Australia 3 Japan 1; Czech Republic 3 USA 0; Italy 2 Ghana 0

Kevin,

First order of business.

G, you want some clips?

Check out this site:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/world_cup_2006/default.stm

You’ll get all the clips you want.

Right, off to some match reports:

Group F
Australia (say it ain’t so) 3
Japan 1

Yes, we lost. Yes, we lost in a resounding fashion. Yes, we lost and it’s all over for us.
Well, really, thanks for participating and not playing your hearts out. Make sure you write back once you’re back in japan.

Dreadful. The local japanese prediction was that we’re supposed to win against australia, drawa against croatia, and draw against brazil. Brazil was supposed to crush the aussies and the croats in their first 2 games and take it easy on us on the final match (also combined with the fact that the current brazilian squad idolizes zico and they wouldn’t want to throw shit on his face by beating a team that he is managing, it’s ridiculous but true).

So much for that. This is now a worrying trend. Combined with the schooling iran got from nacho land yesterday, it’s game set and match for asia. I now got a sneaky feeling that s korea will progress into the knockout phase, because of the relative wanking quality of their group which includes france (old), switzerland (come on, their swiss), and togo (whatever). Add insult to injury, australia will be joining us asians from the next world cup qualification. I’m so happy that I can’t stop crying.

The match went something like this:

Nakamura floats a sort-of-cross-but-maybe-not into the front of the goal where two japanese strikers and two australian defenders and one australian goalkeeper decides to waltz all at the same time. Something awfully goes wrong and the ball goes untouched and lands sweetly into the back of the goal. The score stays that way until the break, but the roos, led by master hiddink, presses on throughout the 1st half, playing the style of football japan would die for (the ones that always finishes with someone shooting at the goal).

2nd half brings much of the same until cahill drops in for a camio. 8 minutes to go, a long throw from the left creates another waltzing party, but this time, it’s on the japanese end. When the dust clears, cahill has just blasted in a crucial goal. By the way, this was the 1st goal in australian world cup history. Good on them.

2nd goal comes moments later, after cahill hacks off an overlapping jap defenders leg at his end (should have been a yellow and a penalty), he places a ball neatly into the left side of kawaguchi and it hits the left post and good bye japan.

3rd goal...i was in distress and didn’t care. Needless to say, it went in and the annihilation was complete.

Now I’m thinking that japan should lose all their matches so that they can go back and do a mass seppuku in front of all the japanese fans. This “party” will also be attended by the geniuses of the football federation who actually thought that giving free reign to zico for 4 years will make the fucking team fucking better. They will be throwing themselves off from mount fuji hog tied with barbed wire.

Whatever.

Group E
Czech Republic 3
USA 0 (yes, that’s right)

Well, since I lost, you have to lose too. :) That, my friend, is what we call “loser” mentality. Tom, please don’t let your child be anything like me.

This game was, according to the ever so accurate FIFA world rankings (still don’t understand why they have this and how it actually works), it was Number 2 against Number 5 in the world.

Let me tell you that the number 2 played like number 5 and number 5 played like...what number were you again?

Let’s just get the painful stuff out of the way, huh?

My guess was that the Czechs led by the guy who had the same haircut for at least the past decade were a bit too old. The former world footballer of the year, was in a way the same type of player figo once wasy. Lightning pace combined with great vision (he’s white, so let’s say steve nash), and a cannon of a foot and he was one of the key for the czechs recent success in euro 2004. But, with his colleagues koller and poborsky aging rather quietly and barros injured enough to not play in this tournament, I thought the star sprinkled banner was going to survive from this group of death part deux.

There are two things I did not expect. One was that the ageing stars, will still be stars and the team that no one cares about because we’re not number 1 isn’t as good as advertised.

The Czechs completely and I mean utterly and conclusively ripped apart the number 5 team in the world. Number 5, I tell you.

1st goal was rather a doppelgenger of the zihna goal from yesterday. A splendid and delicious cross comes from the right feet of the czech full back and when you got a bald dude who could pass on as a 6 foot 5 neo nazi guy in the air of gelsenkirchen, you best get your punk ass out of the way. And got out of the way he did (he, who shall not be named) and blah, Czech’s go one up.

