Group stages are finished, now it is the money time.

 

The group stages are over, and the real tournament can begin. The expansion of the tournament to 48 teams provided us with some fairytales such as tiny Curacao, the Orange Liqueur from the Caribbean, actually getting one point and also scoring a goal against Ze Shermans.

The biggest surprise has been another Island nation, this time the Blue Sharks from Cape Verde, actually qualifying for the knockout stage, by managing to draw all three of their games including against Espana. The reward for the Blue Sharks is a game against Los Gauchos and Messi.

The Jocks duly provided the tragedy we predicted as result after result went against them and they eventually finished as the eleventh placed third team, with only the top eight advancing. The Tartan Army has been magnificent and will be missed especially by the owners of pubs and bars across the continent.

The Ayatollahs also went home after a nail biting conclusion to the game between the Strudels and the ex-French colony of Algeria. Algeria scored in the fifth minute of injury time and in Teheran they were dancing in the streets and prostrating themselves to Allah, only for the Strudels to score a minute later sending the Ayatollahs home. 

This type of mood swing is common.

The three host nations all advanced although the lumberjacks lost their home field advantage, more about them shortly. The US of A have on paper an easy looking run to the quarter finals, so now the pressure is on.

The Sombreros utilizing their home field advantage to the full were one of only three teams to win all three of their group games, the others being Los Gauchos and Les Bleus, so they are in pretty good company. The two latter teams have so far been the standout teams along with the Oranjeboom.

Of the other usual suspects, we shall go into more detail when we preview their actual games but suffice to stay there were no major upsets for the so called big teams, even if they all did not look that good at times.

Of the teams we mentioned as being dark horses, the Samurai boys, the Fez heads and the Vikings are all looking good. and do not be misled by the battering the Frog legs gave to Odin’s boys, The Vikings played a second string team resting ten players for the clash.

To conclude this part, an interesting, in my eyes at least, stat. Nine of the ten African teams advanced, whereas only two from the nine Asian teams managed to do so and I feel that Australia as a continent in its own right is not really Asia and even Japan as an island race is also not.

So, what do we have to look forward to. There are sixteen games in this round and there are some absolute corkers scattered amongst them such as the Oranjeboom against the Fez heads. The Samba Kings against the Samurai and as mentioned above the fairytale clash between the Blue Sharks and the Argies. The Vikings against the pianists from Cote D’Ivoire will also be an interesting clash.

There are also a number of games that will only interest the residents of the respective countries playing in them, such as the Pharaohs versus the Wallabies and the game which opens this round tonight between the lumberjacks and Bafana Bafana.

This game is a difficult one to call, Bafana Bafana, looked awful in their opening game and not very good in their second game scrapping a draw with a late penalty and then winning one nil in their last game against the very poor K Pop demons.

The Lumberjacks were not much better, drawing their first, destroying the hapless Qataris in their second and losing when the Canadian goalie had more holes than the Swiss cheese he was playing against. This game is good ammunition for those opposed to the expansion of the tournament.

If the lumberjacks were playing this at home, I would favour them but as it is being played in Los Angeles, I am not sure who to pick. The fact is that whoever wins will be facing the Fez heads or the Oranjeboom and that will be that.  This game could go to extra time and even penalties, and as I am not allowed to sit on the fence, I will go with Canada.

Tomorrow, we have two good games to preview, so until then, adios,

Round two summary and a look ahead to the crunch matches in the final round of group games

Welcome back to a short review of the second round of group games and a look forward to the things to play for in the final round of group games which begins today.

Two of the teams who I picked as being among the favorites showed what we expected to see from them after disappointing in their first games. The Flamenco dancers weaved patterns around the oil sheikhs who may be used to some belly dancing but could not cope with the whirl of the flamencos.

Crybaby Ronaldo came to the party with two goals in the Corks five nil thrashing of the trade merchants from the silk route and I have to give him some credit, as I have been harsh on him, so far, He took his goals nicely and the team really gelled.

