2011 AFC Asian Cup

[Rebajlo]

This is the Asian championship tournament, currently being held in Qatar (where else?).

Why am I bothering to mention it? Because Australia is competing and we've reached the final, in which we shall play Japan on the 29th January.

Australia demolished Uzbekistan 6-0 in the semifinals - to be fair, the Uzbeks had a player sent off in the 67th minute, but the Socceroos were already 3-0 up at that point. Just out of interest, Uzbekistan's side contained a couple of ethnic Russians.

Here is the official website (which isawfully muddled rubbish, especially the "Schedule and Results" section

. I guess that it may have been designed by some top Indian "IT experts"...):

http://www.the-afc.com/en/tournaments/men-a-youth/afc-asian-cup

Qatar's football team is displaying signs of what we can expect to see in the 2022 World Cup - a "national team" full of non-Arab imports. This squad contained 4 "naturalised" players from Brazil, Uruguay, Ghana, and Kenya respectively.

Not contenting themselves with buying up European football clubs and bribing their way to the right to stage the 2022 World Cup, it appears that the Qataris are bidding to host just about every sporting event on the planet - this time it's the 2015 World Men's Handball Championship:

http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item_no=412070&version=1&template_id=36&parent_id=16

Next thing we know, they'll be hosting the Winter Olympics...

 

[Rebajlo]

In relation to the final part of my above post, Qatar was granted the right to host the 2015 Men's World Handball Championship overnight.

Qatar to host 2015 handball world championship

<DIV =inside-copy>
<DIV =inside-copy>MALMO, Sweden (AP) â€" Qatar has been chosen to host the men's handball world championship in 2015.
The International Handball Federation's ruling council on Thursday voted for Qatar ahead of three European bids â€" France, Norway and Poland.
IHF president Hassan Moustafa says in a statement that "it was a very close decision between four top handball nations."
Qatar was the only bidder not to qualify for the world championship currently being played in Sweden.
It is Qatar's latest victory in a hosting contest as it seeks to build a portfolio of major sports events.
<DIV id=tagCrumbs>
Last month, FIFA chose Qatar to host the football World Cup in 2022.
The women's 2015 handball world championship will be held in Denmark, which was the only bidder.
Source: http://www.usatoday.com/sports/olympics/2011-01-27-1384428616_x.htm

"Four top handball nations" - that's a blatant insult. Since when is Qatar a bloody "top handball nation"? Handball is a European sport in every sense - the top teams are European, the fans are European, the media coverage is European, yet the president of the International Handball Federation is an Egyptian...

The following excerpt from an articlein "The Scotsman" sums things up:

French federation technical director Philippe Bana said: "There is obviously a superior power in all sports." He might just have a point: France are reigning Olympic, European and world handball champions, Qatar, who did not qualify for this year's world championships, claimed their best result in the event when they finished 16th in 2003.<!---
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Source: http://sport.scotsman.com/football/Changing-room-chat-You39ve-got.6704749.jp

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[Rebajlo]

Unfortunately, Australia lost the final (0-1) against the Japs, who scored in extra time (109'). Needless to say, I'm well pissed off...

The game was there for the taking but, once again, the Socceroosshowed that we always seem to lack the incision required to win the biggest, most importantmatches againstrelativelygood opposition.

Irefer to Japan as "relatively good" oppositionin the context of world football - in Asia, they are obviously heavyweights, and here lies the problem. Despite the Asian media's talk of Australia's ultra-solid defence, we conceded goals against the only quality opposition we faced, South Korea and Japan, and failed to beat either. We always struggle to score againstcompetent and motivated defences and, being a part of the Asian confederation, we only faced two in the entire competition (including the qualifiers).

The qualifying tournament pitted us against the footballing might of Indonesia, Oman, and Kuwait, so progression to the finals is not exactly a Herculean labour. Out of interest, the Kuwaitis qualified behind usin second place, but failed to make it out of their group in the finals tournament, losing all three matches and conceding seven goals.

Australia had an easy passage into the quarterfinals, having to finish in the top two of a group which also contained India, Bahrain and South Korea. The former two, especially the curry munchers,are a complete joke, while the South Koreans are regional giants - so we could only draw against the latter...

Ah, well...