2nd goal came from courtesy of wenger’s good early summer spending (a mere 8 million quid) and I think this is now the best goal of the tournament (but pirlo might say otherwise, but more on that later ralph nader). It went Nedved, Koller, and Rosicky, but if I said that you wouldn’t understand the sheer beauty of the goal. Nedved gets the ball quite deep on the left flank and crosses into the guy who you don’t want to meet when you are sporting your old skool fubu jacket. Baldy heads it directly out of the box to the bargain (I mean, was he that cheap? He has to be more more than 8 million? Come on now?) of the summer. He takes that ball and thumps it. The ball is struck with no spin and usually this means that the ball will dip at the end. It did just that, but it also had a slider quality to it. But a slider coming from a lhp and really digging into the guys nutsacks. As if were some voodoo power was willing it into the side netting, it just blows past everything in the way for what could be the best goal of the tournament so far. He’s only 8 million...

3rd one was also 8 million, which means that the first one was 4 and this one is 4. But if he scores more then...okay, I’ll stop. Rosicky gets the ball and dribbles straight into the penalty box. With a usa defender hanging onto him like a dried up jizz covered penthouse mag, he goes until I’m telling myself, “please stop, you’re running straight at the goalie and you’re going to get injured and you won’t play for my team next year”. Perhaps it was voodoo, but my fears were unrealized as 8 million (well, 4) strikes a deft outside of his right foot shot just before he gets crumpled by the oncoming goalie.

Game set and soooooooooooooooooooo match.

Don’t worry, you’re still number 5.

Group E
Italy 2
Ghana 0

I will forever remember the day when Albert, his current wife (you’re lucky to have one, son), and moi went to little italy to watch the final of euro 2000. I was pumped up and al was pumped up and therefore I realized that he was there. Kristen on the other hand wasn’t too interested in the football, but since she is a great woman, decided to make sure that albert didn’t get beaten up by tony soprano’s cousin’s father’s 3 year old daughter. The match started and albert, me, and 50 greasy italians were glued to the tv.

I will never forget what happened next. Kristen’s eyes lit up as if albert proposed to him with 41 karat diamond chop sticks. She was enamoured by the sizzling italians. You know, they’re all “olive” skinned, fit as a professional athletes should be, and sporting hair dos which were made illegal at the end of the 80’s. With totti raking his hair after every single botched attempt at goal, I can see some droolage forming around her mouths, but I kept my mouth shut for the fear that their relationship could end because I took them to little italy.

The match, as you may know by now, ended with an emphatic golden goal victory by the french, which concluded their world treble (world cup, confed cup, european cup). This in turn was a budweiser turning point of the match in albert and kristen’s life and nearly 4 years later they were happily married.

Some might say, it was love at boston college, but some might say that the loss of italians shocked her too much that he had to fall in love with the first man in her sight (al).

So, 6 years on, totti and the gang our back.
Although kristen may not approve of totti’s hair (yes, he cut it off), they have reversed the samson and have brough in their A Team against the Ghanans.

Just so you know that the italians have got Toni (31 goals in serie A last season, a triumph not even accomplished by the current dutch manager in his prime), hair man, gillardino, and pirlo. This quartet, in my mind, is the 2nd best quartet only to you know who. In case you are wondering, I’m talking about the saudi arabia quartet of mohammed, mahmud, mohammund, and mohamid.

I also just want to add that the Ghanans were much better than I anticipated. They do remind me a lot of the ivory coast, but to get out of this group will be a miracle on grass. Why would fifa put two great african sides into two of the toughest groups when their next world cup is going to be in africa, I don't fucking know.

1st goal was sweet and not really sour. Maybe it was a bit sour, but just enough to make it really really tasty. A short medium corner from totti is gathered by pirlo, who looks up and sees a sea of blue and black (and white) and decides that he will just launch a torpedo that stayed above water.

And did he.

There are replay on the bbc site (this is for you, g) where the ball goes through at least 74 people (okay, maybe 6) and no one touches the ball before it gets nailed into the back of the ghanaian net. If you haven’t seen that many goals in your life, most goals usually touch body parts before they go in. some of them get greatly change their direction, but most changes ever so slightly and just enough to fool the goalie. But this one did not touch a single person and that in itself was amazin.

Just check it out.

There were other great attempts by toni (bar), totti (bar), and essien (post), but the game was wrapped up by a Iaquinta goal, which was alright.

Italians look the fucking business as well.

Ryu’s “You best get out of my fucking way, because you’re in my fucking way” goal of the day.
This has to goto 8 millions first strike. It was beautiful yet had a hint of budget in it.

Tomorrow we bring you the best team in the world (so they say) against the team who let in only one goal in the quaifiers, cheese feet and the swiss miss squares off couple hours later, and we cap it off with what could be the most anticipated match of the tournament thus far:

Togo v S Korea

Watch it.