{"id":1259,"date":"2026-07-18T07:09:46","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T07:09:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/?p=1259"},"modified":"2026-07-18T07:12:29","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T07:12:29","slug":"om-world-cup-diary-37","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/om-world-cup-diary-37\/","title":{"rendered":"GOM World Cup Diary #37 Third Place… First Loser?"},"content":{"rendered":"

GOM World Cup Diary #37 Third Place… First Loser?<\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n

Whatever Happened To Knowing When It’s Over?<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

I’ve never really understood the Third Place Play-off.<\/p>\n

Perhaps it’s just me.<\/p>\n

After all, I’m a grumpy old man.<\/p>\n

But if you’ve spent four weeks dreaming of lifting the World Cup, losing a semi-final and then being told, “Never mind, you’ve got one more game to decide who finishes third,” it all feels a little… underwhelming.<\/p>\n

Imagine climbing a mountain, slipping a few feet from the summit and then being handed a certificate for reaching the scenic viewpoint.<\/p>\n

Nice.<\/p>\n

But not quite what you had in mind.<\/p>\n

England and France both arrived believing they could reach Sunday’s Final.<\/p>\n

Instead, they’ll be asked to lace up their boots one more time for a match that neither of them really wanted to play.<\/p>\n

I’m sure both managers will say all the right things.<\/p>\n

“It’s important to finish strongly.”<\/p>\n

“We owe it to the supporters.”<\/p>\n

“The players remain fully motivated.”<\/p>\n

Well, they have to say that, don’t they?<\/p>\n

The truth is that if you’d offered both squads a flight home the morning after their semi-final defeats, I suspect the departure lounge would have been rather busy.<\/p>\n

To be fair, there are positives.<\/p>\n

Players who haven’t featured much finally get their chance.<\/p>\n

Youngsters gain valuable experience.<\/p>\n

Supporters get another opportunity to watch their team.<\/p>\n

There’s nothing wrong with any of that.<\/p>\n

It just doesn’t feel like the ending anyone was hoping for.<\/p>\n

And then there’s the little matter of modern football’s never-ending calendar.<\/p>\n

By the time this World Cup finishes, many of these players will have been going almost non-stop for the best part of a year.<\/p>\n

Club football.<\/p>\n

European competitions.<\/p>\n

International qualifiers.<\/p>\n

The World Cup.<\/p>\n

Somewhere along the line, football stopped asking players to perform and started asking them to endure.<\/p>\n

Of course, FIFA will tell us every match matters.<\/p>\n

Another game.<\/p>\n

Another full stadium.<\/p>\n

Another global television audience.<\/p>\n

Another celebration of the world’s greatest sport.<\/p>\n

Funny how all those wonderful sentiments also happen to come with another set of tickets sold and another evening of television coverage.<\/p>\n

I’m sure that’s purely coincidental.<\/p>\n

Nobody grows up dreaming of finishing third.<\/p>\n

Children don’t run around the garden pretending to lift the Third Place Trophy.<\/p>\n

They dream of the Final.<\/p>\n

They dream of the winner’s medal.<\/p>\n

Everything else is simply what’s left.<\/p>\n

Still, the whistle will blow, the match will be played and somebody will finish third.<\/p>\n

Whether anyone remembers who that was in ten years’ time is another matter entirely.<\/p>\n

Anyway, what do I know?<\/p>\n

I’m just a grumpy old man.<\/p>\n

Drop a comment so I know I\u2019m not the only one suffering through this tournament.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

GOM World Cup Diary #37 Third Place… First Loser? Whatever Happened To Knowing When It’s Over? I’ve never really understood the Third Place Play-off. Perhaps it’s just me. After all, I’m a grumpy old man. But if you’ve spent four weeks dreaming of lifting the World Cup, losing a semi-final and then being told, “Never […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1262,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[81,13,53,82,111],"tags":[213,125,89,177,176,79,98,90,214,102,106],"class_list":["post-1259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football","category-grumpy-old-man","category-humour","category-soccer","category-world-cup-2026","tag-3rd-place-play-off","tag-england","tag-fifa","tag-football-humour","tag-france","tag-grumpy-old-man","tag-modern-football","tag-sports-commentary","tag-sports-opinion","tag-world-cup-2026","tag-world-cup-diary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1259"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1259\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1264,"href":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1259\/revisions\/1264"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1262"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davethomasonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}