From: puerta@camis.Stanford.EDU (Angel Puerta)
Subject: re: Spain/Poland Final Re:
Organization: Stanford School of Medicine
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 08:34:19 GMT


marios@ecs.comm.mot.com (mario smarduch) writes:
> puerta@camis writes:

>>With respect to the physical play, I invite any Polish player to survive
>>one year in the Spanish first division and still say that Polish players
>>are more physical.

>This has nothing to do with surviving in any league (besides if you are going
>to talk about surviving you should mention the English, Italian leagues) its
>just that the Polish players a taller, wider and stronger therefore its easier
>for them to hold their own when it comes to contact.

It looks to me that there are some who cannot take losing gracefully and must
find "luck" by others and "referees sold out" to rationalize why their team
lost.

Let me put it this way. Spain thoroughly dominated Poland. It was a miracle 
that the game was not over in 15 minutes. The final score could have been
easily 5-0.

As for your "arguments", they are easy to answer in the same tone that you
put them. For example, I can say that Polish players are bigger, fatter,
and clumsier and that's why they tire easily.


>What ????, This has to be a joke. There is no daubt that it was a penalty,
>the only thing that really amazed me is that Lopez did it so openly, he
>didn't even consider that a Columbian referee could call a penalty against
>Spain playing at home in the Olympic final. This Lopez guy is quite a
>talentless butcher I wonder where he plays at?

Please spend some time researching where Lopez plays. I think that you'll
find out that his team could win the Polish league 75 years in a row.


>My friend you just dont understand football. Being allover a team and
> exploiting
>a couple defensive breakdowns is a completely different thing from actually
>creating clear cut scoring oppertunities. I've seen countless number of games
>where a team was supposedlly "allover" the other team and lost the game. How's
>Denmark vs. Germany game, its the finishing and execution that matters.

That sounds about right. The finish was 3-2 Spain and the executed was Poland.


>I would agree the best team won but only because of the environment and
>circumstances.
>Spain in a neutral site would be an average team. Wheather these kids get
>spoiled or not I just dont see any glory days for Spanish soccer. I think
>Spain has to produce more physical players, or else they will be ran of the
>field by teams like Germany, Holland, England.


You better start looking better because glory Days for Spanish soccer are
here already. Who was the Eurocup Champion, and who was the Olympic Champion
this year, just to mention one?. Please give me a call when Poland does
something similar.

Let me get this straight. This great, versatile, strong, classy, athletic,
talented, fast, intelligent, well-coached, mature Polish team was beaten by
the small, unimaginative, weak, classless, puny, talentless, slow, dumb,
poorly-coached, and inmature Spanish team because:
a) the referee made one call
b) the referee did not make another call, and
c) the spectators yelled too loud.
Gee, sounds like it doesn't take much to beat your great team.

You know, maybe Spanish soccer has been so successful throughout its history
because when a Club or the National team loses, we criticize ourselves not
the other team.
-- 
Angel Puerta
puerta@camis.stanford.edu