Deutschland ueber alles

Ok, maybe that's a bit much; let's all be glad that isn't the nationanl anthem any more (though I did just find out that the model of the "perfect aryan child" used by the Third Reich was Jewish, which is hilariously ironic).

My prediction of the score was definitely way off the mark, and Germany's match against Argentina was far more of a piece with the rest of this World Cup.

Argentina, still missing di Maria, was largely content to sit back against the Germans, and attempt counterattacks.  And that strategy worked ok for them, as all of their chances came on the counterattack.  But they had a bit of bad luck, as Higuain (called hig-wayne by one of the commentators; think rhyming with lil' wayne's older brother) put the shot off to the side of the net on his first chance, when he tried to chip Neuer* (Boateng might well have been able to head it away if it had been on target).  And Higuain was called offside on his second chance, which did end up in the net; his celebration went halfway around the field before he noticed the flag.

* A small shout-out to the German midfielder who headed it over his defense, and straight to Higuain to give him that chance.

But the Germans had even less luck.  Repeatedly going into the teeth of a harsh and ready defense, they had few chances; none as good as either of those by Higuain.

The only decent chance I can remember from Argentina in the second half had them again shooting wide from in-close, but I have no notes on the game, so I can't say when it happened.  Or exactly who had it, for that matter.

In any event, Germany had some good chances in the second, but only forced one good save that I can recall.

So, into extra time they went, again tied at nil (for the fifth time, by my count).  And really, not much was going on there.  Nobody got terribly close (there were several dangerous free kicks, but none were close to scoring) before Goetze received the ball in the box in the 113th minute.  He had some time, but was still quick to blast it past Romero for the lead.  And for the win, as it turned out.

Argentina tried pushing forward, but had no luck.  Their best chance came in stoppage time, when Messi had a 25-yard or so free kick, but the direct shot went well over the net.

And, with that, Argentina's chances dimished to nil, and the Germans started celebrating.

Loew, like van Gaal, also showed some class, subbing Mertesacker in for Oezil just before stoppage time.  I assume that was mostly as a career thank-you for Mertesacker, who has given yeoman service to the national team in the past, but played very little in this tournament (I think he might have been a late sub in one previous game.  Maybe).

So, despite a bunch of surprises along the way, the tournament ended with a predictable bunch, and a predictable victor.  In fact, I seem to recall a friend telling me that a computer simulation (done by ESPN with the latest FIFA game, I think) came up with Germany as the winner before play started.

And I was certainly hoping for German victory, so I was happy with the result (and I can't express just how much happier I am that it didn't go to penalty kicks).  I wonder how Klinsmann feels...

(And I feel a bit sorry for Messi, who's undoubtedly getting a great deal of undeserved criticism from Argentinian fans.)

No consolation

It seemed like it would be impossible for Brazil's finish to the World Cup to get worse, after a 7-1 drubbing at the hands of Germany (their first competitive loss at home in 62 matches).  And they certainly came out fired up to show that that was a fluke.

The Netherlands got the ball to start, and the hosts were chasing the ball, on defense, all the way back to the goalie.  But the Dutch dealt with that pressure, and after the ball getting all the way back to the goalie, they pushed it way upfield with a couple of passes.  One of those went to van Persie in the air, and he headed it straight up in the air.   It came down at his feet, with him facing his own goal.  He saw Robben breaking, to his left, and turned and put it into space behind the defense.

Robben ran to the ball, and Silva, who'd been on van Persie, had to pull Robben down by his jersey at the top of the box.  It was a weird call by the ref, who awarded the penalty kick and gave Silva a yellow card.  Normally, a foul at that spot would be a foot or so outside the box, but it was a foul by the last defender and clearly should have been a red card.

By the time they finished arguing that out, and van Persie put the penalty kick into the top-right corner, it was still only the third minute of the game.  The Brazilians were clearly off-kilter, though, at being behind so early, and it took them a while to settle down.  Before they did, however, the Orangemen scored again with a run down the right side that went all the way to the touch line.  From there, it was centered back to Blind, in the middle, who might have had enough time to drink a coffee while he took three touches, in place, to get a controlled shot into the net.

That was in the seventeenth minute, and was pretty much the end of the match, competitively speaking.  The Brazilians did get several chances over the balance of the game, but were unable to convert any of them, putting it off to the side a couple of times.

Ramires, who'd had a decent game against Germany (one of the few; he came on as a sub for Hulk around halftime), and who looked decent against the Dutch, went out in favor of Hulk around halftime.

Hulk tried to repeat his runs down the left that showed some threat against Germany, but it was nothing doing.

The final score of the game didn't come until stoppage time, when Wijnaldum was left alone in the middle (this seems familiar, somehow) to knit a sweater for a relative.  Or put the ball past Cesar, he had a difficult decision.

I've been very impressed by the Dutch coach, van Gaal, and he showed his class by subbing in his third-string goalie, Vorm, a minute or two after that.  With that move, he'd managed to get his entire line-up onto the pitch at some point in the tournament.  My understanding is that van Gaal is going to Man U for next season, and I think that'll work well for both him and the team.

In any event, while the Dutch went home fairly happy (but not going into space; nice PR move to make that offer), for the second time, hosting the World Cup ended in misery for the Brazilians (maybe they'll look for a co-lo host next time).  It was the first time that they had lost consecutive home games of any sort in seventy-odd years; I can't imagine what the locker room was like afterwards.

In any event, it left only the title game to be played, with Germany taking on Argentina.

Quiescence

As busy as the action was in the Germany-Brazil semifinal, the Netherlands-Argentina semifinal was a real snoozer.

I didn't realize it before the game started but di Maria was out with a minor injury; I didn't hear whether he'd be back for the last game (final or third place).

The only thing I really found interesting about the play was that the Dutch were playing a possession game, rather than a counterattacking one.  I wonder if that was a sign of respect for the Argentine attack; certainly, it shows that the Dutch are well-coached.

It was a game marked by defense; very closely marked, in fact.  So much so that there was very little room for anyone in the attacking third.  When Robben or van Persie got the ball, they only had space for a single touch.  When Messi got it, he had someone with him at almost all times.

But the Argentinians had far more chances for a long while.  It turned out that there was only one shot on net in the entire first half, and that was a Messi free kick (skirted the left side of the wall, and struck hard, but still not a hard save for the keeper).

As far as chances, I didn't count, but those from the land of silver definitely had more of them (though really, there were very few really good ones, and those were mostly shot off-net).

The second half played pretty evenly, maybe slightly still in favor of the Argentines.  But again, there wasn't much going on; neither team did much in the attacking third of the pitch.

So regulation expired without anything much having happened.

Extra time came, and saw the play definitely favor the Dutch, who had a few good chances, but they still couldn't convert any of them.  The Argentines did manage a couple of chances, at least one of which was very good, but spoiled again.

Neither goalie was really pushed much.  By the end of extra time, they'd made six saves between them, and I don't think any of those were especially good saves.

So the ho-hum game went to penalty kicks, which was at least going to force the goalies to work a bit.  The Dutch were out of subs by that point (they'd used their third sub to put Huntelaar in for van Persie a short bit into extra time), which I think they regretted.  Not only were they missing van Persie's shots, but they couldn't put Krul in at goalie again, either.

But it likely didn't matter; Vlaar came up for the first kick, and put it waist-high on the left.  The Argentine goalie dove out to his right and knocked it in the air and back to him.

I was surprised to see Messi come out first for Argentina, and you knew he wouldn't miss (top-center, if you're wondering about placement).

Robben came out next for the Netherlands, and you knew he was good for it too, putting it hard into the right side of the net.

Garay was next for the South Americans, putting it low and left, just below the diving keeper to keep Argentina ahead.

