quote:In its first Olympic competition since its country was shattered by war, Iraq upset star-studded Portugal 4-2 on Thursday in a gritty, come-from-behind victory as about 200 chanting fans cheered and jumped wildly....
The stunning victory over a team that made it to final of the recent Euro 2004 tournament brought a rare moment of joy for residents of a country plagued by violence, chaos and constant power outages during the hot summer....
In May, Iraq clinched an Olympic soccer berth just three months after being reinstated by the International Olympic Committee. Two months later, the team’s German coach, Bernd Stange, resigned, claiming authorities advised him to leave for his safety.
He was replaced by his assistant, Adnan Hamad, who coached Iraq’s national soccer team to victory in the West Asian Championship in 2002 and played on the national team during the early 1980s.
In July, Iraq reached the quarterfinals of the Asian Cup that included a 2-1 win over regional soccer power Saudi Arabia.
Portugal, which had Manchester United winger Cristiano Ronaldo, Boa Morte and Hugo Viana on the lineup, is trying to make up for losing to upstart Greece in the final of Euro 2004, which it hosted.
I love this story. These Iraqi players used to get tortured for bad performance. When their coach tried to get team back together for the Olympics, he had to drive around the streets in a van looking for them because he did not know how to contact them.
I wish these guys the best of luck.
P.S. I still think soccer is a boring sport to watch though.
Posts: 4116 | Registered: Apr 2002
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I'm guessing the Iraqi team gets extra security. Your double fudge cookies care package will probably not make it pass the guard dogs.
While looking for an answer for Foust, I came across this interesting website:
quote:You can help share soccer with the children of Iraq. The US soccer community has been working to support Iraqi youth who love and play soccer during the rebuilding of their country. Already 60,000 soccer balls have been collected through Major League Soccer teams, fans, and official suppliers, and are on their way to Iraq.
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Google. Best way to contact anything. Except probably flu.
Edit: Oh, one piece of information that has been SOOOO conveniently left out of the story: Olympic teams include only under-23 players, so that Portugal team isn't really "a team that made it to final of the recent Euro 2004 tournament"...
Edit 2: Under-21 transformed into under-23 after a better look at this article.
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After the American men's basketball team lost to Spain by twenty points, I can believe anything.
Posts: 4116 | Registered: Apr 2002
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That all news about Iraq should be depressing. Personally, I'm hoping Iraq wins gold. Good news for Iraqi civilians is great news for UStroops.
Posts: 8501 | Registered: Jul 2001
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Yes...success in sports is a great way to appease people on the brink of revolt.
For example: the military dictatorship, here in Brazil, was very happy when we won the soccer world cup, 1970. They recognized it may have avoided armed insurrections and even, maybe, a civil war.
Not that I think american actions in Iraq can be compared with brazilian military dictatorship. I'm just giving an example (although, I'm against the war in Iraq).
Posts: 1785 | Registered: Oct 2003
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No one in Europe could hold off the Greeks. I'm very disappointed that the US team didn't qualify. Ironically if the we hadn't invaded Iraq they wouldn't have qualified either because they would still be barred, not that it mattered for the US because we had to qualify from a different region.
Posts: 3446 | Registered: Jul 2002
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That's true, newfoundlogic. The Greeks are the European chapions of soccer. Nobody could hold them (although they don't play a crowd-pleasing game, they're very strong in defense).
Since Brazil didn't qualify, I'll be a Iraqui fan. Posts: 1785 | Registered: Oct 2003
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That's the way they played and...won the european championchip, while favorites like France, Italy, German, England and Portugal were left behind.
For myself, I don't like this kind of game. Brazil usually has a very strong offense and a not so good defense, but...well...it worked for the Greeks, this time.
Posts: 1785 | Registered: Oct 2003
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And the Greeks lost to Mali, of course that's just the olympic team, but still, are we seeing the end of European (plus one or two teams from South America) domination in soccer? I hope so.
Posts: 3446 | Registered: Jul 2002
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TMedina: I have to say I enjoying seeing Ronaldo destroying German, that day. But, to tell you the truth, that German team was weaker than previous ones. I thought the most difficult game for Brazil was against England (2X1)
Oh, and congratulations... U.S. won Brazil (2X0) for women's soccer championship at the Olympics. Of course, it wasn't REAL (male) soccer, but still... Posts: 1785 | Registered: Oct 2003
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Iraq beat Costa Rica 2-0 
