Without Further Ado: Boner's 2006 World Cup Picks
 

GROUP STAGE

GROUP A

Germany
Ecuador
Costa Rica
Poland

GROUP B

Sweden
England
Paraguay
T and T

GROUP C

Holland
Argentina
Ivory Coast
S and M

GROUP D

Mexico
Portugal
Iran
Angola

GROUP E

Italy
USA
Ghana
Czech Republic

GROUP F

Brazil
Australia
Croatia
Japan

GROUP G

France
South Korea
Switzerland
Togo

GROUP H

Ukraine
Spain
Saudi Arabia
Tunisia

ROUND OF 16

England over Germany

Ecuador over Sweden

Holland over Portugal

Argentina over Mexico

Italy over Australia

Brazil over USA

France over Spain

Ukraine over South Korea

QUARTERS

Holland over England

Italy over France

Argentina over Ecuador

Brazil over Ukraine

SEMIFINALS

Italy over Holland

Argentina over Brazil

FINALS

Argentina over Italy

Ukraine is weak.

I just wanted to say that.

And you Boner, you are weak like Ukraine.

Assuming Shevchenko is healthy, Ukraine will be very very dangerous.

world cup is soccer, right?

No it's Cricket.

I would pick Czech Republic instead USA and Croatia instead of Australia

you're an american. wtf are you doing watching soccer.

fuck the mexicans... anyone caught watching soccer in america should be kicked over the fuckin ' wall.

Italy isn't so good this year :(

Germany will win

I'm rooting for the US. Not because I'm from the US, but because I think it would be hillarious if the country who gives the least of a shit about it won.

I'm going to attempt to watch it. I bet I don't last 5 minutes.

I think you'd be surprised by how much of a shit people would give if we made it to the Semifinals. And if we made it to the Finals it would be borderline pandamonium.

it would have little league world series level excitement

ok maybe thats not fair

world baseball classic level

I doubt it. Even if it did get a rise out of people, the lasting effects would be minimal.

sucks that we get Brazil even if we make it out of the group

Italy / USA on the 17th, mark those calendars, kids!

I too picked Argentina to win it all several weeks ago.

Ecuador looking good.

I'm not sure if Poland could be less creative offensively.

The local TV is not broadcasting the Poland VS Ecuador match! :mad:

I think Ace's Ecuadorian Quarterfinal pick will ring true.

The interest level shown by my peers is much much much higher than I expected. I don't know how indicative this is of the rest of the country....I'd be interested to see what the ratings are for the games today.

stop being so gay and making threads where you act like everybody should be in awe of your amazing picks and how the fact that you made picks is worth making threads like this. or just do it for yankee sports and tennis or whatever.

see i can just post my own thoughts like this without being pompous about it: i think that pseudo "group of death" really is pretty wide open (since i don't think either argentina or the netherlands are that good - mark riquelme tight and he'll lose interest and argentina will play badly and the dutch have loads of injuries and a squad that i don't think was even that great to begin with). i think people are underestimating germany though. if they were to sort out their problems at the back they could start being pretty dangerous.

You will realize that my picks deserved their own thread when I nail 15 of the final 16, 6 of the Final 8, 3 of the Final 4, and the correct championship and champion.

I'm embrassed to know this, but isn't the Czech Republic rated #2 in the world, or something? You don't have them getting past the group stage? Bold.

@Boner: England over Germany? Lol....when did that ever happen? I mean honestly...no way

I fell asleep during the Poland-Ecuador game today. to be fair, I had to wake up at 5 am today so I was pretty tired, but I'm still standing by my story that soccer sucks.

even if the US made it to the finals, nobody would care. there would be some forced "oh wait everyone else in the world cares about this so maybe we should too" enthusiasm, but that's it. it actually would be pretty hilarious if we made it far, because out of all the countries in the world cup, ours is probably the one that cares about it the least. I mean, I think that the majority of sports fans think soccer sucks.

Bacon!!!!