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Underwhelming but brilliant

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So, it has all started at last and its safe to say that Group A has officially underwhelmed. I'm still waiting for an opening match to beat the Cameroon vs Argentina match in 1990.

The BBC in its bizarrely inane and misguided commentary efforts (rarely are they made to look inferior to ITV) said that the teams all looked evenly matched! Not so. It looked pretty plain to me that even vuvuzelas won't save South Africa. Sure their goal was great, a fitting start to any World Cup, but they offered very little. They are athletic but lack talent (Pienaar aside Stevey). Mexico should have slaughtered them, and in not doing so have essentially consigned themselves to an early exit.

And so to France v Uruguay, both former winners. Though it turned out to be pretty tedious, it was clear these two teams were a cut above. Uruguay sharp in their passing and potentially threatening, and France with their wealth of talent just waiting to come to life. The draw for these two teams was a good result for them both.

Star men of the day:
  • Tshabalala for his amazing opening goal
  • Abou Diaby for playing like the lovechild of Viera and Zidane
  • Dos Santos for doing his hair like Ronaldinho (and showing some skills like him too)
  • and Perez of Uruguay for being hard as nails and having an arm that looks like he put it through a bacon slicer.

Dross of the day:
  • Mexico's Blanco for being ridiculously old and immobile, and visibly getting a stitch than three minutes after coming on as a sub.
  • Suarez of Uruguay for being offside every time he took an inward breath
  • Govou of France for keeping Malouda, Henry, Gignac all out of the side despite being an odd combination of Trevor Sinclair and Homer Simpson.
I sign off today with a prediction. A keeper is definitely going to get caught out and concede a random goal from a back pass or punt upfield. The new ball is pretty bouncy and some keeper or other is going to run straight underneath one. That's my lot for today...need to steel myself for S Korea vs Greece (a test if ever there was one).

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