[MxPx]

Will take place at April, 17th, 20:30CET, Ernst Happel Stadion, Vienna

Winnie Schäfer´s squad:

Tor
Jacques Song'o Metz/FRA
Alioum Boukar Samsunspor/TUR
Carlos Kameni Le havre/FRA

Verteidigung
Geremi Real Madrid/ESP
Raymond Kalla Nkongo Extremadura/ESP
Lucien Mettomo Manchester City/ENG
Rigobert Song 1. FC Köln/GER
Pierre Wome Bologna/ITA
Bill Tchato Montpellier/FRA
Joel Epalle Panahaiki/GRE

Mittelfeld
Nicolas Alnoudji Rizespor/TUR
Lauren Etame Mayer Arsenal/ENG
Marc Vivien Foe Lyon/FRA
Salomon Olembe Marseille/FRA
Eric Djemba Nantes/FRA
Joseph Ndo Al Kahaleej/Katar
Daniel Ngom Kome Numancia/ESP

Angriff
Samuel Eto'o Mallorca/ESP
Patrick Mboma Sunderland/ENG
Pius Ndiefi Sedan/FRA
Patrick Suffo Sheffield United/ENG

 

[Alexx]

Thomas Hickersberger can handle all of them with ease....

 

[tgv325]

Kameni still at Le Havre? Why that? The boy was outstanding at the Sydney olympics.

 

[Viola]

To be honest, despite their recent success, Cameroons squad doesn't look that impressive. I mean, a player like Suffo is too weak for Sheffield United an has been loaned to Numancia....

 

[Alexx]

...well, but they just blew the star Argies quite some tune....

 

[MxPx]

Yep, on first glance they look pretty equal to us.
But Eto'o and Mboma make a difference.
Cameroon has the world-class strikers that we lack.

 

[Viola]

There are some other very good players like Foe, Song, Lauren or Geremi, still....

On the other hand, Argentina relies on Caniggia, so no wonder why los Gauchos suddenly slip.

 

[MxPx]

But it´s not like we don´t have players of the calibre of Olembe, Foe, Geremi or Song.

Still, as a collective they belong to the top15 NT´s in the world, we´re far, far away from that.

 

[Alexx]

On the other hand, Argentina relies on Caniggia, so no wonder why los Gauchos suddenly slip.

Come on, they fielded e.g. the likes of Samuel, Zanetti, Sorin, Aimar, Veron, Lopez and Gonzalez. So it was not really on the shoulders of Caniggia, right. And show me a current Austrian striker who has the class/experience combination of Caniggia, in addition to his dritter Frühling.

So in our game against Cameroon, we can't even rely on a guy like him. So us believing we are more or less equal to Cameroon is good oldfashioned optimism against the odds, in my humble opinion.

 

[Viola]

What I wanted to say is: Argentina has an old Bati, injured Crespo, injured Palermo....Caniggia playing for Argentina 2002 is a big, sad JOKE!

 

[Alexx]

...I think it's Latin blooded drama & nostalgia, that similar to Romario (not really comparable, I know). They have enough forwards to send and Crespo will be fit. So Cannigia may go, but that only for the mentioned drama and nostalgia reasons. However, one has to give the guy respect. What he managed to do in Scotland is not von schlechten Eltern, one gotta admit that, I think.

 

[MxPx]

Krankl´s line-up:

                  Manninger

         Scharner    Baur    Feldhofer

     Wimmer   Herzog    Aufhauser     Panis 

                Weissenberger

             Wallner     Vastic

If it´s true that Winnie Schäfer rests Eto'o and Mboma, Cameroon does not look that impressive anymore.
I know, they´re still physically and technically superior and will probably trash us, but hey, if there´s a right time to show some "Zweckoptimismus", it´s 20 mins before the game, no?

 

[MxPx]

Halftime.
Klestil obviously drunk, some would say blunznfett, again.

As for the game, Cameroon isn´t really doing more than needed to control the game (they have about 60% percession rate).


Again the most important stats of the evening, patriotism-ranking:

singing the anthem:
Feldhofer
Scharner
Aufhauser
Herzog
Weissenberger

not singing the anthem:
Manninger
Baur
Panis
Wimmer
Vastic
Wallner

Whereas we had a 6-5 against Slovakia, it was 5-6 this evening.
Hopefully not a bad omen.


By the way... has anybody actually seen Vastic on the field? Ivo had a lot of bad NT-games before, but this time....totally INVISIBLE.