Sneijder came up next, and you were sure he wouldn't mess it up.  But he put it in the goalie's reach, and it was knockout well away from the goal to largely guarantee loss for the Europeans.

Aguero, who was a late sub, came up next and clinically kept the pressure on the Orangemen.

Kuyt came up next, with a very long run-up, and put it bottom-right to stay alive.

But then Maxi Rodriguez came up; it took me a few minutes to place his name.  He'd had the unbelievable goal in the 2006 World Cup (quite possibly the prettiest of that World Cup) against Mexico to win that game.  Well, he calmly finished this one (with some luck; the goalie deflected it up, but into the back of the crossbar) for the win, also.

So Argentina will go up against Germany in the final, with the Dutch falling into a rematch of their knockout game with Brazil in the last World Cup.  I don't see the Brazilians being heavily favored, this time.  Nor do I see the hosts winning, unless the Dutch fail to take the game seriously (which I highly doubt).

In Sunday night's final between Argentina and Germany... It's funny, thinking about it; all the upsets and surprise eliminations in pool play, and even a casual fan would be likely to get at least three of the final four right.  And a Germany Argentina final was probably considered one of the more likely possibilities, even back then.

I'm going to have to go with my ancestry, and pick Germany.  Messi will definitely be the best player on the pitch (by a pretty good margin), but the Germans will hound him relentlessly.  And the Europeans will attack in waves as well.  A 3-1 result would not surprise me in the least (though it would be a bit out of character for this World Cup, which has seen far too many knock-out games go scoreless in regulation); if the one was a pretty Messi score, that would be perfect, in my book.

Pounding away

I still need to write up my notes on the quarter-finals of the World Cup, but holy crap! that game yesterday.

I figured it'd be close to a toss-up with both teams at full strength, so with Silva and Neymar out, I did expect a German victory.  But man, did Brazil crap the bed.

I joked to a friend of mine, after the third goal, that it looked like Brazil had already given up.  He responded that they were doing the traditional turtling, defensively, except that this turtle was on its back and thrashing.

And then there were a couple more German goals, in short order.  After that stretch, figured the Germans would score a few more.

What I didn't realize, going in, was how key Silva was at the back end.  I knew how big a deal Neymar missing was, but didn't know that Silva was the coordination for the defense.  At least, I hope that was it, because there was no coordination on the back end.

For a while, not only were Germans finding space anywhere they wanted to, but they weren't even being pressed until they got within ten yards of the Brazilian box.  It was incredible.

When Mueller scored in the 11th minute, on the Germans' first corner, he was basically uncovered.  I saw a tweet saying that he'd "found a thiago silva-sized hole", and that seems about right.

It took about ten more minutes for the Germans to score again (Klose, this time, with a generous feed from Mueller and a bit of luck on a rebound.  That was enough to give him the all-time World Cup goal-scoring record), but then they scored three more in rapid succession after that.  The remaining fifteen minutes or so of the first half went fairly quickly,  with the Germans able to move about at will, but unable to score.

The second half finally showed a bit of spine from the Brazilians; in fact, they had several good scoring chances in the first few minutes of the half.  Some of that was due to the German's playing extremely avoiding of any fouls, and thereby giving a lot of space.  That still might have been a good strategy, though, as the Brazilians were diving all over the place, and that might have been less obvious.

But Schuerrle came in for Klose not too long after, and he got into the scoring act with a pair of his own (to match Kroos' brace and exceed Khedira's lone tally).

The rest of the game was pretty desultory, with occasional attempts by each team to score (Oezil missed a nearly-empty net off to the side some time around the 85th minute), but the only remaining score can from Oscar in the 90th minute.  I was surprised the ref gave them as much stoppage time as he did, but it was still two minutes.

I saw a funny tweet doing scoring equivalents of that final margin.  Though funny, it seems a bit off-base, in some of those sports.  Baseball being twenty-two seems reasonable.  NFL seems twenty or so points high as well (it's been well over 800 games (how many all-time World Cup games there've been) since anyone has scored even 80 points in an NFL game.  Actually, just did a bit of research, and highest score since 1940 seems to be 73 (when the Bears beat the Redskins for the title; hadn't realized that was highest-scoring game since then).  So 107 is pretty bizarre.

And the NBA one is just wacky-land.  I'm fairly sure no one has ever scored even half that many in a single game.  One quarter that many is well short of an everyday occurence.  484 is eight points a minute.  That's at least three baskets a minute over an entire game.  Crazy.

And I might need to rethink that NHL comparison.  Since the 1917-18 season, there have been eight games with 14+ goals scored by one team (none in almost thirty-three years).  Eight in almost a hundred years.  Over 12000k games just in the last eleven seasons.

One in 800+ would be significantly less than that, and this was not the most lopsided result ever seen in the World Cup, so probably eleven or twelve would be a more reasonable number for NHL equivalence.

Round of Sixteen

There were no surprises in the round of sixteen of the World Cup.  How they got to the results was a surprise in a couple cases; how close the result was, in some cases, shocking.

Brazil beating Chile was certainly expected; when Neymar scored in the eighteenth minute, it seemed like a harbinger of more to come.

But when Chile stole the ball from the defense, fifteen minutes later, and promptly equalized, that was not at all expected.

The reffing seemed generally favorable to Brazil (as you'd expect); when Jo went flying into the goalie with his spikes extended, he got away with only a yellow.  But when Hulk used his mighty thews to knock down a ball in the offensive zone, preparatory to a scoring kick, I didn't expect the goal to be called back, let alone for him to get a yellow.

But basically all of the game, after Chile's equalizer, minus a couple brief forays upfield, was all Brazil hemming in their Spanish-speaking rivals.  But the Chileans held on, all the way to the end of regulation and stoppage time.  And then all through thirty minutes of extra time.

So it came down to penalty kicks.  Things really looked bad when Ceasar blocked the first two from Chile.  But the Chilean goalie stopped the second, and Hulk's shot in the fourth slot went over the net.  When Neymar nailed the fifth for Brazil, Chile needed to score to stay alive into sudden-death.

And the ensuing kick was beautiful, curling in to the inside of the right side post.  But it bounced out, curling around the far-size post and landing behind the goal line.  I suspect it was only millimeters from going in.  Such a disappointing finish for a really good game.

Uruguay's game against Colombia (the only one of the round I probably would have gotten wrong, if I'd done a bracket as planned) was a game of attractive, attacking soccer, with both teams attempting to break through via build-up.  But almost all of the shots were very long ones, from outside the box.

One that was a little shorter came from James Rodriguez of Colombia in the 28th minute.  He fired it off his right foot, on the half volley and right into the top of the net.  And it was shot so hard that the goalie got his hand on, but it was barely even deflected, let alone stopped.

The only other goal of the game also came from Rodriguez, and it was also pretty, but because of the passing that led to it, not the shot itself.  It was first crossed too high across the box, then crossed back to the far post, where it was headed into the middle, where Rodriguez was waiting.

Uruguay had a few chances, but they were largely outplayed.  And Rodriguez was electric.

The Netherlands v Mexico was one of the games I was most looking forward to, in the round.  And it was a build-up vs counterattack game, with the Dutch mostly sitting back.  And getting pretty seriously outplayed; their counterattacks were basically nonexistent in the first half.  I think RvP only touched the ball on one possession (for two touches) in the entire half.

Meanwhile, the Mexicans had a number of attacks that went all the way down to the endline but only managed a few shots off of them.

Offensively, the Dutch were mostly just playing back and forth, then trying to go over the top to connect with the offense.  Their few forays downfield were down the sides, with no results.

Holland's only real chance in the first half was when Robben was taken down in stoppage time in the box, but no call resulted.

