Unstoppable Force Meets Immoveable Object

Or the potentially hardest working defence left standing meets the apparently most intricate passing team in the world. And bugger me it was boring. Paraguay are the Switzerland of South America, and not just because they were the home of fleeing ex-nazis and secretive bank accounts. No, they are set up to defend. And harry. And press. And harry some more. And do everything but actually score. And, like Switzerland, they work bloody hard at it. So hard that it wasn’t until very late on in the game that Spain finally got their act together. But, also like Switzerland, they really can’t score. One goal against Italy and two against the mighty Slovakia in the Group stage have taken them to the brink of a World Cup semi-final. And very odd moments aside they really never looked even vaguely threatening. I mean at 72 minutes, with the score 0 – 0 they play their joker, taking off their by now knackered striker Valdez and bringing on Rocque Santa Cruz, who hasn’t scored for Paraguay for two years and hasn’t scored for Man City since the Mark Hughes era. Even then he manages to scuff up their only real chance from open play.

It’s All Gone To Penalties

Thank fucking christ it didn’t because the tedium would have finished me off. But for a crazy 5 minutes this game went off the charts. First Paraguay got a penalty, which they contrived to tamely tap into Casillas’ midriff, then Spain got a penalty, which Alonso scored, then had to retake, then missed. For a second it was like the shoot out had come early, before normal service (and tedium) was resumed. You feel that if Paraguay, like Ghana, had scored their penalty, they would have won this match. And you could feel that the pressure of being here, having gone further in the tournament than they had really believed they would, weighed heavily on the penalty takers.

Tikki Takki’s All Gone Messy

The Spanish have got a problem. They’ve arrived with half a good game and no idea of how to make it a whole game. Admittedly it works better than teams like Engerland, who arrive without any part of a good game, or teams like New Zealand, Switzerland and Paraguay, who arrive with one that they’ve borrowed from Jose Mourinho but haven’t read all of the user manuals. Spain’s real problem is that their chosen game has both declined and been susssed out. I don’t think they’re implementing their clever passing game as well as they did in Euro 2008 and I think teams have discovered how to put them off their game. All of which sounds a little pedantic given that Spain have Tikki Takka’d their way to the semi-finals, but they have been fantastically lucky. Chile gifted them the game, Paraguay surrendered it and they were lucky to beat Portugal. But they really need a way to combine clever, good looking football with incisiveness, speed and variation. Too often their attacks come down the middle at a pedestrian pace with no great effect. Take out David Villa and Spain don’t look remotely threatening, just pretty in the middle of the park.

60 Down 4 To Go 4 Teams Remaining

It’s The End Of The World As We Know It

Both these teams are like bad Premiership centre halves approaching the opposition half and suddenly realising where they are and immediately falling into panic mode. They have achieved beyond their wildest dreams. For Paraguay, this is as far as their nation has ever gone, while Japan, prior to this tournament, had never won a World Cup game not held in Japan. Their coach, who was prepared to resign during the team’s charabanc tour of every footballing venue in Europe, can now retire gracefully to his farm, where he will always be addressed as Football-Manager-San and probably won’t have to pay for anything ever again.

The saddest thing about this match was that it was essentially a throwback to the very First Round of matches. Both sides emerged like frightened rabbits, too scared to attack, happy to pass it around their back four and stultifyingly dull. The Japanese actually seemed to have the better of it, making more vaguely attacking moves, but none that had the cutting edge of their match against Denmark.

You sense that there is a huge unseen psychological impact that the World Cup exerts on teams and players. For Japan, you sense that they gave it all in the match with Denmark and somehow felt that they had reached the summit of their achievement, that this match was one match too far. You can see it writ large in the dreadful, painful Third and Fourth place play-off that neither side wants to be in and which too often collapses under the pressures of the previous semi-finals. Paraguay just don’t seem very good, yet, thanks to the failings of Italy and Slovakia, have lucked out into this, the easiest of Second Rounds. How Engerland would have like to be playing Japan. Actually, on second thoughts based on our previous friendly with Japan, we’d probably lose that one 4 – 1 as well.

It went to penalties. Paraguay won’t get past Spain.

55 Down 9 To Go 9 Teams Remaining

Group Of Ease

Yeah, so one of Uruguay, South Korea, USA or Ghana is going to a World Cup semi-final. And, let’s face it, that should have been Engerland not USA in that list. Out of these I give the Koreans little or no chance, for while they have a great team with a couple of decent players, they’re up against Uruguay, who have the excellent Diego Forlorn, who seems to be one of the very few players not to have been overwhelmed by the scale of the World Cup and has actually seized control of and dominated games. I see Uruguay going right the way through to the semi. USA have a great team with a never say die attitude, but attitude aside all they really have to offer is Landon Donovan and Clint Dempsey and I’m not convinced. Ghana are a great strong passing side, who haven’t managed to score goals other than penalties so far. You can see them riding the wave of African euphoria, but they’re going to have trouble when they come up against a quality side.

Group Of Death

Forget any previous pussy, lame Groups of Death, this is the real thing. Germany, Engerland, Argentina and, well there’s always one, Mexico. For Engerland to get to the semis, we’re going to have to beat both the Germans and the Argies. If we get that far life will be very sweet indeed and we’ll probably only have to beat Spain and Brazil to win the big lump of gold. So no pressure there boys. If we want to win it, we’re going to have to do it the hard way. Heart says we go through and win, rational analysis says it’ll be the bloody Argies (again).

Group Of Football

With both Holland and Brazil, this should be a group of total football. Holland, I suspect have been playing a very cagey game and not really over-exerting themselves. Straight wins throughout their First Round matches means that they haven’t really been tested yet and I don’t see the conquerors of Italy, Slovakia, giving them any trouble at all. I think the Dutch will open with their wingmen and then we’ll see some football. Brazil and Chile should play off a great South American cup tie, but given Chile’s attack only policy and Brazil’s excellent defence I see Brazil wiping the floor with Chile’s poor quality defending. Brazil v Holland will be a cracking quarter final, which will provide Brazil with a really serious test, but this Brazil side is pretty formidable and, like the Dutch, just beginning to find their form. I see this as Brazil’s group.

Group Of Unexpected

Ideally, Spain and Chile should have switched groups, but they didn’t so this group has the Tweedledumb and Tweedledumberer match up of Spain and Portugal, in some ways it hardly matters which one of them comes through. Spain will have a tough game, they seem to have lost their way mentally and don’t know which direction to go in. Now true World Cup Champions always undergo some kind of transformation during the tournament, but the transformation Spain are undergoing is tortuous. Will they sacrifice the beautiful game that got them here for a pragmatic hoof and wingplay game we saw them trying before Chile gifted them the game? Portugal will be a hard test, they have a rock solid defence and are really hard to play against and when they’re in flow as they were against North Korea, they can’t half knock in the goals. I see Portugal going through. Paraguay and Japan will be a fantastic, open game, the Japanese will not give in and Paraguay are a decent team. This match should be a cracker and I see Portugal going out of this group.

The Semis

I see these being

Uruguay vs Engerland

Brazil vs Portugal

Can’t help being optimistic eh?