The Argies and the Frogs carried on their merry way, with both their stars scoring another brace. The Frogs had a two hour hold up due to lightning near the ground. That’s probably the most interesting thing about them so far.

The two nations from the United Kingdom also returned to what we expect but to their detriment, The girders of the Forth bridge were toothless (a common sight back home) in their tame defeat to Morocco, despite their protestations for two penalties and as for EnGerLand, all I will say for now is every team usually has one bad game at a tournament and it is better if it is in the group stages. They were also lucky not to concede a penalty, and we will return to the Video Assistant Referee known as VAR shortly.

Elsewhere, the Viking long boat men continue to row forwards or is it backwards and are looking good. The little boy with his finger in the dike has so far managed to stem the flow for the Oranjeboom. The Samurai put Tunisia to the sword and sent them home, with one of the Carthaginian defenders giving a remarkable press conference after the game where he lambasted the Tunisian board for being incompetent and corrupt. Cato the younger would have been proud of his moral integrity, even though it ended in tears.

On the surprise watch, the Blue Sharks from the islands off the West Coast of Africa remained unbeaten with a really good chance of advancing to the next stage. The other Island team, the Orange Liqueur from the Caribbean, gained a historic first point

To finish the review part, we also know five of the teams that will be bowing out after their next game, Haiti, Panama, Jordan, Tunisia and perhaps surprisingly Turkey.

Before looking at some of the interesting match ups to come, I feel the use of VAR must be discussed and in fact the standard of refereeing in general.

Some of the officiating on display has been dubious to say the least, forty-four countries have supplied the main referees with another six countries having people selected as secondary officials or on VAR.

The game Is refereed differently from continent to continent and to those readers who do not understand how that can be, surely the rules are the rules, well yes, but they are also open to interpretation. What maybe a foul in one place may be seen as perfectly acceptable in another, for example when two players jump for a header with force.

This is causing a lot of difficulty and frustration for the players as they do not know what is permissible. However, this is not the real talking point here. That honour goes to the lack of intervention of VAR when the whole planet thinks that an infringement has taken place except for the people sitting in the VAR room.

Lots of People but especially football fans love a conspiracy theory, especially when it comes to favoritism or injustice for or against particular teams. Argentina should have had two red cards so far, one in each match for foul play,  EnGerLand should have had a penalty awarded against them last night in the game against Ghana,

How is that not even looked at. EnGerLand were very lucky

Lastly Morocco, probably should have had a Penalty against them when they played Scotland.

Again, VAR must intervene here.

The problem with the examples I have given is that the VAR officials did not even take a look or intervene to ask the referee to have another look on the screen he has available to do so. The Evil Empire of FIFA favouring the big teams, one for you to discuss and get angry about if you are a supporter of one of the aggrieved parties.

So, what is to look forward to starting tonight until Sunday morning? Firstly, both games in a group will start simultaneously.  

Already tonight we have a game which could provide much drama, when the Samba Kings take on the Wee Jocks in a repeat of their memorable clash in the 1982 world cup. 

The Jocks do not want a repeat of this result.

The Jocks need a draw to be certain of advancing, but if they lose, there is a scenario where the three points they have accrued will not be enough and they could go out on goal difference which would be  a classic embodiment of the tragedy which is Scottish football. If they do lose tonight, they must hope it is only by a goal or two.

There are two games where a draw between the two teams would see them both through with four points apiece, Australia against Paraguay and Austria and Algeria. Austria have previous form for this in their infamous goalless draw against West Shermany also in the 1982 finals. Two draws here would be very bad for the Jocks if they lose to the Samba Kings.

A draw between the Pharaohs and the Ayatollahs in the Pride game could also be a negative result for the Jocks.

In the game between the Blue Sharks and the Oil Sheikhs, it is winner take all, the sheikhs have to win or they are out, a draw might be enough for the Blue Sharks. Interestingly enough, The Spam fritters from Fray Bentos may suffer a shock exist if they lose to the castanets. This would be good for the Jocks.