 

[tgv325]

You have to exclude Vastic - I'm pretty sure he doesn't even know the text of our anthem. And the singer didn't know the text too... :wallbang:

I allow myself to copy my German text to the game...


Wie kann man sich über das Spiel + Ergebnis ernsthaft freuen? Die erste Hälfte war eine einzige Katastrophe, die zweite ein bißchen besser. Kamerun ist technisch mindestens zwei Klassen besser, hat sich über die ganze Partie eigentlich nie wirklich reingehaut. MMn haben sie eher das Kombinationsspiel auf nassem Boden geprobt, denn versucht ein Tor zu schiessen!

Wallner war eine Vorgabe, Herzog auch fast nicht existent - beide hätten zur Pause ausgewechselt werden müssen.

Unsere Akteure: Schön von Krankl, daß er Scharner spielen läßt, aber warum in drei Teufels Namen als Verteidiger, wenn er seit Monaten immer defensives Mittelfeld spielt??? War in Ordnung, wenn auch nicht wirklich gut. Mayrleb hat's zumindest probiert. Linz und Dospel waren wohl nur der Statistik wegen auf dem Platz.

Und was bitte sollte dieses sch... Interview vom Krankl nach dem Spiel? Das kann er doch nicht ernst meinen!

Der Gipfel der Peinlichkeit war jedoch die Sängerin unserer Hymne, die nicht einmal den offiziellen Text kann!

 

[Quentin]

Herzog nicht existent?

Well, whatever. I don´t want to start another holy war with you guys here.

 

[MxPx]

Quentin, I can´t agree with tgv either.
I´m perfectly happy with the result and the game (2nd half was better than everything we had to witness under Baric).

And I can agree with Krankl´s comments after the game:
We must be happy about the win over Slovakia, who are 10 places higher than us in the UEFA-ranking, and about the draw against Cameroon, who are a WC contender.

Comments on the players:

Manninger - As usual, very safe in goal. I´m very happy to have a world-class keeper like him for the qualifiers. Unfortunately he´ll miss the Germany-game. 2

Scharner - Made a good debut. Played a lot stronger in the second half, like most of our players. 3, almost 2.

Baur - Unlike against Slovakia, unable to join the attacks, forced to stay at the back this time. 3

Feldhofer - A better 1st half than Scharner, in my opinion, but not as striking as the FAK player in half #2. 3

Wimmer - Not the player I want for our right side. 4

Herzog - Way better than against Slovakia. Not as often up in front as he´d probably like to be, since someone else played his attacking midfielder-position. 3

Aufhauser - Had a lot of work to do in central midfield against the likes of Foe and Lauren. Still mamaged to have that big chance when he missed that header. 3

Weissenberger - Markus Weissenberger Fussballgott! What a revelation in the second half, easily our best player yesterday. 2

Panis - Had a strong opponent in Geremi, that´s why our left side wasn´t that strong in attack. Average, we all know he can do better. 3

Wallner - Terribly weak. Just as Herzog could´ve gotten a red card against Slovakia, Wallner played very agressive with a lot of fouls. 4

Vastic - Like I said before, invisible in the first half. He was a lot better after the break and unfortunately Krankl had to substitute him after 18 minutes of the 2nd half. Would have rocked together with Weissenberger the last 30 minutes. 3

subs:

Mayrleb - Had a better game than Wallner, no doubt. Not very productive though. 3

Markus Hiden - Finally back in the NT. Played only 20 minutes. 3

Kitzbichler + Linz - weren´t on the field long enough.

Dospel + Höller - played some great 20 seconds.

 

[MxPx]

In order to witness a real loss of reality, check out sport1.at´s marks: http://www.sport1.at/coremedia/generator/sv=at/id=1428768.html

 

[tgv325]

Considering Austrias anthem, that's what Stickler said...

Am Tag danach entschuldigte sich Stickler via Presseaussendung. "Die Sache tut uns Leid. Wir waren davon nicht in Kenntnis gesetzt. Wir werden jedenfalls künftig darauf achten, dass der Text der Hymne genau eingehalten wird", hieß es.

 

[Djet]

It was a shame that they failed to know the text of our anthem

A discussion about this, is here:

http://www.austriansoccerboard.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard/ikonboard.cgi?s=3cc54b44588cffff;act=ST;f=26;t=228

 

[onimaci]

Djet, what would we do if we didn't have you? I guess that your higher mission to inform us bout ASB is now once and for all forfilled!