Quotes About Competition

The World Cup is a competition in which everything needs to work to your advantage. Players need to be fit, decisions have to go in your favour, and details such as a red card can cost a team dearly.

I was an attacking full-back but was told by Hope Powell to just sit back when we played U.S.A. in the 2007 World Cup. It's hard to rein yourself in, but the team comes first.

You have to show up in the World Cup, and in the World Cup anything can happen.

Everyone wants to be a part of the World Cup and to play for the country.

The best thing to do is to find the type of play to make Italy win the World Cup, and maybe Baggio be the best player.

You cannot compare warm-ups with World Cup games.

The World Cup is the ultimate moment for any player. It is the opportunity to defend your country in the biggest tournament in the world and the moment the whole world will watch you play.

When the U.S. team went on its historic run to the World Cup quarter-finals in 2002, I was thirteen years old. Each game in that run - the astonishing victory against Portugal, the resilient win over Mexico, even the gutsy but unlucky effort against the Germans - propelled me to push my other athletic interests aside and focus only on soccer.

In order to play at the World Cup, I know I have to do well with my club, Athletic.

The World Cup is definitely a good place to show that when you're at Tottenham, you can be a top player.

I think everyone around the world knows the tools are there in England's armoury to do well in a World Cup. The challenge is to go out there and prove it.

The World Cup needs a brilliant Brazilian team.

My best years were 2010 and 2011, and the 2010 World Cup was the most incredible experience. Our tiny nation reached the semi-finals, I finished joint-top scorer in South Africa, and my goal against Germany was voted the best of the tournament. I was also named the best player of that World Cup.

Brazil is well served for goalkeepers, many who have not been to the World Cup are very good.

The dream of every footballer and why we train and work is to reach the top, and a World Cup is the top.

Brazil goes into every World Cup expecting to win - so when it is in Brazil it is expected even more. You can't understand what the World Cup means to our country.

It's the best thing that can happen to a player. Being able to play at the World Cup is already the best, but then to raise the trophy to the sky is a dream.

The Selecao is always treated as favourites, so we're aware of our responsibility, and the goal is always to enter every competition to win, and the World Cup is no different.

The World Cup is a very big event. Every player dreams of playing in one, and it was my dream, too.

People enjoy watching sports at the weekend and watching motor racing and whatever sports, and Formula One is the number one global platform which is competing regularly - not like the Olympic Games or the World Cup - so the macro case was this is something that we should be part of because it's going to grow, and it does.

I think that all the countries that qualify for a World Cup finals deserve respect and if they are there it is because they have won that right.

Winning the Absa Cape Epic already was a wonderful surprise. The World Cup was, for sure, my main goal, but winning all of them was nothing I had planned on.

You think about past World Cups - in 2006, it was a fantastic Brazil team, but we did not do so well that year. In 2010, the same: it did not go far, either - only the quarter-finals. But in '94 and 2002, Brazil did not play the best football but won the World Cup; they found a way to win.

You can evaluate your competitiveness and your potential in international competitions like the World Cup.