In the second half, Mexico finally broke through when Dos Santos pulled the ball down at the top of the box, in the middle, drifted to the side a little, and placed an innocent-looking shot into the bottom corner of the net.

In the seventy-fifth minute, there was an official water break, and the Dutch coach showed why he was selected.  They abandoned their few attempts to build up, and went purely to the long ball.

That paid off in the 88th, when a cross in was headed out by a defender on the goal line, and the rebound went right to Sneijder, who put it into the left side of the net.  And then it paid off again in stoppage time, when Robben got the ball in the box, and took a complete dive to get the penalty call.

Huntelaar took the shot from the spot (van Persie had already subbed out), and ended the game in a bit of an anticlimax.

It really looked like Mexico was going to pull off the upset, and that was a really terrible way for it to end.  Very disappointing.

When Costa Rica and Greece faced off, I was feeling a little bit guilty.  The Greeks had played some impressive (for almost completely lacking offense) soccer to get to that point, and I'd been cheering against the all the way.  But Costa Rica had gotten there with some very impressive wins.

Ruiz scored first, for the Costa Ricans, with a shot from the top of the box that went into the side of the net.  It was uncharacteristically terrible defense from the Greeks, who neglected to cover him.

But things looked really bad for the Western Hemisphere when Duarte was sent off with his second yellow card in the sixty-sixth minute.

From there, it was just waves of Greek attacks, crashing against the buttresses of the Puerto Rican defense.  Every so often, one of the clearances would get to Campbell, and he'd attempt to make something out of it.

But it was a lot of defense for the Pura Vidans, and just as the commentator was saying how great they'd been, in stoppage time, the Greeks pulled down a ball bouncing around the attacking box, and Papastathopoulos put it past the goaltender.

That sent the game into extra time, with Puerto Rico still defending, down a man.  They even managed a couple of close chances while defending, but the game went into penalty kicks.  And my recording cut out a couple of minutes before that, so I didn't see Puerto Rico's 5-3 win there.

Not a good day for the Mediterranean.

The next day, things went a little better for Europe.  I don't have any notes on the game, as I watched most of it in a restaurant.  France beat Nigeria 2-0, but the game was much closer than that score indicates.  It took France close to 80 minutes to score, and they allowed many, many chances the other way during that time.  In fact, it looked like Nigeria scored, early on, but the offside flag was up (though on replay it looked like it should have counted).

All in all, France was the better team, and did deserve to win, but with a little bit of luck, Nigeria could have won.  And the game itself was one of the better-played ones of the tournament, with less diving, and both teams attacking constantly.  I would not have been even a little disappointed for it to go to extra time.

The late game, that day, had Germany versus Algeria, and the Algerian's definitely learned from the Americans game, and improved on the strategy.  Germany's attack was very much side-to-side, while Algeria was straight-forward, going over the top to turn it into a footrace with the German defenders.

Algeria never scored that way, but they forced Neuer to come a long way out of his net to prevent some of those passes from connecting.  Algeria definitely had, by far, the better of the play through the first half.

I'm not sure what the Germans changed at the half, but they did much better in the second half.  In the first ten minutes of the second half, they forced several good saves out of the goaltender; I don't think they managed to do that once in the first half.

But Algeria kept coming at them, and kept getting good chances.  Neuer was up to the challenge, mostly because he was so adept at reading the play, not because he was making such great saves.

Mueller probably would have scored in the 81st, if he'd been comfortable taking a shot with his left foot.  But his great job bringing a long pass under control only left him space on his left side, and he still tried to shoot with his right; it was not close.

But neither team was able to capitalize in the first ninety, so it went into extra time again.  Scoreless, instead of tied at one.

But it didn't stay scoreless long; the Algerians had already been looking tired, and allowed a goal less than two minutes in.  Mueller made a nice run down the left side, and crossed in to Schuerrle just past the near post.  Schuerrle slightly overran the ball, but managed to deflect it just enough with his trailing foot to send it in.

Algeria got a few more chances in extra time, but were unable to capitalize.  And Germany got an insurance goal in the final minute, as Oezil and Schuerrle combined to pass back and forth several times, shedding defenders, before Oezil put the ball in.  And my recording stopped just after the replay of that goal, so I missed Algeria scoring one to make it closer.

The final day had Argentina attacking Switzerland.  Unfortunately, I missed the first eight minutes, but what I saw was Argentina attacking hard, both with and without the ball.  Their aggressive defense resulted in Switzerland not holding on to the ball, and put them in good position on counterattacks.

Because of that, it took twenty-seven minutes for the Swiss to get their first chance (and only good one of the first half).  Meanwhile, the Argentines had a number of chances, twice forcing the Swiss keeper to come out to stop crosses into the box.

In the second half, chances were a bit more even (and Argentine defense was a bit more passive).  Di Maria did have one interesting run down the right hand side, but got to the end line and was unable to cross with his right.  So he tried crossing his legs to center with his left; it didn't work, but was an interesting attempt.

Shaqiri was certainly doing everything in his power to push the Swiss to the next round, but despite his best efforts, I think Benaglio felt like he was in a shooting gallery.  Thankfully for him, the Argentines put a lot of shots over or wide of the net.

So regulation ended scoreless again, and both teams looked really tired going into extra time.  In particular, there were a lot of wild clearances from the defenses, with fewer passes to the midfield.

And all of that resulted in getting to the 118th minute without a goal.  Then Messi made a run down the center, avoiding defenders, and passing outside from just above the box.  The entire defense had collapsed on him, leaving di Maria with an open shot to the far side of the net, and he didn't miss.

The Swiss got very close three times in the remaining couple of minutes (Benaglio was even in the attacking box a couple of times, and looked useful there.  And not just on their corner kick), but were unable to get closer than hitting the post from an in-close header (which bounced right back to the shooter, off his leg, and out of bounds).  I really felt bad for the Swiss, coming so close.

The final game did not go so well for the Americans, as they faced off against Belgium.  And basically, Belgium just ran over, around, and through them.  In the first half, the Flemish were one of eighteen on crossing attempts.  Good center defense to stop so many attempts; terrible outside defense to allow so many.

Howard certainly felt like he was facing a firing squad; he turned in the best goaltending performance of the tournament with sixteen saves.  He got them all the way to extra time (and almost to winning, but Wondolowski was unable to put a ball headed to him in the last minute or two of regulation into the net with the goalie out of position.  He kicked it over on the half volley from the inner box), but the Belgians kept attacking.

Origi was a beast during regulation, getting his first shot just forty seconds in and being a large part of the constant attack.  He shot several of those crosses, and headed a couple more towards net.  And had a couple other shots as well.

Fellaini was largely contained, due to Beckerman being benched and Cameron covering him.  That helped a lot with breaking up those crosses, but it definitely hurt the American attack, as his passes were much less reliable.

But despite his yeomanlike work in the center, the US was just getting used on the outside.  And that stayed the case all game.

But, as mentioned, the US managed to survive the barrage into extra time, but it took only two minutes for the Belgians to finally score.  Lukaku, who came in for Origi at the beginning of extra time, charged down the right and crossed in to de Bruyne.  He put several moves on the US defender, and finally got a clear shot from inside the box.  Howard had his first moment of weakness, and was off-balance when the shot finally came.

It took another twelve minutes, and a couple more saves for Howard, before the Dutch struck again.  And again, it was Lukaku leading the charge, this time down the left.  And this time he just took it himself to very close, and was able to beat Howard to the near post.

I actually turned the game off at that point (I'd promised to take my daughter bike riding), so I missed Green's gorgeous goal a couple minutes later (at a sprint, on a full volley, he kicked a ball coming over his shoulder from behind, into the net.  Give him ten more chances at that shot, and I'd be impressed if he could do it twice).  A friend texted me, though, so I watched the last few minutes (we'd gotten delayed from the bike ride).  But nothing more came of the last few minutes.

