The FIFA World Cup started on Friday following a lavish opening ceremony in the Rainbow Nation. The opening game for me was a good open contest, and to be honest i expected Mexico to walk it. However, as was demonstrated in Japan and Korea 2002, the hosts often experience a boost from playing in front of their own fans. Siphiwe Tshabalala's opening goal could easily be the best first goal of any major tournament, but there was an inevitability to Mexico's equaliser, as i think they demonstrated the greater quality over the whole ninety minutes. I think a draw was probably the fairest result.
Sadly due to a prior commitment i missed the France, Uruguay game. I honestly don't think i missed anything. An aging French team will do well to reach the latter stages of the tournament, and congratulations to Uruguay's Nicolas Lodeiro, who managed two bookings in twenty minutes, to become the first player red-carded in this years tournament. A move to Leeds United surely beckons.
Saturday saw a fun opening game between South Korea and Greece. Fun that is, if you happen to be Korean. The Greek team were woeful, and that is really being nice to them. I described France as an aging team, but you could call the Hellenic players the Ancient Greeks. Their entire team creaked through the whole game, and the younger, more lively Koreans ran rings round their midfield and were unlucky not to win by a greater than 2-0 margin. It was difficult to pick out a stand out performer for the Koreans, but it is notable that for the second goal, the finishing of Park Ji-Sung (complete with inevitable commentary regarding Champions League finals, Patrice Evra etc..) showed more poise than he usually exhibits in the Premiership.
Again, i missed the second game of the day, and frankly the third game of the day i don't really want to talk about. Sufficeth to say that England should have won. Heskey was excellent, linking the play as a big target man should, with Steven Gerrard playing a rare good game for England. Rob Green's world cup on the other hand has, within forty minutes joined a long list of English goalkeeping disasters. Had he laid down full length on the line for Clint Dempsey's speculative drive it would have stayed out. Instead he took his eye off the ball, literally and metaphorically and now shall forever be mentioned over pints of lager, alongside Scott Carson's howler, Paul Robinson's fresh air kick, David Seaman's blunder against Ronaldinho and many others.
From what i have seen England should still have the quality to advance. Given what i have seen from the other groups, Group A is wide open for all four teams and in Group B Maradona's Argentina could be joined by the Koreans if they can overcome the Nigerian Super Eagles. Greece have already won my "Thanks for Coming" award, even up against some of the weaker teams yet to play. The Peoples Republic of Korea may push them close, though of course state media will probably inform the people that they crushed all from the evil capitalist West.
Alongside the onfield action i feel that the officials so far have been outstanding. Very often they are figures of blame but i think all the representatives i have seen have done exceptionally well under extreme pressure to be correct. I am fairly sure that Howard Webb will do his best to dispel this come his first appearance in this years finals.
The only other minor complaint i have is the damn vuvuzelas. They sound like a swarm of angry wasps. I hate wasps.
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