aucanucktiger

Former Arkansas coach Ken Hatfield allegedly didnt allow it either. Something in the water over there.

Gus catching flak from bamaham media & al.com for "flip flopping" on the 9 sec games per season issue. I suspect he sees the way out for us not having to play bama AND uga away every other season.

Yawn. Once Whitlow gets rolling this season, Gus will give him 90% of the carries the next two years anyway.😉

11 undefeated seasons (including consecutive undefeated seasons) yet back to back ten wins only once is odd. Course in Shug's day winning ten games MEANT going undefeated. Still...

Sonnys is born, bred and typical of central Florida (Gainesville) BBQ, regardless where its corp hq might be right now. To each his own.

Yes that was him. Not sure about germans or russians but the brits are ALSO piling on (dspite winning) because their aging favorite son gary linekar tweeted that the Colombian headbutt should have been a red, not yellow. That call is consistent with recent international pecedent as mandated by fifa and just one of many examples of refs in this cup with marching orders from FIFA (which hasnt kept it a secret) to avoid having cards decide subsequent games and to let 'em play. In the ages of zidane, linekar, matthaus etc that WAS a straight red. Long story short - fifa has consistently given geiger high marks RELATIVE TO other grade 1 & 2 refs. He's flawed like every body else but gets many foreseably hard assignments because he toes the FIFA party line. Look for him to do a third world cup in 2022 then be on the assignment committee for 2026 in the US.

He's taken some heat but unfairly I think. The non-American (some would say anti-American) ref selection committee at FIFA chose him to this his second World Cup with multiple assignments because he has done a good job in some difficult World Cup games. My Morrocan friend blamed his country not advancing solely on Gieger awarding divemaster Chrissy Ronaldo a penalty against Morrocco and I agree that was not his best game but I've looked at Chrissy's foul multiple times and several other World Cup centers in this would have also awarded it IMHO (one will be the center in Sunday's final0. fwiw, I also told my Morrocan friend his team needs to stop putting the ball in their own net (see Morroccan loss to Egypt) instead of looking for an American to blame. Frankly, I would place Geiger behind a half dozen other world class American refs that for one reason or another were not pegged for this World Cup.

Well shoot, 3 Argentinians got picked to ref the final (4th official & reserve are Dutch). Center will be Pitana, an excellent choice IMO...except they should have gone with the Yank.

Interesting that going into this World Cup many experts gave Croatia a 3-4% chance of winning it all. But Croatian soccer has rock & rolled on the international level for decades, first as the region within Yugoslavia supplying most of that country's best players during some terrific WC and European championship tournament performances in the 50's, 60's & 70's then recently making it to the '98 WC semis before losing to eventual champion...France. Unfortunately Croatian soccer and some of the superstars on THIS team have been connected to a level of corruption that would make the tour de France jealous. But there's no faking it into the WC championship game. Huge side note: USA ref Mark Geiger made FIFA's final pool to ref Sunday's game - we find out if he's on the crew Friday.

I hope Zion pumps some AU sunshine in Obnoxville to Wanya later this month and that the opposite doesn't happen.

https://www.collegeandmagnolia.com/2018/7/10/17552848/auburn-football-recruiting-quandarrius-robinson-kayode-oladele-cord-sandberg Phillies being on the hook for "some" of Cord's college expenses makes this particularly interesting. Sandberg makes sense IMO if (IF) we foresee having reasonable depth at all other key positions and IF our future QB situation will to the staff be foreseeably like the Jeremy/Sean era. IF Cord brings maturity, work ethic & businesslike manner - even as just a competent but rusty QB that's been around the block in a professional sport.

Vive la France! Made it past the golden generation of Belgium soccer (w/ all respect to their '86 squad). With 19 yo M'bappe & an overall tremendously young team, I thought France's WC would be 2022. England's team is basically a youth movement too - what a great matchup that would be in the final!

And to be clear, immigration agreements between countries to enhance numbers of student visas that will expire after a date certain (with possible options for renewal) is very common.

http://www.theplainsman.com/article/2018/07/four-star-oladele-decommit Student visa's & many other temporary resident immigration situations in the US (& every other country I'm aware of) are usually not a one & done thing. If he was cleared for a visa last year it would be subject to renewal - how often & what's involved depends on several facts including his country of origin and reasons for being here. Country of origin can make the immigrant's status totally different from one year to the next, something not necessarily easy for Auburn to predict (e.g. Iceland funds Greenland's invasion of Maine in 2017, Icelandics will face higher immigration status scrutiny in US in 2018). I can say from personal experience & opinion that Homeland Security & the complicated Patriot Act & related laws (largely a compilation of previously lightly enforced immigration laws) have in many ways made immigration logistics clearer & smoother for the immigrant than pre terrorist attacks of 9/11.

Yes, tactics but development of player defensive skills AND as a defensive unit. And yes, Brazil & Argentina ARE the conmebol story over the last almost 50 years. Only Uruguay (once) has also made it into the WC semis from Conmebol in that time. Four of the 13 WC's have been won by Conmebol in that period (2 for Brazil - '94 & '06 and 2 for Argentina - '78 & '86). Conmebol is made up of 10 south American countries where (except Venezuela) soccer is king and has essentially 5 qualifying slots (4 direct and 1 inter-continental playoff against usually New Zealand). Half the continent gets into the World Cup now. IMHO that is underachieving as a confederation. EUFA is made up of 52 countries with 13 qualifying slots. Twelve (12) different UEFA countries have reached the semis and 5 different UEFA countries have won it in the same period. The argument about population is a muddy one - what percentage of a population play soccer at a high level, are the "high levels" comparable, HOW are superior resources utilized (imagine if the South had the North's "resources" during the Civil War or better yet, imagine Uruguay with U.S. soccer resources?) Quantity doesn't mean quality and (e.g.) little Belgium's "system" is reeking havoc over some mighty big soccer-resource countries. Anyway, yes, conmebol does not have a monopoly on stubbornness - there's is just lingering longer. IMHO