It was a disappointing end, but by no means was the loss undeserved (or unpredictable).  Belgium will be a handful for Argentina.  Perhaps it's just that the US isn't as good as their survival of the Group of Death would seem to indicate, but Belgium looked much better than they had in any of their earlier games (and they were one of two undefeated teams in the group stage.  Part of that might have been starting Origi instead of having him on the bench).

Anyway, France plays Germany tomorrow in the first quarterfinal.  Brazil will play Colombia later.  Saturday will start with Argentina facing Belgium, followed by the Dutch facing Costa Rica.  And as much as I've enjoyed watching Costa Rica, their magic runs out there.

I would pick Germany over France, but France has looked very good in this tournament.  I haven't really noticed how much speed France has up top, but if they have that, they can certainly win.

Brazil and Colombia will be an interesting match.  Rodriguez has been a match for Neymar so far, but the hosts have a much better supporting cast.  Like Costa Rica, I can see this one being a blowout.

I think Argentina and Belgium will be the most fun game to watch.  Neither team is particularly prone to diving, and both will be attacking with speed.  I'm looking forward to it.  I think the South Americans will win, but I wouldn't be surprised if it went 3-2 or 4-3.

Waffling play

The last group to play had Algeria playing Russia and South Korea facing Belgium.  Belgium was already guaranteed to advance, and could only not win the group with both Algeria and South Korea winning.  But the other position was wide open, with all three teams having a chance (though the Koreans were a very long shot).

Not having any real feel for things, I opted for the Belgian game, hoping for an upset.

And the South Koreans came out as a desperate side, playing hard, possessing the ball and dominating the game for more than twenty minutes at the outset.  They weren't getting  a lot of great chances, but they were keeping the Belgians from having any chances.

The Belgians' first chance came in the twenty-fourth minute, but Mertens managed to put the ball over the net from point-blank range.

Five minutes later, the Koreans had several very good chances, but were unable to capitalize.  The first came off a long shot by Ki, which the goalie did well just to get a hand on it to deflect it out of play.  On the resulting corner, the ball ping-ponged around a bit in the box and the Koreans were finally able to head it towards the goal.  But the forward was unable to get enough on it to put it past the goalkeeper.

Mertens got another shot a minute later, but was called offsides (and his shot went over the net anyway).

The complexion of the game changed significantly right as normal time expired for the half, as Defour got a straight red for a dangerous challenge where he went spikes-first into a Korean player, missing the ball by a lot.

Stoppage time went by very quickly, without anything interesting happening.  But it certainly looked likely that the Koreans would win, at that point, and even that they might be able to win by enough to move on (helped by the Russians being ahead in the other game, at that point).

But that wasn't the way it played out at all.  In fact, the Belgians actually played better, the rest of the way.  They held the Koreans to only a couple of chances, and finally scored, themselves, in the 77th minute.  Origi got a pretty good shot off from the top of the box, and the rebound went straight to Vertonghen, who calmly slotted it home without any defenders close enough to challenge him.

That goal basically took all the wind out of the sails of the Koreans, and the game was essentially over, then.

So Belgium won the group cleanly, and Algeria took second spot, as they had managed to equalize against Russia.  That pits Belgium against the US, and put Algeria up against Germany.

USA loses to advance

In group G, the Group of Death, there was a lot of talk that the Germans and US might have an gentleman's agreement to play to a draw, so both would advance.

Then it appeared likely that the game would be cancelled, as Recife was experiencing severe flooding, and it was very difficult to drive the hour out of town to get to the stadium.  But everyone made it, eventually, and the game went on as scheduled.

Well, it quickly became apparent that there was no agreement, as the Germans came out firing, getting several chances in the opening minutes.

A pass across the box to Mueller in the eighth minute was one of those chances, where Mueller jumped at the ball, leg outstretched, but it was a foot or so off.  A minute later, the Germans had a corner that was immediately played out, leading to another corner.  That one ended up with two Germans interfering with each other, to keep either from having a very good chance.

The US played up, and there was a foul on the play.  Odd that the ref stopped play immediately, instead of allowing US to continue play upfield.  Regardless, the possession lasted well over a minute and was the longest that the US managed in the entire game.  And they never even threatened to score.

The Germans came back fairly quickly, and in next several minutes forced Gonzalez to break up a couple plays across to Mueller.

Things went back and forth a bit less eventfully for a while after that, but the Germans did force a really good save out of Howard in the thirty-fourth.

A few minutes later, a nice through pass was put to Podolsky, but his pass across the box went to Howard.

A minute later, the US managed to get a corner, but the cross flew over everyone.

That was it for chances in the first half, but it was certainly clear that the battle lines were drawn.

In the second half, Germany was even more aggressive in going for the net.  Klose, who had just come in, had a great chance in the air in the 50th, but the serve across was off by an inch or two and he was unable to put it on net.

A few minutes later, Howard made a fantastic save off a shot in close, but the rebound bounced all the way out to the edge of the box, to the right of Howard, where Mueller was waiting to pound it into the far corner of the net.

Almost ten minutes later, the US managed a bit of a threat with a long pass from Bradley to Jones, which forced Neuer to come thirty-five yards out of his net to break up the play (see foreshadowing here to the Germany game against Algeria).

The US might have had another threat on the counterattack a couple minutes later, but there was a breakdown in communication that kept the ball from moving upfield quickly enough.

In the 69th, the US got a pair of corner kicks, and were threatening on the second one until Jones and Bedoya ran into each other at speed, breaking Jones' nose and knocking Bedoya down.  Both ended up continuing, but it didn't look good.

While they were being looked at, Schweinsteiger went out for Goetze.  Seems like an odd substitution; wonder what the reasoning was.

In any event, the Germans continued attacking, and Gonzalez was called upon again in the 82nd, to break up a diagonal run into the box by Hoewedes.

A couple minutes later, the US threated again, until a miscommunication by Bedoya and Dempsey broke up the play.

The Germans brought the ball back down after that, and Gonzalez again broke up the play, although the offside flag went up anyway.

The US managed a final offensive push just before the end of the game, in stoppage time.  The first of them was pushed outside by Neuer, where it was retrieved by the US and crossed back in before Neuer could get back into position.  Dempsey was on the receiving end, but headed it over the goal from only a few feet out.

Although the score was 1-0, the US was never in danger of winning the game.  And they wer definitely watching the progress in the other game.  Although they were never in position to be eliminated, they were very worried when Ghana pulled even with Portugal.  But Ronaldo delivered a second goal for the Portuguese to win the game, which ensured US moving on.

The US performance was very uneven, although maybe it showed some weakness at the German back end.  But the US couldn't get the ball up front; I think Dempsey only had two or three touches (one of which came via him coming back well into the midfield).

Really, the only two Americans who consistently looked good were Jones, who made some great runs upfield, and Gonzalez, who was the rock in the defense.  Let's hope they can improve.

The most common letter in the English language...

For whatever reason, this group had about the least appeal to me.  The French were looking impressive, Honduras didn''t, and Ecuador and Switzerland were enigmas.

Expecting the French to win handily, I opted to watch the Swiss game, although I was paying much less attention than to other games.

But it started out pretty quickly, with the Swiss getting the ball in the box in the second or third minute, but they were unable to get a good shot off.

But it didn't take long for another Swiss attack to materialize; Shaqiri finally justified my faith, putting it in with an impressive curving shot to the far side from the top of the box only a few minutes later.  It was very similar to Messi's goal from the top of the box that beat Iran, except that it didn't go quite all the way to the far post, and did hit the crossbar.

