Shadow Scholar Syndicate: FWM/CA/N 2019--Day Nineteen Recap

Your “Syndicate Hangover” is proudly presented by “Perrier”

Your friendly bookie remains more of a San Pellegrino man, but we’ll accord the hosts some respect for their second-rate club soda. Along with La Croix, it’s an acceptable option when the only other alternative happens to be Seltzer Water.

Day 19: Recap

Bookie’s Stats—

Spread: 34-39

Straight up: 47-18-8

There’s my girl. With all due respect to the Italian principessa, today belongs to my girl Lieke Martens. FINALLY, she got involved. It may have been a quirky goal and a soft penalty, but at least the REAL female Messi has some skin in the game now.

It’s very nice skin as well ; ) Trust me. With some confidence, this amazing girl can make this an even more memorable tournament.

A Syndicate Classic—“German Hubris, defined”

AFCON Lines set to drop tonight, so we’ll have a laugh at the bookie’s expense in lieu of a tactical review. How much more shit can I get wrong about Sweden before their showdown with the German Girls on Saturday? Here’s my assessment of them from the Preview Sections

From FWM 2019—Group F Preview:

Purge your friendly bookie’s dire assessment of the men’s team last Summer from your mind. I’ll admit to have royally fucked up that prediction worse than Princess Anna fucked up her film career. No contest. I underestimated them. Here we most assuredly confront a team in decline. The Swedish Steamroller has been stuck ever since Lotta Schelin’s retirement. Their qualifying round and recent friendlies have been rather mediocre.

Should I have this one wrong too, all of you remain welcome to lambast me for falsely belittling the Swedes for two consecutive Summers. A writer of a gambling column deserves an extra serving of draconian criticism. It’s entirely possible that one of the players will deliver the bookie what 55-M describes as a “Gustav Svensson Bookie Breach”. Bookie stands ready.

…and here’s last Summer.. ; ( ; (

From WM 2018—Group F Preview:

While it may not be a true “Group of Death”, we’ve got plenty of high-caliber teams to discuss. The Swedes are the only ones that truly suck. They’ll be dancing with the Macabre relatively soon.

Christ, they’re bad. As we witnessed in Euro 2016, they were a lousy team even with Ibrahimović in the starting eleven. Practically all of the discussion around this team has centered around whether or not Zlatan would “un-retire”. He has not, leaving manager Janne Andersson scrambling to find players to build an attack around. The fact that he’s called up—for fuck’s sake—Gustav Svensson tells you all you need to know about this country’s prospects. They were quite fortunate to secure qualification against our beloved “Dastardly Dagos” in the European playoff. They’ll be even more fortunate to score more than one or two goals over the course of their three matches.

The new kits are kinda cool. In all likelihood they’ll remain squarely on the shoulders of every Blaugult player throughout the duration of regulation match time. No reason to expect that a striker will ecstatically strip off their shirt in celebration of a goal. For starters, they don’t even have a true striker. I can’t find one. Toivonen barely factors in for his club team anymore. Berg is just outright junk, even in the U.A.E. league. Guidetti has been tanking for three years now. Really no attacking threat to report on.

Ugh. It gets even more fugly. Jimmy Durmaz and Emil Forsberg haven’t developed in the way many had hoped for. Both players find themselves in regressive form for their clubs. Ekdal and Lindehöf have also taken enormous leaps backward. There doesn’t appear to be room for Augustinsson, the lone bright spot leftover from the 2015 U-21 Championship team, because Olsson still occupies the starting Left Back position.

The entire back four are notoriously unimaginative. Källstrom will be sorely missed in midfield. Berg can’t hope to replace him. Isaaksson’s retirement leaves us with a total novice between the pipes. Your friendly bookie searched diligently for something positive to say about these lads, but it’s simply not forthcoming.

The team that scored ONE measly goal in the 2016 Euros might get totally blanked here. Out go the Swedes, steamrolled and trampled upon like the cartoonishly cruddy crap that they are.

…..Guess “Group F” stands for failure when it comes to handicapping the Swedes. Should the German girls lose on Saturday, I’m picking the Swedes to win Euro 2020.

“Riffs of the Day”—Day Nineteen

Reader: Plenty of hot Italian girls in the stands today.

Vicey: Dad…we’ve been through this. It’s time to let it go. Your co-dependent fetishism never leads anywhere good. Stop it!

Reader: The Dutch trumpeters are doing a spirited rendition of “Go West” by the Pet Shop Boys.

Vicey: I noticed. Now that I think about it, I think the world was always supremely gay. Deep down, we probably always knew it was. Perhaps what’s so annoying about our present age is that we don’t need any more reminders. It’s like those TPS Reports in “Office Space”. Yeah….we got the memo.

Reader: You totally got the two Adama Traorés mixed up.

Vicey: I’ll take your word for it, 72-M Thanks for the deep research. Sorry about your girl Kerr.

Reader: Are there any real girls in your life, or just the ones on the TV screen?

Vicey: (fumbling desperately for comeback…and not finding one).

Sigh. 6-F wins…again.

Reader: These Dutch fans are amazing. Since when do the goofy Germans care so much about women’s football?

Vicey: Since the girls hosted and won the European Championship in 2017. The German girls had won every continental championship dating back to 1995. They broke a 22-year-streak of German dominance. Of course......it also helps that the men’s team sucks.

DAY TWENTY—PREVIEW

Round Two Africa Cup of Nations Lines set to debut in the post immediately following this one. A “sneak peek” available here for the compulsive gamblers. It’s an “All Africa Day”

Nigeria vs. Guinea