Senegal needs to hammer Babylon by four clear goals to overtake the Jocks on goal difference, once again dependent on the Jocks not gaining a draw.

There are other interesting games, but that is enough for now. Let us hope for some more good football. Lots of goals and surprises galore.

I will be back on Sunday, when we will start to get to the nitty gritty of elimination football.

 

A few take aways from the 1st round including a bucket of Vindaloo.

This morning saw the conclusion of the first round of 24 games in the group stages. All 48 teams have now played one game, so it is a good time to do a what have we learnt so far style review.

I must start with an admission, I have only watched seven complete games, plus three first halves of other games. This means there are 14 games where I have only seen the highlights which are readily available. Despite that I am ready to share my observations with you all.

The English premier league reigns supreme. In the previews. we discussed the increase in size of the tournament, how the minnows would fair and other such topics. I think the jury is still out on the increase, as I mentioned above, speaking as an average fan, I have watched a tad over twenty five percent of the games, that is not very high, there are just too many games. Obviously, the time of the games due to the location has been a factor, but also there are too many that are just not worth the effort.

What about the evil empires so called lofty ambition of giving more nations a chance to participate?  Obviously on a base level this is true, but this is where the opening line in this section comes into play.

The Democratic Republic of Congo team that admirably held Portugal to a draw had five players that play in the English premier league, a few others in the French first division. There is not one player in the twenty-six-man squad who plays in the local league. The Oranjeboom had 8 premier league players in their starting eleven. Even Ze Shermans had a few.

With the proliferation of football, that can be found on the internet and the insatiable demand of top European clubs to find the newest talent, the so-called minnows are not so small anymore. This is definitely the case with Africa, the Arab countries still lag behind here.

There is also another important point to mention here, one which is a major talking point all over the world and has nothing to do with football and that is migration.

Going back to the DRC, only five of the twenty six man squad where actually born in the DRC, The Moroccan team that faced Brazil comprised of eleven players who were born in Europe to parents who had left Morocco in search of a better life.  

I heard an interesting stat that there are fifty-three players in the world cup who were born in Paris France (as opposed to Paris Texas) and yet only five of them play for France.

An interesting subject to discuss at the water cooler for people not that interested in football, but who want to join in the conversation.

To sum up, there is a certain European superiority complex when thinking about lesser teams and this needs to be revised for the reasons listed above.

It is now time to talk about some football, one thing that is very noticeable is the improvement in the flow of the game due to the rule changes we mentioned in the previews. We are hardly seeing players staying down after tackles. unless they are really hurt. Throw ins are actually only taking five seconds as we see the referees counting down with their fingers. In the DRC game, Portugal was awarded a corner when the goalkeeper took too long restarting the game. The last point here is that due to the hydration break, injury time always will be 3 minutes plus the actual injury time.  

Two very important clarifications. Firstly, a corner that has been incorrectly awarded can be changed to a goal kick by the Video Assistant referee, but a goal kick cannot be changed to a corner.

Secondly, and this is probably the most important and will help your health. One of the things common to all fans watching on TV is the shouting at the screen that a player is offside when the side they are supporting has conceded a goal. It happened in the EnGerLand game yesterday. The Croatian who nodded the ball on had his arm in an offside position as he jumped to head the ball. It will help to remember the song we all teach our children to learn body parts. Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes can all be offside, but arms cannot be offside as you cannot score a goal with your arm.

this is not offside even though it looks it.

How have the true minnows performed? to be honest as expected, with an obvious exception, and this is where the expansion falls down. Ze Shermans duly quaffed on the Orange Liqueur of Curacao with a 7-1 picnic. However, mark my words, Ze Shermans looked frail at the back. We will have to wait to see them face better opposition before we can truly say if they will go far this time round.