Shaqiri delivered again in the thirty-first minute.  A long pass to Drmic gave he and Shaqiri a 2-on-1, and they quickly made it a 2-on-none with a quick pass just out of reach of the defender.  Shaqiri drifted across from right to left, then put the ball back across to the right, with the goalie having no chance.  It was just a perfectly executed fast break with the only two defenders around barely missing intercepting it.

From there, I paid a little attention until halftime, but it didn't look like Honduras was going to seriously threaten, so I missed Shaqiri completing the hat trick in the seventy-first minute.  Kudos to him for a fabulous game when the team needed him most.  I hope he plays like that again in the knockout (unless they somehow end up facing the US, though that would require several very unlikely upsets).

Anyway, France won the group on the strength of a scoreless draw with Ecuador adding to their two earlier, convincing wins.  And Switzerland moved on, with their two wins.

And then group F

Wednesday opened with Group F finishing its pool play.  Argentina was facing Nigeria, while Bosnia was taking on Iran.  Expecting a blowout in the Argentinian game, I opted to see if Iran was able to advance for the first time.

The game started with Iran being content to be tight in the back and look for counterattacks, which worked for both teams, as Bosnia is much better in the build-up.  But Iran was giving an awful lot of space, not looking to pressure until the Bosnians were fifteen to twenty yards into their side of the field.  So much of the game was taking place in a very small area, where Bosnia would bring it down, give it up in the midfield, and then squash the Iranian counterattack.

And that's how much of the game went, although each team got occasional glimpses of the net.  The first good look at the net from Bosnia actually looked pretty innocuous, as Djeko had the ball at the top of the box, and elected to shoot from there.  It wasn't a terribly hard shot, but it was placed with pin-point accuracy, on the ground, but an inch or two off the post, and the goalie just couldn't reach that far (it was only a few inches out of his reach).

Earlier, the announcers mentioned Argentina scoring, and I flipped over to see Messi's nice goal on replay.  Well, the Nigerians responded by also scoring before the replay even finished, so I saw that goal as well.

The Iranians didn't respond quite as quickly as the African team did, but they weren't far off, either.  However, their shot rang off the crossbar, and nearly straight down.  So it bounced up quite a bit, and the Iranian following up waited to kick it, rather than heading it, which gave the goalie time to get in the way.

They were opening up a bit, both offensively and defensively, and that seemed to be paying off.  They got close again in the thirty-first, with a nice play to chip it over the defense to one of three waiting forwards.  But the forwards were caught by the offside trap for no damage.

The Bosnians took advantage of that space with a run of their own in the 41st.  A pass ahead from the long run went to Vrsevic, but his pass across to Djeko, in the middle of the box (his home away from home, it seems) was a bit off-line and went out of bounds.

Dejagah (who had the bulk of the Iranian chances in the tournament, it seems) almost had a chance in the fifty-fifth, but was a hair off-sides.  There was no excuse for it, though, as he was all the way at one end, and could watch all the defenders.

Four minutes later, Pjanic thanked the Iranian defense for a terrible turnover by depositing the ball into the net.  Six minutes later, the Bosnians almost scored several times, but their players kept getting in each other's way.  Funny sequence to watch, though.

Play went back and forth for a quarter of an hour after that, until Iran got another corner kick.  The kick went to the back side, and was cleared out and further to that side.  It was immediately crossed back to the center, and cleared.  Then yet another played chipped it back into the center, where the only Iranian to stay onsides controlled it and passed it backwards across the net to Ghoochannejhad for an easy tap-in.

And in less time than it took for me to write out that sequence to a friend, the Bosnians came back and Vrsajevic put it in the net.

From there, the rest of the game was a formality.

In the other game, Messi had scored a second, as had Musa, before Rojo had provided the winning tally.  So the Argentinian game ended up being the closer of the two, though the Argentinians showed no fear of losing, subbing Messi out in the 63rd minute.

The results ended up putting both Argentina and Nigeria through, with Argentina winning the group.  No big surprises there, although I certainly wouldn't have been disappointed had Iran managed to win by two and advance.  But that was a long shot, to put it mildly.

Just pick 'C'

In Group C, with Colombia guaranteed to be moving on, I thought the game between Greece and Cote d'Ivoire, who were both fighting to move on, would be more interesting.

And it certainly was.  Greece was missing their captain, of course, suspended for his red card in the previous game.  And Ivory Coast made a small change, bringing Drogba in right away instead of as a later substitute.

And things did not get off to a great start for the Greeks, with Kone going down very early with an injury (though I missed what caused it).

In the thirteenth minute, both teams had decent chances to breaking players, forcing the goaltenders to come out and take the ball just before those breaking players could get a touch.

And I missed what happened again, but in the 18th, the Greek goaltender got a chiropractic adjustment (on the field) to delay the game.  Whatever it was, six minutes later he was unable to continue, and subbed out (back spasms, maybe; those can be seriously debilitating).

Just before he went off, the Ivorians had a decent scoring chance, but Drogba's pass in the box was off, so they didn't even get a shot.

In any event, Karnezis going off meant that the Greeks had used two subs in the first twenty-four minutes.  That definitely wasn't looking encouraging.

That didn't stop the Greeks from having a very nice counterattack that was headed into the bottom of the crossbar and out in the thirty-third minute.  That sequence resulted in a close-in free kick as well, which got past the wall but was an easy save as it rolled to the keeper.

A couple minutes after that, Drogba continued his uncharacteristically ineffectual play by getting a yellow card.  His defensive challenge did win the ball, but it was a dangerous challenge that could have easily broken the other guy's ankle.  I must admit, though, that I don't think I understand what the standards are for cards, now; I thought getting the ball meant everything was ok (unless your cleats are directed into the other player).  This was a case of solidly getting the ball, but getting the player afterward.  I'm not saying it was ruled incorrectly (I don't know), but it wasn't ruled the way I expected.

One thing that surprised me was that the bulk of the offense seemed to be coming from, and through, Gervinho, rather than Drogba or Yaya Toure.  He had one hell of a game, for sure.  In any event, I wonder if that was fluke or design.  I hadn't noticed him as much in the earlier games, but that might be entirely due to not having previously heard of him.

Be that as it may, the Greeks were the ones to score next, with Samaris capitalizing on a turnover from the Ivorian defense.  That left the Greeks up by one at the end of the half, and put the Africans' backs against the wall.

In response to that, they started the second half by opening up a bit in the back.  That helped them get the bulk of the chances, but not necessarily the best of them.

In the sixty-seventh, Kalou had a nice drive from the top-left portion of the box, but pushed the shot a couple of feet wide.

One minute later, the Greeks put a knuckleball of a shot off the crossbar; that one could have easily gone a foot higher or lower, and the goalie wouldn't've been able to do anything about it.

After several nice tries to get scoring chances, Gervinho does come through, and feeds Bony for an easy score, in close on the left, in the seventy-fourth.

But it only took five more minutes for the Greeks to ring the ball off the post again, and six more for the Ivorians to get it close.  Two minutes after that, the Greeks were close again, with a pass going right across the wide-open goal mouth, but there was no one there for the tap-in.

And the Greeks got really close again in stoppage time, with Sio stopping the chance but getting called for a foul to give a Grecian penalty shot.  And Samaras (not to be confused with Samaris, who'd scored earlier) calmly converted it for the goal, and the win.

So the Greeks are moving on, for the first time ever.

In the other game, surprising no one, Colombia crushed Japan to win the group.

Group D follows

Yesterday started with Group D, with Costa Rica facing England and Italy facing Uruguay.  Costa Rica was in, England was out, and Italy and Uruguay were fighting for scraps.  Speaking of groups not following the pre-tournament script.

