Each day of the World Cup I will give you a quick and dirty preview of the teams that will play each day. I will base all of this information on FIFA 10 and stereotypes. And irrational hatred. Because that is what soccer is all about. Well, that and the whole rioting thing.
Honduras vs. Chile: Those Hondurans owe their existence in this World Cup to the US. When we scored two late goals to tie Costa Rica, we bumped Hondo into the Cup and forced Costa Rica into a playoff against one of the Guays. Being a fellow CONCACAF team, we gotta respect Hondo, but man do I love Chile. Especially green chile. Mmmmm Green Chile /Homer
This game is a tale of two Suazos, as Humberto Suazo, the leading scorer in the CONMEBOL (i.e. South America) region returns for Chile, while David Suazo, the Honduran forward will miss the game. Another costly injury for the Hondruas is to their other leading goal scorer Carlos Costly (see the pun in that sentence?).
Leading Chile is wonder-kin Alexis Sanchez. He is really good, and allegedly 21, but knowing those tricky Latins, probably like 47.
Spain vs. Switzerland: Come ye and bathe in the glory that is Fernando Torres. El Nino is simply put the best. Fuck what I said yesterday bout Drogs and Ronaldo, or what you've heard about Messi, they can suck a dick. Torres, when healthy, is the shit.
But since he is just returning from injury, he might not even start for Spain. Yeah, they are that loaded. If you watch a bit of futbol or play FIFA, you will recognize the Spanish stars; Fabergas, David Silva, David Villa, Iniesta, Xavi, Xabi Alonso, Sergio Ramos, Puyol, Pique. Shit, this team is so deep that Pepe Reina is backup Iker Casillas and would probably start for every other team in the Cup.
And yet somehow they lost to the US last year. Which is why they are not prohibitive favorites, because Spain has a bigger history of choking than even England. Or maybe had, as this group won the Euro Cup in 2008, breaking a half-century title drought in the process.
They should stomp everyone in this group, especially the Swiss, we better enter this battle with their knives and watches if they want any chance. Oh, and their best player may be injured. They are so fucking fuct.
South Africa vs. Uraguay: Onto the second slate of group play matches. This one will be pretty important, as every team in Group A is tied after their first match. The Bafana Bafana will be buzzin their Vuvuzelas on some important South African holiday, so basically Uraguay is uber-fucked by karma here. Still, Diego Forlan loves to kick people in the teeth with bigtime goals and UR-A-Gay loves to play collapsing, defensive soccer, so they may be able to frustrate the hosts and steal this one.
I hope that South Africa jumps up early and forces Uraguay to chase the game, opening up the field for a much needed fast-paced game.
Recap
New Zealand 1, Slovakia 1: A pretty boring match for much of it, but it got real fun at the end. Winston Ried sucked and failed to defend on Vittek's goal, then, just in the nick time he went and totally fucking redeemed himself. Guess what? We now have two groups where all teams tied their first games. In this, even more impressive, all scored one goal. Maybe Lance Moorman is right.
Aside: He is not. In a game that lasts 90 minutes, players don't have much left in the tank to play more, especially when they will play again in 5 days. You can't have overtime in the first round and shootouts are really just a crap shoot (I'll have more on this later in the Cup). It is too big of a punishment to fall three points behind your opponent after you played them evenly for a full game.
Teams will settle for a tie in the first round, especially the first game, and though it sucks at the time, it really sets up for much greater drama in the final games in the group stage. By the time we get to the final matches of the group stage the two games are played simultaneously, so things get fucking hectic. Imagine every team in Group F going into the last game all-square on points and goal differential. Think that wouldn't be crazy, with every goal not only impacting that game, but another game going on across the country. Crazy awesomeness.
This happens all the time, where (hypothetically) the US is tied 0-0 with Slovenia and just needs to keep the match tied in order to advance, because England is beating Algeria 1-0. But suddenly in the '88 Algeria scores. The US hears about this from text message or something, and suddenly they have to crank up their attack in order to pull out the win to advance. Glorious sports bar theater right there.
That shit doesn't happen without the option of ties.
Portugal vs. Ivory Coast (Nil-Nil): A boring first half, only stimulated by cock-tease Ronaldo jamming on off the post and falling down when breathed upon. A much more entertaining second still saw no goals, as Drogs cunted up a late chance after heroically coming on as a sub.
Brasil 2, Communist Korea 1: North Korea bunkered in like they did during the Korean War and it took Brazil over a half to figure them out. Finally, Maicon scored from no-angle, a stunning goal that yet again I'm sure I could have stopped. Brazil added another, and then just let some little Korean zip on through for the easiest goal of the tournament. Not sure what that was all about. Didn't really matter, but it shows there is a chink in the mighty Brazil armor, which perhaps Ronaldo and Drogba may be able to go as well.
*Bonus: Did you notice I used both chink and zip in that recap, with neither in a racist manner. Aren't you proud?
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