The game for Ze Shermans was basically a training session and was completely pointless from a competitive point of view. We are very happy that Curacao scored a goal, but do we really need to have the extra games just so that Curacao or Qatar or Jordan can say that they scored at a world cup.

Iraq and Jordan both lost heavily, as did Tunisia who are a more established African side who then promptly sacked their manager after one game. Who would be a football manager?

I have already mentioned the DRC, their draw with Portugal was well earned, but I will contend that the comments I made about the cork boys of Portugal suffering dearly if they insisted on playing Crybaby Ronaldo were vindicated. It was nice to hear the legendary Thierry Henri agreeing with me in his post match analysis.

Crybaby was obviously under enormous pressure after the performance of his great rival Messi in Los Gauchos 3-0 victory over Algeria. However, I want you to watch this clip and explain why Messi was not shown a red card for this tackle and even more importantly, why did VAR not even look at it?

The last game in this section is the draw between the blue sharks of Cape Verde and the flamenco dancers of Espana. This is the type of result that vindicates the evil empire in their eyes. The Cape Verde goalkeeper played like Superman. Espana suffered from a severe dose of complacency and while it was fun to watch because the castanets failed to click, it was not competitive. Are we watching to see one team playing in an Alamo style bunker or two teams, cutting and thrusting and parrying with each other a la Zorro? I know what I would prefer to watch.  Again, as with the Ze Shermans, this was no more than a training exercise for Espana, and I can see them improving from here.

Other games worthy of mention were the ones between the Samba Kings and Morocco and the Rising sun against the windmills. Of course, we cannot forget the Senegal derby, where Les Bleus were lucky not to be trailing at half time and eventually came out on top. I also feel that I must point out that probably the best frog player on the night was born in London!

Honorable mention must go to Scotland who managed to beat Haiti with a very deflected goal and thus win their first group game in 32 years and to the bushmen who led the Turkish baths on a walk about into the outback and lost them there. The Tartan army has also made its mark drinking Boston dry. an impressive achievement.

To finish off, the game between EnGerLand and the boys from kings Landing was an instant classic, it was a vibrant display of how the beautiful game should be played. There is still a long way to go before the fans should start thinking about whether football is coming home, but it was good start

There were two groups where both games ended in a draw, so it is all to play for in those groups with the next round starting today.  I'll be back in a week, feel free to leave comments and I hope I have given you things to talk about.

 

 

 

The last 4 groups to preview Including EnGerLand and Les Bleus

 

Group I	Group J
France	Argentina
Senegal	Algeria
Iraq	Austria
Norway	Jordan

 

Group K	Group L
Portugal	England
Congo DR	Croatia
Uzbekistan	Ghana
Colombia	Panama

 

We have four more groups to preview, before the tournament starts today with the game between the cartels and Bafana Bafana.

Groups I and J are very similar, each contains one of the finalists from 2022, there are three good teams and one very weak Arab team in each group who are not expected to make any waves. Iraq is in its second world cup and Jordan are making their debut.

Les Bleus of France are one of the favourites and to be honest are fun to watch, interestingly, the squad they have picked caused quite a lot of discussion back in Gaul when it was announced with a number of surprise omissions, so we will have to see if “Napolean” Deschamps who has been the Gallic emperor for the past sixteen years knows best or not and can retire with his second triumph as manager.

Senegal are a very strong side, they are the other current African champions alongside Morrocco, they will prove a handful for everyone and of course to round out the group we have the Norwegian Blues who hopefully will be able to put off pining for the fjords, long enough to entertain us with lots of goals as they have two fantastic players up front.

I do not think that Los Gauchos will successfully lasso a second successive title, their little maestro, in some fans eyes the GOAT, is four years older and they still rely on him for so much. They should win the group. Algeria and Austria are both capable and will also advance.