So, given that the Costa Rica/England game had little chance of impact, and was featuring an almost-completely revamped English side, I decided to watch Italy and Uruguay.

And man, whoever named soccer 'The Beautiful Game' did not have to suffer through this game.  It had the most fouls in the first half, 23, of any game in the tournament.  And while I wasn't counting, that wasn't a surprise.

Just about any time there was contact, one or both players took a dive.  Balotelli, Chiellini, and Suarez were fighting for the crown of most (egregious) dive.  As much as it pains me to say it, I'd give the first-half title to Balotelli.

Of course, part of the reason they kept trying it was that it was working.  Italy had a fairly close-in free kick in the twelfth following one of those dives.  Pirlo, of course, took it, and shot directly for net.  It was a very nice shot, and the goalie was doing very well to deflect it over the net.

Ten minutes after that, Balotelli got a yellow for a really dangerous challenge from behind.  He was flying over another player, and hit him in the back of the head with his shin; he was lucky not to get a straight red for it.

And that card was important; probably because of the diving, Italy worried about Mario getting sent off, so he was subbed out at halftime.

In the second half, Uruguay got the first good scoring chance in 58th, but Rodriguez, running down the left, near center, put the shot off to the side.

Only a minute after that, Marchisio, taking the ball upfield, kicked over the ball and into the leg of a South American defender, and was given a straight red.  And that was a huge change in the complexion of the game, as the Italians stopped trying to win, and settled for just playing for a draw.

Buffon, the Italian goalie (and captain), got lucky he didn't get thrown out also.  He ran most of the way down the field and really aggressively got in the face of the ref, and stayed there a while, yelling and pointing at the ref.  I was amazed the ref didn't at least give him a yellow.

Anyway, that got the South Americans charging in, a lot, mostly trying for high crosses to headers, but it wasn't working for a long time.  But in the 81st, it finally did work, as Godin headed in a corner kick, forcing the Italians to open up in the back a bit.  And maybe that was the trick, as they could bring the big defender up for the corner, but he wasn't otherwise around.

Well, when the Italians started attacking, the Uruguayans mostly started bunkering down, and not challenging much.  That gave the Italians a lot of room, and they started playing high balls into the box as well.  And Godin won quite a few of those, as well.  The rest went out of play.

The South Americans did get a couple of chances on the counterattack as well, though.  One had Suarez and a couple other Uruguayans on a fast break.  Luis made the right play, the pass, but when it was blocked back at him, he then tried to go through the whole defense by himself.  Shockingly, that didn't work.

He got another chance just after, when the ball was kicked to him at midfield, and he saw Buffon well off his line.  His 40-50 yard shot, though, missed to the right.

There was almost six minutes of stoppage, but that wasn't enough for Italy to equalize.  So this group ended up as one of the biggest shocks of the tournament.

And speaking of shocks, I didn't say anything in there about Suarez's apparent attempt to, literally, take a bite out of Chiellini in setting up for a free kick.  It was just a wretched display by both players (both immediately dove for the ground); I have no idea what went through Suarez's mind before he did that.  It just makes no sense to me.  I'm pretty sure he's more than two years ago, and that's the highest age for that to make sense.

I hadn't previously heard about his previous incidents.  He'd apparently talked about how tough that was to explain to his young kids.  I wonder what his explanation will be, now.  Sad, really.

I haven't heard anything about him being suspended for that, but you've got to think it's being considered.  And it's deserved; much as I like him, generally, that's just an awful, awful thing to do.

Be that as it may, Costa Rica ended up in a scoreless draw, so they win the group, and Uruguay takes the second spot.

And then Group A

Group A was one where nobody was guaranteed to be in or out, going into the final game, although Brazil and Mexico definitely had the bull by the horns.

But since I thought that the chance of the refs allowing Brazil to lose was zero (assuming that their abundant talent wasn't enough, which was also unlikely), I turned on the Croatia match with Mexico.

It started out as a very tough defensive match-up, with neither team finding much room in the midfield.  Croatia got the first two corner kicks, but couldn't do anything with them.

Shortly after, Mexico tried to go over the top straight off a midfield free kick.  It didn't work, but was a nice attempt.

I was somewhat amused when, soon after that, the Croats tried grabbing both shoulders of a Mexican and then kicked over top of him.  No foul.

The Croats then got the third corner kick.  It didn't work, but the strategy was interesting; they went all the way to the opposite side, then centered again from that side for a header attempt.  Again, it didn't work, but it was cool to watch.

In the fifteenth minute, the North Americans put it off the crossbar, right by the corner of the goal, but it went out.  That was their first good chance, and it came off a 20-25yd shot.

They got another chance in the nineteenth, with a long ball to a player running down the right side.  But it was foiled when he went to kick it into the middle, as his plant foot slipped and the ball bounced off of that foot and out of play.

The Mexicans got a couple of corner kicks in the 39th, but it didn't work out for them.  The first was immediately played out and the second was played upfield to start a counterattack.  Of course, that play out came from a defender at minimum distance, and he used his hand to send it out.  And if the ref had been looking, he would have seen that player grab his hand afterwards to assuage the hurt.  But the counterattack did no damage; the shot wasn't taken terribly close, and was fired over the crossbar.

A couple minutes later, there was a massive pig-pile in front of the net following a Mexican corner kick, but the Croats managed to clear just as a Mexican was called for interfering with the goaltender.

Early in the second, the Croats got away with murder, as there was a very deliberate take-down of a forward in the box, followed by blocking a cross with a handball.  Not exactly the prettiest sequence.

But Mexico finally scored in the 72nd minute.  Not a complicated play; just a centering from a corner kick, heading it into the net from close range.

It didn't take long for Mexico to increase their lead; only about three minutes.  The Croats back line gave the ball away before midfield, and Chicharito brought it down nicely.  Then he passed outside, and, going back to the middle, let the cross go to the far side for an easy tap-in.  Nicely played.

And karma came back to him, a couple minutes later, on a corner kick flicked on by another Mexican and right to him to head in for the goal.  There being only ten minutes left, that was enough for me to turn the game off, so I missed Croatia's goal just before the end.

So Brazil won the group, with Mexico also moving on.  Group B might have been a big surprise, but this is the result most would have predicted, before the tournament started.

Update: I forgot to mention one item of amusement.  I did flip across to the other game a couple of times; the first two, I flipped only a second or two before a score (the first two scores).

Group B resolution

On Monday, the World Cup went into the final round of games in the round robin.  Due to collusive results in earlier world cups, the two final games in each pool are now played as close to simultaneous as possible.

So it's impossible to watch all games live from this round (pity), but the plus side is that there are only two kickoff times per day, rather than the three to four seen previously.

The first, oddly, was Group B, where Spain and Australia had already been eliminated, and the Dutch and Chileans were fighting to win the group.  Since it was the only game that mattered, I opted for the Netherlands/Chile match-up.

Early on, the Dutch seemed content to let the South Americans keep the ball, and weren't even pressuring them until they crossed midfield.  I guess that was an attempt to draw them in and open up counterattacks (or maybe a sign that the Dutch didn't care much about the result and didn't want to tire themselves out; also a possibility).

Whatever the reason, it made for a fairly boring game, with the first scoring chance I wrote down coming in the 39th minute.  That was off a nice run by Robben, coming down just left of center by himself, but finally pushing the shot wide.

I think I must have not been paying really close attention, because that's the only scoring attempt I noted in the first half.  And I don't have any for the first half-hour of the second half, although I did note that the midfield was contested much more tightly, by both sides, in the second half.  To the point that there was an immense amount of contact between players.

