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Post by Simey on Mar 2, 2010 18:32:17 GMT -5
Sounds alright. Can't say as I'm too fond of my standing either, so we'll go for a restart.
I'll let you take all those gold medals back off the Canadian hockey team though. ;D
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Post by Beowuuf on Mar 2, 2010 18:40:08 GMT -5
Nevr got into the sports, having no real way to watch live. Sorry I didn't get to take part, but definitely well done in coming up with an hosting the whole thing Simey!
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Post by Simey on Mar 2, 2010 18:50:18 GMT -5
Why, thank you. It's been a lot of fun, and a bit of an indulgence on my part when writing mini- - and on one occasion not so mini- - match reports. I don't know enough about this or any other sport to really be doing that, but I enjoyed having a crack at it. Anyway, I'm just really pleased that we had our minimum ideal number of six players to do it - wouldn't've worked otherwise! In combination with actually watching the Olympics, it has, of course, kept me away from the West Watch - something which I must this week rectify....
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Post by Al on Mar 2, 2010 19:07:29 GMT -5
could you tell us what it was like for you watching the final, and how it feels for you and other Canadians for Canada to have won it in Canada? I am not going to speak for BC, but never in my life have I been so excited/anxious/worried/hopeful all at once.
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Post by Black Cat on Mar 3, 2010 1:14:41 GMT -5
I am not going to speak for BC, but never in my life have I been so excited/anxious/worried/hopeful all at once. Me, yes. It was back in 2002 when we won the gold medal for this first time in 50 years. ;D This time, I was very confident in our team. I told you earlier: this team looked the one from 2002: a slow start in the tournament (1 W - 1 L - 1 T), and then the team was unbeatable in the elimination round, gaining momentum after each game. In this game, it was clear that Canada was better than the Americans but since the US team has several young guys compared to the Canadian team, by the end of the third period, it was clear that our old defensive brigade had difficulties to follow the American offensive players. I started to fear: if the Americans can score a second goal by the end of the third period, the momentum will switch and they will win this game. And indeed, they did scored with less than 30 seconds in the game. But to my surprise, right at the beginning of the overtime, the Canadians seemed more aggressive which I think surprised the Americans. And we know the rest: a second effort by both Crosby and Iginla led to a goal that will stick in our collective memory in Canada. I swear: I've jumped and screamed when Crosby scored. And then I left to meet my parents for my birthday supper with them. But I had a good present from Team Canada: a gold medal. If you want to compare what exactly it is for us Canadians to win the gold medal at the Olympics, it is exactly as if your national team had won the World Cup of football/soccer.
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Post by eviltb on Mar 3, 2010 3:22:04 GMT -5
Whoo! Goes to show its not what you know, its who you back! Silver FTW!!!
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Post by jan on Mar 3, 2010 5:25:46 GMT -5
Wow, great, I won the bronze medal, so I'm still in the better half! ;D Congratulations to Black Cat! ;D Thanks to you, Simey, for inventing and leading this competition and for calculating the scores and wonderfully commenting the matches! It was great fun and pleasure for me to take part in it. So - thank you again! It's nice that the original starting / picking order was not important - compare the picking order (Simey - AS - BC - Doomy - ETB - Jan) and the final scores (BC - ETB - Jan - Simey - AS - Doomy). It gives correlation of only -0,257 (sig. 2-tailed 0,623) (both Pearson and Spearman) and this is not a significant relationship. Regarding my two teams: Slovakia really surprised many people, but their team is very old, so the performance of Slovakia on next olympics can be much lower, once the old dogs leave the team. The Czech hockey team is in a deep depression - again, as in many previous cases, we were not able to win against any of the stronger teams (except the first match with Slovakia), and any significant improvement is not in sight within next four years. Our golden times (Nagano 1998, three world championships in a row, etc.) are over for us for now.