As I mentioned, each of these two groups has one very weak team and this is going to hopefully mean a flurry of goals and have huge implications on the finishing positions. In general, one assumes that a hypothetically weaker team will finish in third, but it is possible that l’escargot or the gods from Valhalla could finish in third and set up a very interesting clash in the last 32 with a strong team from another group.

Group K has the poisonous jellyfish as the main team with the second part of the fan GOAT argument still playing for them and in reality, hampering their progress. Some people just do not know how to let go and Christiano Crybaby Ronaldo is one of them. The Portuguese Men of War are a really good team and if they manage CR7 well, and by that, I mean restricting his minutes then they are one of the candidates to go the whole way.

Colombia can be exciting, they still have James (Chamez) Rodriquez who scored this wonder goal 12 years ago.

 

Add to that L Diaz and they will progress. Uzbekistan is the 4th debutant at this world cup, and I know absolutely nothing about them, so I’m looking forward to seeing what they have to offer.  Their best player is a defender who plays for Manchester Citeh in the English Premier league and that’s it.

When I was growing up, the DRC was known as Zaire, and they appeared in the 1974 World cup. They lost 9-0 to Yugoslavia and were involved in one of the funniest moments in world cup history in their game against Brazil.

 

The new version of the team with a different name had not qualified since them, but their fortunes have improved over the past few years, they are defensively very strong and have a midfielder who played for Sunderland in the EPL this year to great effect.

The closing game between these two teams promises to be a classic.

This brings us to the final group to cover, and it is the group that includes EnGerLand, it is now sixty years since England won their only world cup, and for once and I do not know why, the expectations from this squad are not as over exaggerated as they normally are. Perhaps, it is partly because they have a German manager. If EnGerLand do have to face Ze Shermans, in the later stages, will we still hear all the songs with their World War two themes such as this classic?

 

As with other big teams, I hope that we will have plenty opportunity to cover EnGerLand further down the road, so will stop here. 

Since Croatian independence after the dissolution of Yugoslavia in the 1990’s they have been a strong force in European football, reaching the final in 2018 and they finished third in 1998 and in 2022. This version is not as good as previous incarnations, but they could still cause a shock or two. EnGerLand will be wary of them as the men from Kings Landing slew the dragon of St George in the 2018 Semi Final.

Ghana have had a good record in previous world cups, but they have had wretched luck with injuries recently weakening their squad and chances to do well. As with so many of the other groups their game with the last team in the group Panama could decide if they advance or not. 

Panama has a Danish Manager who actually lived in Panama as a child before moving to Barcelona as a player and then managing in Cyprus before he was manager at Leeds United for a while. Both Canada and Uruguay are managed by ex-Leeds managers as a little piece of trivia.

So, there we have it, all twelve groups previewed, I am not going to cover every game but will do some reviews and updates on anything interesting that arises until we reach the knockout stages where I will return in full flow, so stay tuned in. I hope you have enjoyed it so far, I hope we are blessed with some good football even if we only watch the highlights of a lot of the games.

Let the fun begin.

Groups E-H

 

Group E	Group F
Germany	Netherlands
Curacao	Japan
Ivory Coast	Sweden
Ecuador	Tunisia

 

 

Group G	Group H
Belgium	Spain
Egypt	Cape Verde
Iran	Saudi Arabia
New Zealand	Uruguay

 

Today is going to be a bit of a steep learning curve for all of us, with two teams that I doubt many people even know where they are located on the planet, along with some of our old favourites such as Die Mannschaft.

In group E, we have 3 strong teams and one which even to call them a minnow, is being generous. Curacao is an island in what is known as the Dutch Caribbean located off the Northern coast of Venezuela. The population is less than 160.000 people making it the smallest nation to ever qualify. Their aim must be just to score a goal, something which will be hard to do given the other teams in their group.

Ecuador, not usually considered one of the stronger South American teams, have become defensive giants in recent times. Two of their defenders started in the recent European Champions League final on opposing sides. Ecuador's problem is scoring goals, but they will be very hard to beat.

