Fully agree. If Italy played like they did at WC '82 in Spain, I’d be one of their biggest fans. But watching 11 bats hanging from the goalposts really really turns me off. Never mind the theatrics that normally accompany the display.
Heck, I’m still bitter about Tassoti’s blatant elbow to Luis Enrique’s nose at USA '94. What makes it worse, he was suspended for nine games upon after-match reviews and never played for Italy again. Even worse I was at Foxborough that day – hard to forget; along with inept Salina’s miss which lead to Baggio’s winning score…
I am impressed with my adopted team - Der Mannschaft. Her Highness the SYSTEM is back and is fed with youth and purpose.
Two more observations:
18 goals in 11 matches, this far - 1.64 goals a game. I do not remember it being this bad. Is it the new ball? That would explain goalkeepers’ follies. But why are the big guns quiet? Where are the scorers? Are they all stupefied by these annoying vuvuzelas that turn brain into moosh?
How bad is Greece? And how could we (the Ukrainian National team) lose to them in the play-offs? Depressing…
As a hard-core defender, I rather enjoy catenaccio. The point of football is neither scoring nor entertaining the fans. It’s all about winning. And if you manage to prevent the other team from scoring, chances are you will win.
My footy viewing will be somewhat curtailed today as it’s my wife’s birthday, and I thought I should take her out for dinner rather than watching Brazil v Korea.
I will get to see NZ v Slovakia though - woohoo… (and at least half of the second match, depending when se gets home from work).
I think, there is more than one reason for the apparent lack of goals so far. The ball might be one but every national team participating in South Africa received it some time ago to get used to it; it was also already in play during the Africa Cup 2010 in Angola, a couple of leagues worldwide and a lot of friendlies. I am sure that the players are correct in stating that the ball behaves differently but there is no excuse for unfamiliarity for any player since everyone had ample time to test it thoroughly.
The noise is definitely distracting and has a negative effect on communication on the field. It’s impossible to give commands and it’s easier for an opponent to steal the ball from behind because you can’t warn your team member with a single shout. It might also have an impact on concentration in general but, otoh, the teams don’t seem to lack it in their defensive efforts (as long as they are not exhausted by their running games).
Which, imo, points to the main culprit: the teams who already consider themselves the underdog in a game concentrate quite successfully on the destruction of the opponent’s gameflow while the stronger teams have yet to find their attacking rhythm. The only larger win so far was greatly helped by the wrong defensive strategy; and Argentina could have won with two, three or four goals made if Messi and Higuain hadn’t missed their chances.
And two teams who should be offensive powers seem to have too many issues among each other or/and with the coach to work properly: France and Cameroon.
Oh well, I’ll keep my fingers crossed that Portugal and Spain will entertain us with beautiful attacks and I am quite confident that we’ll see better football after the initial round of games.
Yeah, even worse than I expected. They implemented Rehhagel’s defensive strategy perfectly a couple of years ago but they seem to lack the unity as a team and discipline to make it work one more time.
I don’t think 11 games is enough to draw any strong conclusions. Could just be normal random variance?
People have been saying that this World Cup has got off to a slow start, and I guess that’s right, but then I think about the last World Cup which, if I remember rightly, had quite sparkling group stages but then fizzled out a bit.
My sister was a ball girl at the Italy/Paraguay game last night and FIFA really went all out to look after the kids. We knew that the kids were getting kit but didn’t know if they were getting jackets for the cold. Turns out they got two jackets, one waterproof, one lightweight. They also got a tracksuit, socks, boots, shirts, shorts, under shirts, caps and a soccer ball.
The kids come from a local football club, and a number of them live in the nearby squatter camp, those kids just got given more clothing than they will probably ever get again, hundreds of dollars worth of kit just for one nights work. They were also well fed and entertained while they waited for the match to start, and they waited a long time as they got there at 11:30am for the 8:30pm match.
As annoying as FIFA has been with all of its rules and regulations, road closures, advertising restrictions et cetera doing this makes up for a lot of it. Imagine being one of the kids from a poor background, you get to go to a match, something your parents could never afford ever. You get given a kit bag only slightly smaller than yourself, you get more food than you’ve probably ever seen in one place and the holding areas have playstations and other toys you could only dream about. Just for giving these kids this experience, I will put up with the annoyances that FIFA have brought to SA.
Loving the African teams, loving the African enthusiasm and loving the clashes of football cultures on the pitch . . . south American, European, Anglo-Saxon, Eastern, African . . . love it, love it!
Bound to be cautious at this stage, tournament football init, groups now, knock out later.
No? I thought they were big on encouraging National cultural traditions at this World Cup?
@ yendis — I love this practice of allowing under-privileged kids a moment in the spotlight. I don’t mind any kids getting a go, but I’d prefer to see the opportunity go to less fortunate children everytime.
I think I’m becoming a soccer fan. I started out rooting for NZL but SVK won me over. I find it hard to notice the NZL players on the field with their mostly white nondescript uniforms. It’s pretty superficial I know.
I think some of the problems Americans have with soccer could be fixed with more varied camera angles. Not sure how to accomplish that though.
Slovakia really didn’t press much for a security goal after the first one and ended up paying the price. Kudos to New Zealand for snatching something from nothing. Maybe the worst football I’ve seen yet this tournament, saw several mistakes by both sides that went unpunished, but quite a bit of drama. I only saw about half of the match in total. Did get a bit of rooting interest when Jeremy Christie, who plays for my hometown club, subbed on. Great for him as he’s still a quite young player.
I’d almost have to say that it was more a case of they weren’t as much worse than Slovakia as I’d expected. Slovakia did not impress, and you have to expect Paraguay and Italy to advance out of the group.