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Post by Black Cat on Mar 3, 2010 12:55:58 GMT -5
Right, I should thank Simey for holding (and commenting!) this tournament. Also, thanks to every players for taking part in this. We'll see you in 4 years!
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Post by Doomy on Mar 3, 2010 14:15:37 GMT -5
Absolutely, Simey did a great job. Thanks everyone!
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Post by Simey on Mar 4, 2010 14:19:15 GMT -5
Cheers guys! Had I been wittering away to myself, it would have been pointless, so I much appreciate the participation and comments of your good selves. It's nice that the original starting / picking order was not important Yeah, thanks for pointing that out. ( ) A very good description! Made me laugh, that did. ;D Yeah, except you actually have a team that can win at hockey! The U.K. has four football teams (England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland) for all of whom winning the World Cup is something of a pipe dream. I mean, England - typically the strongest of the four - is always talked up as a potential winner, but when it comes down to it they're just not terribly good. I don't take enough notice of football to know for sure, but I think the issue appears to be that there's too much emphasis on club football for them to have the oppotunity to gel as a national team. Anyway, much though I most likely will watch a bit of the action from South Africa this summer, I think I'd be more excited if the U.K. simply managed to qualify for the next Winter Olympic hockey tournament than if England do well at the World Cup. The national (ice) hockey side is gradually improving, but it's such a minority sport that to get into a competition with only the best twelve teams represented is always going to be tough.
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Post by Black Cat on Mar 4, 2010 17:12:48 GMT -5
Ha, well, the Great Britain is currently ranked 24th in the world. To be part of the Olympics, it should had won its Pre-Qualification division (a small tournament with only four teams) that would had allowed them to take part to the Qualification tournament(another tournament with only four teams) where it should had won it. Germany, Latvia and Norway won their respective divisions in the Qualification tournament and took part in the Olympics.
You never know: there were 14 teams at the Nagano and Salt Lake City Olympics, so maybe one day they'll bring back that format. Or maybe the UK will host the Winter Olympics one day after three summer games in London.
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Post by Doomy on Mar 4, 2010 17:28:35 GMT -5
Or maybe the UK will host the Winter Olympics one day after three summer games in London. Doubtful in the extreme. For one thing, winter sports aren't sufficiently popular in the UK. Also, there is a distinct lack of mountains in the London area and the likes of Aviemore (Scotland's main skiing resort) doesn't quite have the infrastructure to support something as massive as the Olympics.
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Post by Beowuuf on Mar 4, 2010 18:03:12 GMT -5
Maybe Donald Trump would let everyone fly in his personal jet and stay on his golfcourse near Aberdeen.
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Post by Simey on Mar 4, 2010 18:31:00 GMT -5
The Winter Olympics in the U.K.? Yikes. They were having to import snow even to the Vancouver games, so I heard - you'd have to import a whole different climate - and probably build bigger mountains - to hold them in the U.K.! ;D True, whlst Germany and Norway would, I imagine, be very stiff competition for the GB team, if little Latvia can make it into the Olympics, there is perhaps hope. But then as part of the former Soviet Union, they probably still have a much stronger recent hockey tradition than we do here. Seventy or eighty years ago when lakes and stuff actually froze for prolonged periods in winter there was possibly more general playing of the sport. The Earth warms up, our lakes stay wet, we can only play hockey indoors, and we don't have all that many permanent ice rinks: we lose the tradition to a great extent. Okay, so global warming sucks for many more significant reasons, but it's probably made us worse at hockey, which is definitely a reason to be concerned about it, I reckon. Was he allowed to build that? I thought it was going to be ruining acres of natural dunes and stuff? Did the fact that he has insane amounts of cash to wave at people put aside concerns about the environment, perchance? And if you are gonna trash a beautiful natural landscape, the least you could do would be to do it for a decent sport!
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Post by Doomy on Mar 4, 2010 18:58:34 GMT -5
The SNP Government at Holyrood took a bribe was persuaded to overturn Aberdeen City Council's initial refusal of planning permission.
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