Ivory Coast has a young squad and should be fun to watch, they did not concede a goal in qualifying, but they did score 25 themselves.

Die Mannschaft or as we know them, Ze Shermans, are not the team they were. They have lost their fear factor, gone are the days where Germany always wins after 90 minutes to paraphrase a famous quote. However, they should advance from this group with ease.

Group F is not as simple as it looks, I do not expect a lot from Tunisia, not one of the stronger African teams. Flat pack Sweden scrapped into the world cup through the back door so to speak, but footballing history is littered with teams doing well after barely qualifying, I don't think they will go far in the knockout stages, but they should make it through.

This leaves the rising sun and the Oranjeboom. In 2022, the rising sun defeated Espana with a goal that despite all the advances in technology is still argued about today. 

This goal enabled the Samurai boys to win their group and eliminated Ze Shermans at the same time. There are more and more Japanese players featuring in the line ups of the top clubs in Europe, while small in stature, they are big in heart with a generous dose of skill sprinkled in.

The Oranjeboom are the perennial bridesmaids of World cup football, three final appearances all ending in defeat as well as a third and fourth place finish. There has been a certain amount of disharmony in the national team for a number of years, and Dutch domestic football is not considered to be very strong. Again, they will advance, probably a stage or two but are lacking in attack, something which seems to be a problem for many teams. One thing is for sure, the Dutch fans are amazing with their famous links rechts dance.

Group G, will not generate much excitement, so we can briefly deal with this group. The Kiwis prefer playing with a different shaped ball, they are known as the All Whites as opposed to the All Blacks, they need to keep it simple, but no more needs to be said about them.

The Pharaohs are heavily reliant on a few players, they do not generally travel well but should have enough to advance.

The Ayatollahs are in a difficult position, back home things are not calm, they are technically in a war with the US of A, despite there being a ceasefire at the moment, but the war of rhetoric goes on. A number of their backroom staff have been refused entry into the US of A. They have also never advanced form the group stages, but due to the format, this time, as with the Jocks is their chance. What will be interesting to see is how many of their players do not want to return to Iran after their participation has ended.

There is however one very amusing story here. As I am sure all the readers know, June is world pride month and the evil empire in an effort to improve their image wanted to show that they are an inclusive and woke organisation. Before the draw for the tournament, the game due to be played on June 26th in Seattle, a known stronghold of the LGBTQ+ ilk, was designated as the game where pride would be celebrated.

I am sure by now, you know what's coming, but of course in a massive ironic twist, it transpired that the game between the Pharaohs and the Ayatollahs was the one due to be played then. There will be lots of events taking place outside the stadium to commemorate the occasion. It will be interesting to see how the fans react, to something which is completely illegal in their cultures.

This leaves us with the red devils from Belgium and any team with that nickname is not one to be liked in my eyes. They are past their prime and have missed their opportunity for success after finishing third in 2018.

To finish off for today, we will look at Group H, Espana have to be one of the favourites for the tournament, they are strong in every position and have been very successful recently, we will surely be covering them deep into the tournament, so that will do for now.

Uruguay were twice winners in the early days of the world cup. They are now managed by Marcelo Bielsa, an idiosyncratic anomaly in the world of football. I love Bielsa and his footballing philosophy, so I hope that Uruguay do well.

Saudi Arabia have been a growing force in world football, and they will be hosting the world cup in 2034. They shocked the world in 2022 when they beat Argentina 2-1 in their opening match.

Despite this improvement, I think they may struggle here, especially as the last team in this group is such an unknown quantity.

As with Curacao, does anyone know where Cape Verde is geographically? Well, it is off the West coast of Africa and is a former colony of Portugal that gained independence in 1975 after the fall of the Portuguese dictatorship the previous year. This is the first time that they have qualified for a world cup, thus making them an unknown factor.

They will have good support as there is a large Cape Verdean diaspora in the US of A. Their nickname is the Blue Sharks, and they may catch some people by surprise, they are an outside bet to finish third and advance.

