Shadow Scholar Syndicate: CC 2017--Day Two Recap

Your “Syndicate Hangover” is proudly presented by “Renegade: Hammer & Sickle Imperial Stout”

Meh. It’s still probably better than your local “Hipster IPA”

Day 2: Recap

Record—

Spread: 1-2

Straight up: 1-1-1

Hot Girl Standings

Country	Tally	Games Played
Russia	8	1
Cameroon	3	1
Chile	2	1
Mexico	1	1
Portugal	1	1
New Zealand	0	1

What the shit is this?!? An international football tournament without any eye candy?? Did Putin not get the memo that such competitions are to be hospitable to tourists? Silly rhetorical question. In truth, it’s the Rest of the World was, in fact the recipients of the memo. The Header reads as follows:

INRE: “Traveling to Russia isn’t worth it”.

We all witnessed FIFA President Gianni Infantino literally begging football fans to travel to Russia in his opening remarks. Not taking anything out of context here. He actually said,

“Please come to Russia!!"

How absurd. This hurts the beautiful game. A Summer festival that features only Russian flags. Few in their right mind wish to travel to a locale with a reputation for both random and organized thuggery. Fans deserve to feel safe. Why spend exorbitant amounts of money wayfaring to a site where you may get hit on the head with a wayward flare?

Grrrrr…this could be an opportunity for an odd inward-looking country to integrate itself into modern Western Civilization. Guess Putin’s Petty “Proxy Wars” were simply more important. ; ( ; (

It’s not too late, FIFA! Consider an Alternate Site!

That’s enough Geopolitics for today. ; ( Some truly great football to talk about. Spectacularly played AND commentated. We are meant to be enjoying ourselves after all.

If you didn’t get up early, or program your DVR properly, to catch Mexico vs. Portugal you missed out on an instant classic. You also missed out on Jorge Perez Navarro! He’s a dynamite play-by-play announcer. He even managed to make Colbi Jones—yes THAT Colbi Jones—into a most amazing Color Commentator. The man is a freaking wizard. On top of his game and keeping everyone involved. Hells to the yes!

Chile vs. Cameroon was good too, but I must disagree with the “Video Refereeing Assistant System”. Vargas was ONSIDE!! PERIOD!! Vargas’s second goal was OFFSIDE! PERIOD! What are we doing?

Wrong, wrong, wrong, WRONG!!

Ah hell. Let’s get to the lineups.

LINEUP—Portugal—PROJECTED (4-3-3)

Andre Silva

C. Ronaldo Nani

A. Gomez J. Moutinho W. Carvalho

Eliseu Pepe

Bruno Alves Cedric Soares

Rui Patricio

LINEUP—Portugal—ACTUAL (4-4-2)

C. Ronaldo Nani

A. Gomez R. Quaresma

J. Moutinho W. Carvalho

R. Guerreiro Cedric Soares

Pepe Jose Fonte

Rui Patricio

Got the back four completely wrong. Nice shifts from Santos, even if they still need to get their act together on set pieces. Guerreiro screwed up too. Giving Quaresma the start really paid dividends. He looked ten years younger! Still expect this team to win it all. Plenty of talent “pocketed” kader talent that we haven’t seen yet.

LINEUP—Mexico—PROJECTED (4-4-2)

Javier Hernandez Giovanni dos Santos

Raul Jimenez Carlos Vela

Jürgen Damm Marco Fabian

Hector Morena Hector Herrera

Rafael Marquez Oswaldo Alanis

Rodolfo Coto

LINEUP—Mexico—ACTUAL (4-3-3)

Raul Jimenez Chicharito Carlos Vela

Andres Guardado Jonathan dos Santos

Hector Herrera

Miguel Layun Carlos Salcedo

Hector Moreno Diego Reyes

Guillermo Ochoa

Cool. Hector Herrera in central midfield. Moreno at centerback. Layun and Salcedo as the fullbacks. Carlos Vela up front and Giovani dos Santos—not to be confused with Jonathan dos Santos—on the bench. Some weakness at the back, but mostly an inspired selection. El Tri should have no problems trouncing the hosts.

