Standard disclaimer: Based on the matches I saw and not all matches
Lets deal with the England situation first. England qualified last week for the second round last week which was expected by their followers to act like a tonic. However the tonic seemed to have been mixed with too much gin. The way they succumbed to Germany was a rude shock to the diehard England supporter, but quite expected by everyone else. Germany after a shock defeat in the league stage (to Serbia), seemed to be finding their feet. More on this later.
Brazil, the golden boys of world football seemed to be doing no wrong. Dunga's strategy of having a solid defense combined with attacking flair (maybe flair may be putting it a bit too strong, but at least effectiveness has to be granted), seemed to be the magic formula for Brazil to regain lost glory. Their match against Chile was much anticipated. Chile started very well and for the first ten minutes had the upper hand, but Brazil stood strong. The tide started turning after the first goal and the second goal by Fabiano in the second half put the dagger in. Chile seemed dispirited by it and the third goal just served to emphasize Brazil's domination of the game.
The Spain-Portugal match promised much, however Portugal could not live up to expectations and had to bow out. Cristiano Ronaldo will have to await his turn on the world stage (all in all this is turning out to be a bad world cup for big name stars, some of whom missed out because of injury and others have had to swallow the bitter pill of defeat). For my money the most skillful goal of the tournament has been scored by Ronaldo in their 7-0 decimation of North Korea, the way he effortlessly dribbled the ball on his back before casually tapping it home is a treat to watch (in case you missed it, it can be seen on YouTube here).
Ghana survived as the lone African nation in the round of 8, with 5 South American teams and 3 from Europe. Japan was unlucky to lose to Paraguay (to lose on penalties seems a cruel way to lose the game), however given that the teams were locked 0-0 after extra time, imho, both teams had not done enough to be deserving winners.
To round off the other matches, Argentina had the measure of Mexico, while the Dutch quietly booked their place in the round of 8 to setup their match with Brazil. And so, on to the quarter-finals.
The Brazil-Netherlands match was expected to be well fought with the Netherlands succumbing to the legacy of Brazilian football at the end. It all seemed going according to script after Brazil scored the first goal and the celebrations were already starting in Rio. The Oranje though remained mentally strong and the equalizer after the break (though Brazil will blame themselves for it for the way their goalkeeper was unsighted), meant that the match was evenly poised. This is when Dunga's strategy started to unravel and Brazil's hitherto strong defense suddenly started looking shaky with Dutch raid after raid. The second Dutch goal actually was a fair reflection of the way both sides were playing and based on the performance on the day, the Dutch were deserving winners and Brazil were left facing the long flight back home and the disappointment of their fans (not just in Brazil but world wide - yours truly included).
Uruguay - Ghana. I did not watch the entire match, the early moments did not seem to be taking the match to any great heights. It came alive in the dying moments and the ball handling by Suarez meant that Ghana needed to convert the penalty to go ahead. The penalty was missed Ghana lost on the tie-break and the miss of the penalty kick is something which will take them a long time to forget.
Argentina vs Germany was also a very widely anticipated match. I thought that Argentina, though they had played well earlier had not been stretched, except for the first match against Nigeria, which they must have written off as a bad dream. However, the nightmare was yet to come. Germany started the match strongly and their hard running was taking its toll on Argentina. Messi was hardly visible in the first half and the early goal meant that the onus was on Argentina to take the fight to the Germans. The first half ended with chances on either side and setup the match nicely for the second half. If Argentina expected the Germans to run out of steam, they had reckoned without Schweinsteiger was a livewire on the field and well supported by Podolski, Mueller, Boateng and Lahm. Miroslav Klose is as dangerous a striker as any in the world and was always half a step away from scoring, Ozil (my favourite player from earlier matches, I am sure he will leave his mark in the SF and beyond) seemed a little off colour. Germany slowly started dominating after the second half started and the brace of goals mid-way through knocked the stuffing out of Argentina. Messi, Tevez and di Mario tried hard, but were unable to combine well to pierce the German defence which made no mistakes. The 4-0 final score was a drubbing that Maradona would not have anticipated and what seemed like a bad dream was turned into harsh reality when the final whistle was blown. The two favourites from Week 1 have now been knocked out.
On to the last match of Week 3 - Paraguay - Spain. Paraguay was competing well all through the match, though Spain looked a little more organized and dangerous in offense, however the Ghana bogey of a penalty miss struck Paraguay. For Spain, Villa and Xavi played well and Villa justified his star billing by scoring the only goal of the match.
This sets up the semis nicely, Uruguay vs the Dutch and Germany vs Spain. If current form is anything to go by, the final will be Germany vs Holland, a fair reward for both teams.
Some observations on matches to date. One of the inexplicable aspects of this World Cup has been the really poor taking of free kicks from outside the box. Invariably the ball has shot way over the goal, the same holding for the booming shots being taken from outside the box during the course of play. This leads me to think that the criticism of the Jabulani ball is somewhat justified, otherwise there is no explanation for free kick specialists to be so consistently wide off the target. Some more information, including player reactions to the ball are here.
On to the final stage.
1 comment:
"This leads me to think that the criticism of the Jabulani ball is somewhat justified..."
I think FIFA is finally saying that they will check this matter, after refusing to accept any earlier criticism saying that teams have been playing with this ball since last December.
One of the Klose's shot in the first half against Argentina, I felt like the ball indeed played some trick - it simply flies upward in so many cases. Adidas is the designer and manufacturer of this Jabulani ball, the company is German and major sponsorer of the German national team. Understandably, all along German Team has been maintaining that everything is fine with this ball!
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