone who watches world football knows that this United States team is undeniably talented. Are they France, England, Spain, Argentina in terms of pitch to bench talent? No. There's more technical ability on all of those teams, but the U.S. almost certainly has more fitness and athleticism than all of them and enough talent to use it to our advantage. This isn't the U.S. of decades past. They have a legitimate chance at making the semi finals where I'd predict we would be knocked out by France. This American squad is legitimately very good. We beat Paraguay handily 4-1 and it wasn't as close as the score suggests. That same Paraguay team eliminated Germany.

[–] bold_atlas@lemmy.world 1 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago)

Unfortunately all that effort is for naught now that Trump has officially been revealed to be pulling strings behind the curtains for their benefit.

Even the nicest, most delicious hamburger ever made still gets tossed out when it gets shit on it.

[–] fizzle@quokk.au 6 points 15 hours ago (4 children)

As someone who has know knowledge of such things what so ever, do they have any chance at winning the cup?

[–] S_H_K@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 1 hour ago)

Historically benito mussolini managed to get 2 world cups for italy whenever they weren't the real best. Even said that the chance is low, even buying refs there are very good teams remaining even beating Belgium they would face Spain one of the best trams and recent cup winner or Portugal that has Cristiano Ronaldo. From the other side of the bracket there is Norway which beaten Brazil with a tuned on Haaland and Argentina the last winner with Lionel Messi the all time best striker of the whole History now a fucking living legend. Mind you all this names come with great teams behind. Imagine If USA manages to beat Argentina in a final without cheating and/or injuring Messi that would be nothing short of a fucking miracle. Now going back to my initial statement if they do it mussolini style... against none other that Argentina...

oh boy...

[–] Pringles@sopuli.xyz 5 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

They’re a mediocre team at best. Mediocre teams usually don’t make it to the quarter finals without an exceptionally lucky draw and almost never make it to the semis.

To put it into a chess comparison: to win you need a 2700+ elo and the US is maybe a 2200 elo. Decent, they can beat a higher ranked opponent on a good day for them and an off day for the opponent, but they can’t beat world class opponents in succession. The class difference is too high.

Now they are up against their first higher ranked opponent, Belgium, who should win it fairly easy on paper. In a pre-tournament friendly they comfortably beat the US 5-2, which is indicative of the difference in level between the two sides. Still, it’s a knockout game in the world cup, the US has home and FIFA advantage and Belgium has played below their standards all tournament, so they probably have a decent shot at winning the tie.

[–] Hawk@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 5 hours ago

We always joke about being better on paper in Belgium. The team always seems to underperform when it matters, even though many of the players are some of the best in the world.

Curious for the match though. I don't usually follow it very actively, but the blatant corruption might have lit a fire to ensure the victory.

[–] justOnePersistentKbinPlease@fedia.io 5 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

No, they should not.
In the initial phase of the tournament, only Canada wasn't the top seed in their group of 4(behind the Swiss)
The US barely topped their group and in doing so guaranteed that their round of 32 match was against the third seed in Canada's group, Bosnia which isn't in the top 60.

Canada's round of 32 game was against either a similarly ranked South Korea(~28 as I recall), or against the near-60th ranked South Africa. So Canada wasn't guaranteed to get out of R32, but always had a good shot. Canada was never going to get out of R16 short of an actual miracle, the matchup was Netherlands or Morocco.

For the US, their 2nd R16 match v Belgium will be their first game against a peer-or-better opponent of the tournament where statistically they can lose.

[–] the_tab_key@lemmy.world 5 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

I get and agree with what you're saying here but

The US barely topped their group

Is disingenuous. They won their first two games convincingly, winning the group in only two games. The third game therefore meant nothing, so they didn't play to win and still almost came away with a draw. They could have very likely won that game if the first string played, sweeping the group.

[–] justOnePersistentKbinPlease@fedia.io 3 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

Thats extremely disengenous to the then 22nd ranked team, Turkiye. They were the 2nd best team in that group and legitimately beat the US.

[–] onlyhalfminotaur@lemmy.world 2 points 1 hour ago

???? The US rested a bunch of players that game because they didn't need it.

[–] mrmisses@lemmy.world 3 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 15 hours ago) (1 children)

No.

Edit: yes with Trump's help

[–] fizzle@quokk.au 2 points 11 hours ago (2 children)

I think this is what I was really asking.

How can Trump actually help? he can't put balls in the goal.

Yes I get that he can bend FIFA to his will in so far as red cards, but surely that can only really help to an extent.

[–] Rekorse@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago)

Referees can call penalty kicks, which are usually an almost guaranteed goal. They can also kick players out of the game, putting the non-american team at a player disadvantage.

Bribe the referee from the start. That can easily make or break the game.

[–] Faithless@lemmy.world 13 points 16 hours ago (2 children)

That’s a good point actually. I guess they could still do the honorable thing and not use that player

[–] hellequin67@lemmy.zip 14 points 15 hours ago

They won't because the US Soccer Federation would not dare humiliate Trump after he's so publicly stated about the red card being overturned.

This is what happens when you give in to dictators.

[–] FuglyDuck@lemmy.world 11 points 15 hours ago

They won’t though.