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| Avoid the ball |
GONZAGA UNIVERSITY, SPOKANE, WA - Running with a bouncing ball is dangerous to your health as E1-Belgium's Romelu Lukaku's game-tying goal in the 86' was taken away via VAR as during the run-up, a bouncing ball clipped a BEL's hand. Lukaku also had another goal taken away via VAR as he was slightly offsides. After faltering in the group stage in the 2022 World Cup, BEL continues its downfall from the Golden Generation. E2-Slovakia, ranked #48, held on to a 1-0 win in the biggest upset in terms of ranking (delta of 45, with BEL #3) but played well having more corners (7-5) and getting 10 shots, 4 of them on goal.
The feel-good story of E4-Ukraine turned nightmare as E3-Romania blasted them 3-0. #46 ROU trailed in nearly every statistical category except shots on goal (5-2 - somehow, UEFA has UKR with 2 shots on goal but ROU with 3 saves).
D4-France won 1-0 but didn't score (it was an own goal by D3-Austria), Kylian Mbappe exited with a broken nose, and Mbappe exited with a yellow card (so weird he just sat back onto the field to get the card). With the harsh rule of just TWO yellows over five matches to get an automatic one-match suspension, create ideas were thrown of having Mbappe come in late (he apparently will miss the D2-Netherlands match), get a dumb yellow, and sit out the 3rd match against D1-Poland to reset his yellow card count. Soccer is the only sport that can deprive its stars from its fans by suspensions in a previous game (although the NBA does have to rule if a bench players steps onto a court during an altercation, he will be suspended one game).
Toast (7th-Tied, 7 pts) was the only one to pick SVK but unfortunately didn't pick FRA (52 did) which left 11 entries getting 2 of 3 games correct. Five went 0-3. 11 picked ROU. 6 are tied for first with 8 points (out of 10 matches) and BlueIsTheColour 3 is last with 3 pts.
Spokane is a neat city in that three major universities have campuses there and today walked to Gonzaga (with their Bulldog statue) and Washington St's Spokane campus (graduate school) (with their Cougar statue). And I just had two days of meetings at Eastern Washington U.'s new Catalyst Center. I wore my 2016 home Austria jersey and actually visited Vienna in 2017.
WATTS NEIGHBORHOOD, LOS ANGELES, CA (smt)- The first round of matches are complete and 11 of the 12 ended up with a winner. Of the 11 winners, only Group E produced upsets with E2-Slovakia, ranked #48 edging #3 E1-Belgium 1-0 and #46 E3-Romania routing world darling #22 E4-Ukraine, 3-0. The only other surprise was the one tie with #57 C1-Slovenia getting a 77' goal to tie #21 C2-Denmark 1-1. Some favorites to win it all showed their prowess with A1-Germany winning 5-1 and B1-Spain winning 3-0 while others struggled to hold onto 1-0 victories (C4-England and D4-France, who didn't even score (own goal)). Defending champ B3-Italy, D2-Netherlands, and F3-Portugal all had to rally from 1-0 deficits to win 2-1. A4-Switzerland and F1-Turkey used stoppage time goals to make it a comfortable 3-1 win vs 2-1. 
