Third Top 3 (12/17)

CERRITOS, CA - 2F-Croatia and 1F-Morocco played a very entertaining first half before wearing out in the second half as CRO held on to their 2-1 halftime lead to win their second 3rd place finish ('98) to go along with 2014's second-place finish.  A couple of header goals by each team before the ten-minute mark set the pace.  The final CRO goal was a perfectly placed strike that went off the right post and into the net.  The sad thing is we didn't get to see MAR's coach Walid Regragui get tossed in the air by his players one last time.  So it remains the only non-European/South American team to finish in the top 3 is --- USA in 1930 (only retroactively placed in 1986 by FIFA, with better GD over other semifinal loser YUG).

So the closest related jersey I had, to support MAR and Africa's first semifinalist, is my 2010 South Africa away jersey where I wore to take a pic of the pink sushi statue outside Magic Touch Bullet Train sushi restaurant, one of the very few places where the prices on Uber Eats (pickup) is the same as the menu price.  The only bad thing is that any specials do not show up in the app, but those are few and far between.

The most important part of the 3rd place match no one cares about is the total goals scored in that match as it is 1 of 2 games that count towards the total goals tiebreaker (reminder: penalty shootout goals do not count).  The 3 goals helps those who picked a higher tiebreaker as the tiebreaker will be in play twice for the top 5, regardless which team wins.

For the Bonus, three entries have been eliminated with the totals goal standing at 3 (Union F & Cisco in pole position (if ARG wins) as is MezLove (if FRA wins) for now).

If ARGENTINA beats FRANCE in Final…

Inconceivable!  1.0 8-UEFA Wins if 0-1 Union FC 2.5 8-UEFA Wins if 2, 2-way tie if 3 Cisco 3.5 8-UEFA 2-way tie if 3 Firewire, Krob1, MLS Original Stats 4.0 8-UEFA 3-way tie if 4 No Fue Penal 5.0 8-UEFA Wins if 5 MessiMisionImposible, Sebass, Wood 6.0 8-UEFA 3-way tie if 6 Kds911 7.0 8-UEFA Wins if 7 Chris 2, Empire, Kds911-3 8.0 8-UEFA 3-way tie if 8 Free Merman 9.5 8-UEFA Wins if 9-10 Indy Ari 11.0 8-UEFA Wins if >=11 If FRANCE beats ARGENTINA in Final… GolfMomBernice 0.5 9-UEFA Wins if 0, 2-way tie if 1 Maitai 1.5 9-UEFA 2-way tie if 1, Wins if 2 Mezlove 3.0 9-UEFA Wins if 3 Mimi 4.0 9-UEFA Wins if 4 FlyingElvi, Messi's Last Stand, Salah, Thanh 5.0 9-UEFA 4-way tie if 5 Arabian Bribes 6.0 9-UEFA Wins if 6 Do Believe in Ties, EEChick1400 7.0 9-UEFA 2-way tie if 7 Bwakewey 2, Chris 1, Thecomebacker 8.0 9-UEFA 3-way tie if 8 AC in Doha, Ronaldinho 9.0 9-UEFA 2-way Tie if >=9