Tomorrow, we will finish the previews with the return of some old favourites, EnGerLand, the Frogs, Crybaby Ronaldo, to name but a few.

 

 

 

 

Groups A-D Preview

 

Today, we will start previewing the groups, as there are twelve groups this time round, I will do a brief overview of four groups at a time and today we will look at Groups A to D

Group A	Group B
Mexico	Canada
South Africa	Switzerland
South Korea	Bosnia-Herzegovina
Czech Republic	Qatar

 

Group C	Group D
Brazil	USA
Morocco	Paraguay
Scotland	Australia
Haiti	Turkey

 

As you can see, I have highlighted 4 teams in red and in a bold statement, those are the teams that I expect to finish last in their groups before a ball has been kicked. I must be honest that with so many teams, it has diluted somewhat the juicy rivalries that we so adore. It is hard to say that there is "a group of death" as in the past especially with the opportunity to finish third and still advance.

Group D for example is a very bland group, the only interesting thing here is how the host nation will fare. Paraguay qualified with the lowest average goals scored, less than one per game, but also only conceded 10 times in their 18 games played in qualifying. They open against the US of A and where I live, the game kicks off at 04:00, so there is no temptation at all to watch this game. Turkey is usually strong, which is why I have gone for the kangaroos as the weakest team here.

Group B is similar, another host nation with not much footballing pedigree in Canada. Canada has a manager who has some strange views on how the game should be played. They are joined by the Yodel boys from Switzerland, who may have as many players born in in the Balkans as the Bosnians do.  BH as with many of the nations that were formally once part of Yugoslavia, are a very capable European nation, they will not pull up any trees but should have enough to qualify. The group is rounded out by Qatar, who qualified for the first time for a world cup, as last time they were the host nation. They lost all three games then and I would expect to see that repeated this time round.

We shall leave the best for last, so now we focus on Group A, the last of the hosts, the cartel kids will play the opening game of the World cup against Bafana Bafana in a repeat of the opening game from 2010 which will always be remembered for this iconic goal by scored by Tshabalala.

Bafana Bafana, will probably not trouble the scorers to borrow a phrase from cricket, they are rather toothless in attack.  With South Korea, it is a question of how well they will travel, their best player is in his twilight days, but they should have enough. The Czech Republic is a better version of BH, the game between the Czechs and Bafana Bafana could well decide if either of them will be well placed enough in third place to progress, or will both be defenestrated.

So, to group C. This is a good group, I could probably do a whole post just about this group, but I will stick to the format I have chosen.  A Selecao as they are commonly known or the Samba kings as I like to call them are probably most people’s other team. They are the most successful team in world cup history with 5 trophies. They often flatter to deceive with their beautiful attacking football, such as when they were destroyed at home, by Der Shermans in the 2014 world cup semifinal, 1-7, but they are usually fun to watch and that is what we want.

Morocco, are a very good North African side, there is a dispute as to who should be African champions at the moment after the farcical scenes in the recent African cup of nations final, when Senegal walked off the pitch in protest at a refereeing decision and the game was then won by Senegal, when the decision was reversed and Senegal agreed to play on. However. that result has been overturned and awarded to Morocco. In short, a complete mess.

Haiti are appearing in their second world cup, the last time being in 1974, Haiti which is located on the island of Hispaniola, is a very poor country, devastated by a terrible earthquake in 2010 and years of brutal dictatorship first by Papa Doc and then his son Baby Doc Duvalier, who between them ruled the country for nearly 30 years.

Haiti could not play any of their qualifying matches at home, so the fact that they managed to qualify is amazing. They are an unknown quantity and could surprise perhaps the last team we are going to look at.

When Willian Shakespeare wrote his tragedy Macbeth, he knew what he was doing when he set it in Scotland, as Scottish football over the years has mirrored the components of the tragic genre. The Jocks have qualified nine times for the world cup but have never once advanced past the group stage. It has to be stated that with the new format, this is the Jocks best opportunity of breaking that hoodoo.

