World Cup Game #27

Neither Slovakia nor Paraguay really turned on exciting displays in this game - indeed, there were patches where I was outright bored but Paraguay managed to get the result it needed by 2 goals to nil. Slovakia just didn't seem to know what to do to go forward and Paraguay were more than willing to move very slowly up the field, all of which made for a boring spectacle. The first Paraguayan goal was a wonderfully precise strike under immense pressure but that was one of the few highlights.

World Cup Game #28

Holy crap is all I can say - for NZ to draw 1-1 with Italy has to be the surprise result of the tournament so far! Holy crap!

For the Kiwis to score so early and then resist Italy for the remaining 83 minutes has to be the gutsiest performance so far. The Italians did pull back a single goal for their equalizer but apart from that, they looked ordinary and lacking in direction. No Italian player really stepped up to take control or inspire the team so, whilst there were some good individual attempts, Italy's performance was never coordinated enough to really look like they would win.

Holy crap!

World Cup Game #29

This wasn't vintage samba football but this was Brazil at their current functional best, disposing of Cote d'Ivoire by 3 goals to 1. Brazil produced plenty of fluent exciting attacking football to score their three goals fairly easily, although the Cote d'Ivoire goal plus the utterly ridiculous sending off of Kaka did mean that the game finished on quite a down-note for Brazil.

World Cup Game #30

This group is certainly showing us plenty of attacking football and this was Portugal at their attacking best. After a disappointing result in their first game, Portugal came out with a whole different mindset and managed to translate that into action - again and again and again and...

7-0 is a gigantic margin in World Cup terms and Korea DPR were on the receiving end of that. For all that, they matched Portugal for the entire first half in everything but the solitary goal but the second half was a different story. Portugal simply came out a transformed team and scored six goals in two 3-goal bursts that utterly devastated Korea DPR. To their credit, the Koreans fought back every step of the way and never let their heads drop but they simply had no answers to Portugal's multi-pronged attack.