The Dutch finally opened the scoring in the 77th minute, with an interesting corner kick strategy.  They played it straight back from the corner, then centered it from further back, and won the ball in the air just at the far side of the net.  The goalie, of course, had no chance at it.

That pushed the Chileans to desperation, and they opened up a bit, allowing some Dutch chances, but I had to turn the game off (around the 88th minute) before the Dutch scored a second time.

Though it didn't really matter, the Spanish crushed the Aussies 3-0 in the other game, salvaging a little bit of their pride.

Sirens on full volume

Weirdness continued, Sunday; the middle game between Algeria and South Korea was also on ABC, and was completely missed.  The late game, though, despite having the US in it, went back to ESPN.  Good for me, but weird, in general.

So I was able to watch it very late, which was much better than not at all.

It started out very poorly for the Americans, with a very poor defensive play by the right back giving Nani an easy goal in the fifth minute (his first goal of the year, across all competitions; I knew he'd had an off year, but didn't realize how much so).

And for a few minutes thereafter, the Americans looked as bad against the Portuguese as they had for most of the Ghana game.

In the fourteenth, there was some contact weirdness.  First, Mereira went down in a really terrible dive, rightly ignored.  But while the staff came out to look at him, Postiga had to leave the field with an injury.  No contact there, so I assume it was a hamstring pull, or something similar.

But the US settled down (important for a team that had never won after surrendering the first goal), and by the 36th minute, possession was only 56-44 in favor of Portugal.  Not to imply that was a big surprise, the US was only finding offense by going over the top.  And their shots were mostly from distance; the only in-close ones were blocked by the defenders.

Shortly after that, we had the first ref-called water break of the tournament that stopped play for a couple of minutes.

In the forty-fifth, Howard was called on to make a pair of saves.  The first he made well, tipping it off the post, but was offbalance, and had to stretch to tip the ball over the net on the second.

I had to laugh, right after that, when stoppage time was announced at two minutes, since there were at least two stoppages that were individually longer than that (Mereira's "injury" and the water break).

But nothing happened during that time, so they went into the half with the US down a goal still.

The second half started with the Portuguese giving the US a bit more room, perhaps to keep their shape at the back better, and prevent shots over the top.  Thinking back on one of the other games, I wonder if stopping the long ball works better by being tighter at the back or pressuring the kicks more.

The US did get a 5-on-2 break in the 51st minute, but Bradley's pass ahead was a half-step behind the forward, and they lost the momentum.  Very disappointing.

Two minutes later, Bradley again did less than well.  He had an open chance two minutes later, with the goalie completely out of position, but shot it directly into the defender, Costa, who was in the goal.  Not his finest moment.

Ronaldo broke free, finally, about six minutes later, but fired the shot high and wide before the defense caught up.

A couple minutes later, the US finally equalized on a shocker.  There was a pretty bad corner kick, but the ball went out to Jones, ten yards outside the box, and a bit off to the left side.  He took it a little bit to his right, then fired a shot around Costa (in good position again) and into the far side of the net.

Play continued pretty even for quite a while, then.  The US finally found some space with a great run down the right hand side in the 81st minute.  Then there were three quick, nice passes, to Bradley to Zusi to Dempsey, going across the goal one way, then back for Dempsey to finish from the near side goal line.

That got the Portuguese to push forward, at one point managing to have five men offsides in one play.

As stoppage time went on, it looked like time was going to run out for Portuguese, but Bradley misplayed a ball at midfield, and the ball got kicked up to Ronaldo, who made a run down the right field side.  From well back, he crossed into the box and hit a diving Varela for the header to tie the game.

Once the celebration was done, the ref only allowed a few seconds of play, so the game ended in a flabbergasting draw.  A second center-back was subbed in in the last minute or so, and he signally failed his only charge.  Disappointing doesn't even begin to cover it.  A win would've cemented the US into moving on, and even given them a good chance to win the group.

Now, they'll need to beat Germany to win the group, though a draw would be good enough to get them into the knockout.  Knowing the riskiness of playing with desperation, I suspect the US and Germany will play a very desultory game, with both teams looking for a draw.

Russians show soft spot for Belgian

Sunday got off to a weird start, from my perspective.  The Belgium-Russia tilt was on ABC, instead of ESPN; I'd misprogrammed the DVR, so I missed the first thirty-ish minutes entirely.

It pretty quickly became clear that both defenses were better than the opposing offenses, and that it was going to come down to who had the defensive breakdown or lucky bounce.

Belgium did get one chance in the thirty-sixth, by going over the top on the right hand side, but the goalie stopped the shot.

One thing noted is that this World Cup has had far more scoring than the previous one; something like 50% more (it was 84-54 at one point, I don't have a more up-to-date comparison).  I think that's why there's been fewer draws (at one point, at least, there was a big difference there).  I wonder if any of that difference is due to the ball; the Jabulani ball in South Africa had much different characteristics in turbulent air than the ones before or since.

Anyway, getting back to the game, that was about it for the first half.

I was happy to see Origi coming in in the 56th minute, although was disappointed to see him take a big dive in the box a couple minutes after his entrance.

In the eightieth, Russia had a good chance, but shot the ball about three feet wide.  One of the defensemen had made a run into the middle, and got a good feed (he was open), but he just couldn't put it on net.

One thing that surprised me was that the Belgians were showing almost no creativity; Russia wasn't either, though the Russians were generally looking a bit better (not much, call that the damns of faint praise).

A few minutes after that Russian attempt, the Belgians got a free kick at the top of the box, and put it off the post and out.

A minute or two later, Origi had a very good possession, showing good ball-handling and strength, but couldn't put the shot on net.

But it was only a brief respite for the Russians, as Origi scored in the 88th minute.  Surprisingly, it didn't come from using his blazing speed to lead the rush.  He brought it most of the way down, on the left, then passed off to another forward right by him, and then found a soft spot in the box.  When the pass came back to him, he was open for a clinical finish (it was pretty awful defense by the Russians, though, not picking him up at all).

That pushed the Russians to desperation, and opened them up at the back.  The Belgians almost took advantage in the 92nd minute, but put the shot right into the goaltender.

But the game ended half a minute after that, so no harm done, on their part.

The loss leaves Belgium likely to win the group, and puts Russia behind the eight-ball, needing to beat Algeria in the final match.  We'll see if they can do it (sorry, OV, I'll be cheering for the Africans).

Bosnia just off from draw or win

The last game Saturday was Nigeria facing Bosnia-Herzogovina (sorry Herzegovina, hereafter just Bosnia).

And this was a very interesting game, tactically, as the Bosnians looked very good on the build-up, but the Nigerians looked very good on the counterstrike.

It looked like the Bosnians scored first, with Djeko on the tail end of a pretty passing play to score in the twentieth, but it was called back for being offsides.  Video replay, apparently (I didn't see it), said that that was bupkus.  In fact, not even close, according to the commentators.

Djeko almost had another in the 23rd, when he had a clean breakaway, but the goalie managed to stop him.

But Odemwingie put the Nigerians on the board only a few minutes after that, with a counterattack down the right hand side to a cross.

Both teams got good saves between the fifty-fifth and sixtieth minute, with Enyeama coming all the way out to the top of his box to stop Djeko, and Begavic making a great save to deflect a ball off-net.

Bosnia got one more very good chance just before stoppage, with Djeko's shot being deflected by Enyeama just enough to hit the woodwork and go back into the field of play.

But that was it; Bosnia certainly deserved better, and now needs to win, and for Argentina to win, to move on.  We'll see how that goes.

Surprise addendum

The surprise continued in the second game, as Germany faced Ghana.  Ghana was in red, this time, with Germany again in white with red trim.

With Germany ranked in the top four, and Ghana down at 37th, this was not expected to be a terribly competitive game.

