To both your points: no, this is not just apathy. The bottom three teams did try to put up a fight in the first round.
To your first point, the second link gives examples of this in games people choose to play on their own.
To your second point, why did they give up in the second round, rather than form a block of losers? In particular, Austria supported Russia in the first round, so why didn’t Russia support Austria in the second?
Because once they saw that everyone else was following the lead of the ASB guys, they didn’t want to force the issue (social confrontation) because they didn’t care enough about the game?
To both your points: no, this is not just apathy. The bottom three teams did try to put up a fight in the first round.
To your first point, the second link gives examples of this in games people choose to play on their own.
To your second point, why did they give up in the second round, rather than form a block of losers? In particular, Austria supported Russia in the first round, so why didn’t Russia support Austria in the second?
Because once they saw that everyone else was following the lead of the ASB guys, they didn’t want to force the issue (social confrontation) because they didn’t care enough about the game?