The World Cup has had no shortage of action this year. The tournament started off a little slow and goal scoring was few and far between, as were phantom calls by the referees, but all that has changed. At least the goal scoring part.
Portugal and Argentina have been the most impressive teams in my mind so far, but here are some assessments of the tournament.
The Vuvuzelas have grown on me. In the beginning of the tournament, it was the general consensus of Americans that the Vuvuzelas had to go. At this point, however, I have embraced the annoying horns as part of the game, and it is almost white noise to me.
The countries of Africa have more heart than the rest of the pack. Even though Cameroon and Ivory Coast have been eliminated, both teams played like their lives were on the line. The Ivory Coast truly deserves to be one of the 16 teams remaining, however with Portugal and Brazil in their group, it couldn’t have been tougher to advance.
Tying is not the same as winning. A lot of fans seem to forget this and will celebrate when their team has a draw with an opponent. New Zealand technically did not lose a game (tied all three) and were eliminated.
When it comes to most impressive continent in this world cup, the winner is without a doubt South America. At this point in the tournament, Brazil is the favorite to win it all, but every South American team has been on cruise control to the second round. Yesterday, Argentina put on a dominant performance against Mexico.
You don’t always need a superstar. While Kaka and his Brazilians, and Mesi and his fellow Argentinians march on, there are several teams that remain that do not have a superstar on their team (at least not to the average spectator). As far as I’m concerned the biggest names in this tournament are Kaka, Mesi, Christiano Ronaldo, Didier Drogba, and Wayne Rooney. Only two of the aforementioned players’ teams still remain in this World Cup, while teams like Paraguay and Uruguay without marquee players march on.
Finally, a note must be mentioned about how terrible France’s performance was. Since Henry’s handball in the qualifier, it had been nothing but turmoil for this team. They could not get it together at any point, and eventually threw in the towel, refusing to even practice prior to their last game. What happened to good sportsmanship?