A comment from someone in the US, who now gets football/soccer games on one cable channel. (Including many of the European leagues). I am just beginning to learn how the game works and appreciate some of the 'finer' points, though I cannot possibly keep up with the socio-political nuances of the entire scene.
Also, there are a HUGE number of teams, leagues, players,etc. to keep track of BBC sports sometimes gives rundowns of the latest action, and I can't imagine how anyone can follow the details.

I did watch about half of the game, having discovered it was being re-run late, and thus I knew who the winner was to be as I watched.

Several points:
1)I also hate to see serious games and major championships decided on shoot-outs, as many of these are simply the goalkeepers 'luck' in deciding which way to move. Unfortunately, in a sport in which scores are relatively low, ties are common, and playing extra time until a sudden death goal could take all day. (In the US, baseball has 'extra-innings', and there ARE games which take an extra hour or two...but the players are not running constantly). I see no easy solution except to have more goals scored...perhaps by making the net wider??- but I doubt that would be popular.
2)I DO wonder why, in such a sport, championships are decided by single games. In baseball, football, basketball, hockey, top teams in various leagues play a series where there are 5-7 games. If one team has a bad night, they 'can' redeem themselves. It is still possible for the final games of a 7 game series to be decided by one lucky bounce, but it is also possible for a top team to win a series 4-0 or 4-1 and leave little doubt.
3)About fouls. I remember in the World Cup a few years ago, when one of the Baltic teams (Serbia?) played like ...well... like some fans, with the intent of being as dirty as they could get away with. I like the idea of football/soccer better than I like many of the ways it is expressed. (I do not watch hockey at all because hitting & fighting are treated as part of the routine, and seldom watch American football because 'hitting' is WAY too much of the action, and injuries are often intentional.) In soccer/football, it is inevitable that some contact happens, but the sport is supposed to be about kicking/heading the ball, not each other, and I don't comprehend blatant fouls OR stupid attempts at 'tackles' where a player makes a leaping slide at a ball where little gain can be expected! Possession changes rapidly anyway...why risk a card or injury when the odds of success are so small?
4)Offsides: I barely understand how they are determined. I do see that it is treated as 'cheating' to have a player sneak downfield, but might the attitude be changed to make that 'strategy'? Surely defenses could be altered to fit. This 'might' be one way to increase goals and have fewer shoot-outs.
5)About 'ethnic diversity' in teams. That seems to be the way all major sports are going. Even cycling teams are 'assembled' using money to get the best result, and ONLY in the World Cup can pride in football be expressed about one's countrymen.....and even then, we see players who have changed citizenship. (I gather Drogma is changing teams after this season?)

(It's a good thing we don't have a Cricket channel....yet.... that sport is TOTALLY incomprehensible to me! ☺)