Yeah, I wasn't trying to be disparaging, more a practical observation.

The quality on display has improved since I last watched it a few years ago. I watched Oxford Vs Bristol Rovers League 2 over Christmas and would say the standard on display here (Nigeria Vs France) is around the same level, if not slightly better as the ball spends less time in the air.

Edit: League 1.

By Christ Oxford were bad that day. As this match goes on I'm downgrading my initial assessment. Looking more and more non league with every bad touch/misplaced pass...

Edited by ChrisGC (17 Jun 2019 8.31pm)

I don't hold with the viewpoint that the standard of play generally equates to what you get in Sunday morning football.

The better sides have some very skillful players and I've seen some very neat passages of play. However, I will admit that there have been very few games that have upped my pulse rate. The matches do lack the power intensity of the men's game and quite often the sides have been mismatched.

A problem that seems to afflict a large number of the teams is ineffectiveness in and around the opposition penalty area. All too often you see a poor final pass,a wayward cross, a weak shot or tame header ( by the way I'm still talking about the women's World Cup not Palace )

I can't ever see the women's game ever coming close to having the popularity of men's football but I don't think it deserves to be dismissed out of hand, and I think it will continue to improve.

Being a glutton for punishment I've been watching the first half tonight v Japan....

Negatives:

- Japan must be, collectively, the ugliest team I've ever seen,

- 1 min 47 seconds from ko to actually get the ball into the opposition half must be some kind of record! Looking like some of the older England men's team starts there,

- Given the comments about the size of the goal for women,it's the same for both teams so why are there so few goals scored?

Positives:

- No diving that I've seen so far, and far fewer fouls

- referee doesn't seem too bad, given that she doesn't have that much to do.*

*Actually saw her say to 2 players after a foul to "tone it down, please"... now how many male refs say please?

Also good to see that Japan have a woman trainer (although I suppose we have an 'old woman' as ours)

A stairway to Heaven and a Highway to Hell give some indication of expected traffic numbers

Certainly was very fussy over the re-taking situation.

Have you watched any England Mens games over the past 10 years... SO many have been dull as dishwater.

"It was a Team effort, I guess it took all players working together to lose this one"

Trouble is that they were Japanese players who don't speak a word of English