SEMIFINAL
ENGLAND VS. CROATIA
Place:Moscow
Time:Beijing Time 2:00 pm, July 12, 2018
Prediction: 2:1 (England will win the game)
Anaylsis:
AlthoughCroatiawasn’t even an independent country until 1991, it has actually been to a World Cup semifinal more recently than England, the country that claims to have invented soccer. Croatia made the final four in 1998, in its World Cup debut, but didn’t get out of the group stage again until this summer.Englandlast reached the semifinals in 1990 – before 16 players on the current team were born.
Croatiaarrived in the semifinals unbeaten although it wasn’t an easy trip. After breezing through group play, Croatia needed 120 minutes, then penalty kicks to beat both Denmark and Russia, making it just the second team to advance in a World Cup knockout stage on consecutive penalty-kick shootouts. Argentina did it in 28 years ago, reaching the final exhausted and losing to West Germany, 1-0.
Croatia’s offense has been spread around, with eight players contributing to the scoring and only Real Madrid’s Luka Modric scoring twice. Danijel Subasic has been outstanding in goal, especially in the two shootouts.
England,meanwhile, has piled up the goals; only Belgium has scored than the Three Lions, who have 11 goals. More than half that offense has come from captain Harry Kane, whose six scores lead the race for the Golden Boot.
England’s only loss came to Belgium in a group-play finale that proved advantageous since it sent the team to the easier side of the knockout bracket. There England needed a shootout to get past a physical Colombia team before brushing aside Sweden in the quarterfinals.
鄭新民教授簡介
鄭新民， 1957年生， 福建省福州市人， 香港大學哲學博士（PhD）,上海外國語大學教授， 博士生導師， 博士后合作導師。 擔任上海市學位委員會第五屆學科評議組成員， 兼任浦江人才計劃評委， 國家留學基金委評委， Language Teaching Research等國際學術刊物匿名評審， 同時還兼任中國英漢語比較研究會外語教師教育與發展專業委員會常務理事。 是美國紐約大學（NYU）和英國利茲大學（University of Leeds）高級訪問學者。 主要研究興趣：應用語言學、外語教育、外語教師認知和外語課堂教學多模態話語等。
英文專著
Changing Pedagogy: Analyzing ELT Teachers in China( London / New York: Continuum, 2008）, 全球著名應用語言學專家David Nunan為該書作序，
中文專著
《語言教育新概念》（北京師范大學出版集團/安徽大學出版社， 2011）， 《信念與追求—走近上外》（北京師范大學出版集團/安徽大學出版社， 2016）， 《英語學術論文寫作之探—來自鄭新民研究團隊的報告》（北京師范大學出版集團/安徽大學出版社， 2017）， 《英語博士成長札記》（北京師范大學出版集團/安徽大學出版社， 2017）。 已在SSCI和CSSCI發表學術論文50余篇。