LINEUP—Cameroon—PROJECTED (4-4-2)

Vincent Aboubakar Jacqes Zoua

Christian Bassogog Robert Ntip Tambe

Georges Mandjeck Benjamin Moukandjo

Ambrose Oyongo Collins Fai

Michael Ngadeu-Ngadjui Adolphe Teikeu

Fabrice Ondoa

LINEUP—Cameroon—ACTUAL (4-3-3)

Vincent Aboubakar

Benjamin Moukandjo Christian Bassogog

Arnaud Djoum Sebastian Siani

Andre-Frank Zambo Anguissa

C. Fai A. Teikeu M. Ngadeu-Ngadjui E. Mabouka

Fabrice Ondoa

A decent performance from the attacking third. Still not sure Broos’s reorganization of the back was a good idea. It’s good to challenge your players, but throwing Teikeu, Fai, and Ngadeu into unfamiliar territory proved too much once fatigue set it. I’m also curious as to why Hugo was so tentative to pull the trigger on some substitutions. Now isn’t the time for experiments, Belgium! You needed to field a better eleven today!

LINEUP—Chile—PROJECTED (4-2-3-1)

Alexis Sanchez

Eduardo Vargas Arturo Vidal Edson Puch

Marsalo Diaz Francisco Silva

Jean Beausejour Eugenio Mena

Gary Medel Mauricio Isla

Claudio Bravo

LINEUP—Chile—ACTUAL (4-1-2-3)

Eduardo Vargas

Edson Puch Jose Fuenzalida

Charles Aranguiz Arturo Vidal

Marcelo Diaz

J. Beausejour G. Jara G. Medel M. Isla

Johnny Herrera

This is the best sense your friendly bookie can make out of Pizzi’s attempt to compile an eleven without Sanchez. Honestly not sure if Vidal was directed to stay that far back or if Puch was really on the left. Aranguiz looked as if he was playing on the right sometimes. Jara and Medels positioning is anyone’s guess. As tempting as it is to call the formation “disorganized”, I think it was more of a matter of players making the most of their possession. We saw some great creativity from the lads. They’d run just about anywhere to keep the possession game and control the tempo.

A very good team. Can’t wait to face them on Thursday.

Here are the grades.

GRADES—Portugal (Match One)

Cristiano Ronaldo	A+
Ricardo Quaresma	A+
Cedric Soares	A+
Gelson Martins	A
Nani	B+
William Carvalho	B
Andre Silva	B
Andre Gomez	B
Pepe	B-
Rui Patricio	B-
Adrien Silva	B-
Jose Fonte	B-
Raphael Guerreiro	C+
Joao Moutinho	C+

GRADES—Mexico (Match One)

Carlos Vela	A+
Javier Hernandez	A+
Hector Moreno	A
Jonathan dos Santos	A
Raul Jimenez	A
Miguel Layun	A-
Giovanni dos Santos	B+
Diego Reyes	B
Guillermo Ochoa	B
Jonathan dos Santos	B
Nestor Araujo	B-
Hector Moreno	C+
Carlos Salcedo	C

GRADES—Cameroon (Match One)

Benjamin Moukandjo	A+
Vincent Aboubakar	A
Christian Bassogog	A
Michael Ngadeu-Ngadjui	A
Fabrice Ondoa	A
Sebastien Siani	B+
Ernest Mabouka	B
Adolphe Teikeu	B
Collins Fai	B-
A.F. Zambo Anguissa	C+
Arnaud Djoum	D

GRADES—Chile (Match One)

Arturo Vidal	A+
Alexis Sanchez	A+
Eduardo Vargas	A+
Edson Puch	A
Marcelo Diaz	A
Johnny Herrera	A
Charles Aranguiz	A
Gonzalo Jara	A
Jose Pedro Fuenzalida	B+
Gary Medel	B
Mauricio Isla	B-
Jean Beausejour	B-
Leonardo Valencia	C
Francisco Silva	C