Perhaps the best example of Scottish ineptness was in the World cup in 1978, the hated Sassenachs (English) had failed to qualify, and Scotland were in a group with Holland, Iran, pre the Ayatollahs and Peru, one of the weaker South American nations.

The nation was in Euphoria, Ally’s army as the fans called themselves travelled en masse to dictatorial Argentina, only for the Jocks, to, well I can’t use the expression, dirty their underwear, for as we all know, real Scottish men do not wear anything under their Kilts, when all they managed was a one all draw with Iran, a loss to Peru and despite a valiant if ultimately futile victory over Holland 3-2, they went out on goal difference. 

The commentary says it all, the dream is alive, one more goal will see the impossible, etc., but alas not to be.

So, can the Jocks do it?  it will all depend on their game with Haiti, a comfortable victory there should be enough, but you can be assured that in Port-au-Prince, the Haitian witch doctors have prepared their voodoo dolls of John McGinn and Scott McTominay and are ready to stick in their pins in an effort to pull off a mighty upset.

I really like Scottish people, they are fun to be with if you can understand what they are saying, but as any football fan will tell you, another team's misfortune is often much more enjoyable than the success of your own team, so if the unthinkable happens, it will probably be the funniest thing to happen at this world cup.

Tomorrow we will look at the next 4 groups, Hasta La Vista.

 

The Greatest Show on Earth Returns (Part II)

 

Welcome back, as promised, this is the second part of the introduction to the tournament, I feel that I must go into slightly more detail about the format of the tournament and the side issues that have arisen.

As previously mentioned, there are 16, yes, sixteen, more teams taking part. This of course means that there are many more games to be played, 104 to be precise up from 64 which has been the number played since 1998 and therefore the length of the tournament has increased from 29 to 39 days.

To be honest, this is a terrible idea, for many reasons, even the keenest football fan will lose some interest and may find it hard to get too excited in the first place. I mean who is not excited about the thought of the clash between Uzbekistan and the Democratic republic of Congo? footballing giants both.

Player health is also going to be affected, the chances for injury will be higher and the amount of rest the players will receive before the start of their domestic seasons will be greatly reduced, especially for those teams who advance far into the tournament.

However, none of the above is of the remotest interest to the evil empire, that is FIFA. They claim they want to spread the game and give more opportunities to the minnows of world football to have a chance at playing at the world cup, the supposed pinnacle of a footballer’s career.  I would beg to differ and just put it down to greed on behalf of the bean counters at FIFA.

After all, FIFA HQ is in Switzerland, a country synonymous with banks and dirty money.  Unfortunately, this greed has spread across all aspects of the tournament, from ticket prices to the cost of transport to the games, hotel rooms, the list is endless.

I am worried that we will have a lot of empty seats at many games, as proper fans simply will not be able to afford to attend, and the atmosphere may suffer.

I will conclude with a few small rule changes that are to be implemented at this world cup. Football is known as the beautiful game, we fans want to be entertained, whilst those who play want to win when they get on the grass.

There has been for years a certain distaste at some of the dark arts, so to speak, that take place during a game, feigning injury, time wasting, trying to get other players punished unjustly.

The evil empire has decided enough is enough and has been proactive in trying to stop this type of behaviour, and here credit must be given to FIFA. The aim is to speed the game up, so you have five seconds to take a throw in, a player being substituted will have ten seconds to leave the field, and if they take longer, then their replacement will have to wait a minute before coming on.

A player who receives treatment for a possible injury will have to go off for a minute before continuing to play. There are others, but these ones stand out for me. 

Before we end the intro, here are two more little clips from the last two finals played in the USA (1994) and Mexico (1986) to get you in the mood for what is to come.

 

Tomorrow, I will start the group previews, so adios until then.