Germany started out very conservatively, taking the ball and feeling their way around the edges for a while.  In fact, Ghana got the first real chance in the sixth minute on a counterattack.  Seven minutes later, Ghana managed a bit of sustained pressure, but the goalie was able to get across to get their one really good chance.

In the 28th, Germany finally tried to go over the top, and made a good run, though the only result was a corner kick.  And the goaltender caught the cross on that corner.

In the 32nd, they had another decent chance.  It was a long shot, from outside the box, but it was still a tough save for the keeper.  In the next few minutes, the Germans got Oezil and Goetze behind the defense, but neither one was able to get a good shot off.

At the end of the half, it looked inevitable that the Germans would score, probably in buckets, but nobody had yet managed it.

In the second half, it seemed that the Ghanaians were pressuring much deeper, perhaps to make it more difficult to get those long shots over the top.

But it didn't work all that well, as it only took six minutes for the Germans to take the lead.  There was a long cross to the middle of the field, where Goetze was charging in from the left, and he headed it in calmly.

It didn't take long for the Africans to equalize, though.  And they did it on a very similar cross to the German one, except that there were three targets waiting, and the third, Ayew, put it in.  It was interesting, though, as all three were tightly covered; so much for the German height.

In the 62nd minute, Ghana shocked everyone by taking the lead.  It was a really terrible turnover by the German defense, leading to an easy score by Gyan.

Five minutes later, the Germans showed some desperation, bringing in Schweinsteiger and Klose for more scoring punch.

And that worked almost immediately, as Klose scored off a corner kick.  But not with his normal header; he was waiting at the far post as Hoewedes flicked it on to him, and Klose tapped it in for his fifteenth career World Cup goal.  It was also his fourth World Cup in which he scored.  Both put him among the leaders, all-time.  Kudos to Miroslav, and Poland (he's an ethnic Pole, and where he was born was part of Poland, prior to WWII).

One bit of weirdness in the 76th minute; the Germans had a free kick about ten yards outside the box, and they had three people run over the ball before Schweinsteiger finally kicked it over the net.

The Germans almost scored again in the 86th, but Oezil's cross to Mueller was deflected just before getting to him.

For the last few minutes, both teams were looking very tired, and that was the end of the close chances.

Ghana put up quite a showing, and probably got rid of any chance of German complacency.  It also gave the US a pretty good chance to move on, as long as they could beat Portugal.  It does mean that Germany needs a result against the US to be assured of moving on (and would win the group with a draw).

Saturday surprises

Saturday was definitely a day of surprises in the World Cup, and it started with Argentina facing Iran.

It started out about as you'd expect, with Argentina holding the ball a lot, and kind of feeling their way around the Iranian defense.  And that defense was giving them quite a bit of play, only pressuring in their own half.

That slow build-up didn't result in anything until the thirteenth minute, when one of the Argentines got a point blank shot.  But the Iranian goaltender was ready for it, and stopped it (though he appeared to be hurt a little in the process).

In the eighteenth minute, it looked like the Argentinians were going to get a great chance on a counterattack with numbers.  But one of the few defenders managed to cut off the pass to the middle, and allow the other defenders to get back into position.  That had come on the heels of the Iranians getting a decent chance on a corner kick.

In the thirty-third minute, Messi had a fairly close free kick, and bent it past the wall, but put it over the net as well.  The Iranians built up to get a corner kick on the ensuing play, and then did a nice job of dispersing the counterattack that followed.

Mostly it was just a matter of watching the Argentines build up and try to score, and the Iranians work hard to prevent the score.  It took until the 52nd minute before the Iranians forced a good save from the Land of Silver's keeper.  It came off a good header from a cross, but went right into the goaltender.

It took another ten minutes for the Iranians to generate some offensive pressure, but they still didn't manage to get a good scoring chance out of that.

It took another twenty-five minutes after that for the Iranians to get another chance.

But meanwhile, the Argentines, despite a lot of offensive pressure, found the Iranian back line unyielding (and a bit lucky, to be sure).  So the Argentinians were definitely feeling pressure to win the game; after all, this wasn't even supposed to be a game.

Well, in stoppage time, Argentina finally broke through.  No surprise, the score came off the boot of Messi.  He was cutting across, just above the box, from right to left, and just before getting to the goal face, he fired a curling shot across that snaked its way between several defenders, and hit the far side of the net.  Quite an impressive shot.

So Argentina didn't give up any points, but they were pushed to the limit by a very game Iranian team.  Kudos to the Persians for hanging in there as long as they did.  I must admit, I thought they'd be punching bags in the tournament, but they certainly haven't looked out of place.  They even have a chance of moving on, if they can beat Bosnia.

Honduras sent away, with some controversy

The final game Friday finished up the second round in Group E, with Ecuador facing Honduras in a South/Central American matchup.

Judging by the first few seconds, it appeared that Ecuador's way of dealing with Honduras' very physical play was to just go to ground and hope for fouls.

Honduras opened the scoring (for the game, and for their country) in the 31st minute, with Costly taking advantage of a terrible misplay by the Ecuadoran center back.

It took only a couple of minutes for Ecuador to equalize, though, when a shot from the top-left of the box deflected off the inside of the leg of a defender and straight to Valencia for an easy tap-in.

Honduras had some great free kick attempts at 45 minute mark, and bigger controversy came about in stoppage time, as they scored, but was disallowed by refs.  Unclear exactly why, although might have been a handball.  For sure, Bengtson got a yellow card out of the mess.

One thing that was interesting was that Honduras had just about no chances via gradual build-up.  It was pretty much all counterattacks and attacks over the top.  In the 63rd, they actually scored again (arguably, for the third time in the game), but it was disallowed for being offsides.

Ecuador missed one just after, when Guagua's header went way off-base.  But it only held them up for a minute, as they scored for real on a mirror-image play that did make it into the net.

One semi-game-related thing that came up from the commentator.  They said that Honduras was not a good team playing from behind, and wasn't good at scoring.  Those were mentioned separately, but I think they're inextricably linked.  I think, to be a good team playing from behind, you must be very good offensively.

A little bit more controversy came in stoppage time, when Ecuador also had a goal disallowed, perhaps because of a handball call.  But not as big a deal as the earlier ones, as it affected the team already about to win.  On the replay, there was a handball, but it didn't seem at all deliberate, so a little bit weird.

Regardless, like mentioned, it didn't have any effect on the outcome, so not a big deal.

So yes, the final favored Ecuador, 2-1.  So Honduras will be going home, but certainly didn't look like they didn't belong in the tournament.

Francophones, disunite!

I don't have a whole lot to say about the France/Switzerland game that followed.

It started out pretty even for the first fifteen minutes or so (aside from Swiss von Bergen needing to be subbed out in the fifth minute due to a bad cut around his eye).  But then all hell broke loose, as France scored two goals in about seven seconds (less time to celebrate, then move the ball back to center, of course).  The first was a pretty decent play, but the second was execrable execution by the Swiss.

Griezmann took the pass back from the circle, and went to pass back to the defense, but passed it directly to a Frenchman.  Matuidi ran it straight down, just left of center, and fired it past a still-shocked goaltender to double the margin.

From there, I was only paying half an eye's attention to the proceedings.  It seemed that Switzerland got a couple of ok chances (one of which Shaqiri blew by not getting a shot off soon enough), but not a whole lot.  But in the fortieth minute, the French scored a third goal, and that was enough for me.  I turned it off.

The final was 5-2, but when I turned it off was as close as it ever got, so I definitely didn't miss anything (particularly as I've never liked Les Bleus).  Very disappointing.

It just about assures France of moving on, and means the Swiss need to defeat Honduras.  I think it puts France in the top spot, so far, as well.