After three weeks of football, we are finally on familiar territory as the round of sixteen begins tomorrow. The names are more familiar, the rivalries are steeped in tradition, the football purists will be happy. There are still one or two teams who we would not normally see at this stage and incidentally, two of those are playing today.
In fact,
twelve out of the sixteen top ranked teams according to the rankings of the Evil Empire
have made it through to the last sixteen. The teams who are missing are Ze
Shermans, the Oranjeboom, The Croats and the Spaghetti munchers who did not
even qualify for the tournament.
The first
game sees one of the three host nations and of the three I would say the most
surprising that has made it this far. The land of the Mounties, the lumberjacks,
a nation more interested historically in Ice Hockey then the beautiful game, of
course I am talking about Canada. This
is the furthest they have ever been in a World Cup partly due to the change in
format.
They have
an American manager who likes to sing
and dance on the touchline in a very performative, look at me I am the story kind of way.
Some of his tactics are questionable to say the least, they do have one or two good players who play for
European teams, especially Alphonso Davis from Bayern Munchen, but he was
injured recently and has not featured as much they would have liked.
Their attack
has their best players, the wonderfully named Promise David from Union St
Gilloise, Jonathon David, no relation who plays for Juventus in Italy and Cyle
Larin who plays for Southampton in the English Championship.
Alphonso Canada Star man 
Can he deliver up front?
The
Lumberjacks are up against the Fez Heads from Casablanca. The Fez heads are
ranked sixth in the world and reached the Semi finals in the last world cup.
They are very well organized and should have far too much all round power for
the Lumberjacks to deal with.
Led by their captain Achraf Hakimi, an
integral part of the current European champions Paris Saint Germain, they are
stacked with talent all over the pitch, the other star I will mention is Brahim
Diaz who plays for Real Madrid.
On a sidenote
Hakimi is facing charges for an alleged rape when the world cup is over with
the case due to be heard in Paris.
Diaz the magician 
Hakiki likes to get forward
The second
game sees another surprise team Paraguay take on the Escargot from France. I
use the term jokingly as Les Bleus have definitely not been slow so far. Far from
it, they have been blisteringly quick going forward with a front four which is
the envy of every team in the tournament.
Everyone
goes on about Mbappe and Dembele, but in my eyes the player that makes this
team purr like a Lamborghini is the little lad from Crystal Palace. Born to a
British Nigerian father and a French Algerian mother, he had to decide who he
would represent and sensibly he chose Les Bleus. This young man is just a joy
to watch, the vision he has for some of his passes is just ridiculous.
As a born
Englishman it pains me to see how much talent the current Frogs team has. Another player who is only twenty one is Desire Doue who plays for PSG, he is
another one of the current best players in the world, these two supplying the
aforementioned superstars is why Les Bleus will be so difficult for anyone to
beat.
Olise, oozing skill 
Doue, yes, he can
This game should have been against the old French enemy Le Boche, but Ze Shermans as we all saw are a former shadow of themselves and failed to beat Paraguay, thus meaning Paraguay are playing in this game. Paraguay were very lucky when VAR intervened in their favour to disallow what probably would have been a winning goal for Ze Shermans.
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| Gill will be very busy |
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| Enciso, can he nick another goal? |
I cannot see them troubling Les Bleus in the slightest,
thus giving us a titanic quarterfinal match up between the Fez Heads and the Frogs
Legs.
I’ll be
back on Sunday with the previews of the Samba Kings v the Vikings and the Sombreros
v EnGerLand, both fascinating games.
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