nicknamed El Gassico because it was Russia against Saudi Arabia, the two lowest
ranked teams in the competition. I expect that there was a big opening ceremony
before the game and I say expect because I didn’t watch it. I expect it
illustrated all aspects of Russian life like shooting down passenger jets,
polonium darts and nerve gas. Vladimir Putin was in the ground, as was is
counterpart from Saudi Arabia and they sat with FIFA chief Infantino. Nothing
corrupt going on here…. nothing to see here.
To the game itself out quickly became apparent that Saudi Arabia were totally
justified in their low ranking as they were absolutely shit. 2-0 down at
half-time, 3-0 straight into the second half and then they chucked in another
couple of late goals just to make the scoreline more reflective of the game.
It’s hard to tell if Russia were really good or not but it was probably the
result that Vladimir paid for. The following day saw the other game in group A
with Uruguay and their bucktoothed psychopath Luis Suárez making heavy weather
of beating Egypt 1-0 with a classic last minute header from a corner. The
British media saw fit to make the reporting of this game solely about Mohammad
Salah despite the fact that he sat on the bench for 90 minutes for the losing
side.
In Group B there was another last-minute winner as Iran beat Morocco 1-0 with a
spectacular headed own goal in the last minute. Not the way to start the
tournament but the World Cup officially started in the evening with Spain
against Portugal. I thought this game would be a bit boring with it being the
first game of the group and featuring two heavyweight times but fuck me, what a
game. It started off with Ronaldo suckering in the defender and winning a
penalty in the third minute which he duly dispatched before Spain equalised
when Diego Costa got away with a forearm smash on Pepe before making Jose Fonte
look every one of his 58 years before scoring.
VAR or not – a forearm smash on Pepe is never a foul – ever. It was now all Spain but then Ronaldo took a
pot shot just before half-time and the media appointed best goalkeeper in the
world, David de Gea , basically did a Karius and threw the ball in his own net
to make it 2-1 at half time. Again Spain dominated start the second half and
pretty soon were in front with a tap in from Diego the Bastard and a ridiculous
half volley from Nacho which flew in off of a post. It really looked like it
was playing out to a 3-2 win to Spain until Pique had a brain fart and trashed
through the back of Ronaldo on the edge of the box and up steps of the
magnificent beast to curl it over the wall into the top corner. Portugal are
totally a one man team but they know this and has as they haven’t got another
part remotely on Ronaldo‘s level, you can’t blame them for the way they go
about things. Technically, Spain are absolutely brilliant. Totally on a
different level to any other team in the world and are my early tip to win it.
Saturday brought some dull shit in Group C France labouring to a 2-1 over
Australia which they barely deserved. France were shit, with no balance to
their team whatsoever in spite having some pretty good players. Australia were
good defensively but had absolutely nothing in the front half of the pitch.
France won with a very dodgy VAR penalty which Griezmann scored before Umtiti
thought that the best way to deal with hopeful cross into the France penalty
area was to punch it away. Jedinak from the spot, 1-1. Carlton Pogba had been
complete shit all game but he actually looked decent when he played a couple of
quick one-twos and burst into the box but then he got incredibly lucky as an
Aussie tackled him and the ball looped up, off the bar in just over the line.
Somehow, Pogba got given the goal despite the fact it was the clearest own goal
you’ve ever seen. Peru and Denmark provided an interesting game with Peru
looking the better side but they blew it when they smashed a penalty at the
moon after the guy decided to do a wanky stutter after he’d started his run up.
Denmark, despite not being much good managed to pinch it with a header in the
second half.
The main talking point on Saturday was Argentina’s opening game in Group D and
of course it was all about Lionel Messi and how he would respond to Ronaldo‘s
hat-trick from the night before. I’m sure that Messi himself doesn’t don’t give
a toss about Ronaldo but in any case, he didn’t bother to compete in that
particular competition. It’s easy to forget Argentina have some other very good
players and one of them, Sergio Aguero turned the Iceland defence inside out to
put Argentina in front before Chelsea’s Willie Caballero made two consecutive
fuck ups present the ball to Iceland and Finbogason equalised. Argentina were
awarded a slightly fortunate penalty in the second half and up stepped Messi to
keep up his poor penalty record with Halldorsson making a decent save.
Argentina really should realise themselves that they do have other good players
other than Messi and there is no need for virtually every single pass to go to
him or him to take the penalties when he is clearly not very good at them. He
misses one in four for Barcelona which is a ratio of that I think of any
relative competent penalty taker could beat. Anyhow, also in the same group,
Croatia comfortably beat Nigeria without Lovren making any colossal fuck ups
which was a bit of a shame. All the focus seems to be on the Nigeria kit, the
memory of which will last longer than their team probably will at this
competition.
Sunday and Group E with Southampton interest and Dusan Tadic playing against
Costa Rica. To be fair, he had a really good game as Serbia ran out 1-0 winners
with a tremendous free-kick from Kolarov. Serbia look at a really decent side
it will be interesting to see how they get on against Brazil later on in the
group. Talking of Brazil, they started well against Switzerland with Coutinho
scoring a fantastic goal from outside the but went off the boil after that and
Switzerland scored a goal from the corner which really should’ve been
disallowed because of the blatant shove on Mirandha before the Swiss headed
into the net. It was reviewed by VAR and deemed that two hands in the middle of
the back and a big shove wasn’t enough to disallow it. Utter bollocks. I was
wanting Brazil to play like they did in 1982 when they were brilliant and
different to anybody else. Now, they are pretty uninspiring and average.
Everything goes through Neymar who is really unlikeable diving little shit but
to be fair to him, Switzerland were allowed to kick the crap out of him. Some
of the magic is definitely gone from Brazil, with all their players being based
in Europe.
The game of the day though was in Group F with Germany looking very old and
pedestrian against Mexico especially in the first half when Mexico really
should have scored three but they kept butchering the final ball. They had to
settle for the one Lozano goal. Back came the Germans in the 2nd half but they
just didn’t do enough and Mexico held out, despite looking half dead at the
end. You don’t have to know anything about football to enjoy the Germans
getting beat. You know that they will be there or thereabouts at the end but
they looked really really bad for the majority of the game, lacking in energy
and even lacking in structure which is absolutely unheard off from the German
team. The ease with which Mexico broke on them is something that you really
don’t see from Germany, like… ever. Hopefully this will be one tournament too
far for this team and they will be embarrassing rubbish but I somehow doubt it.
Monday saw the other game in Group F with Sweden beating South Korea 1-0 with a
VAR awarded penalty which was this time, correctly awarded. Like with Denmark,
I’m never sure what Sweden really add to a tournament apart from colour. Dull
team and no Zlatan anymore. Then we moved on to England’s Group G. It started
with Belgium comfortably, in the end, beating Panama 3-0 with a superb volley
from Mertens and two goals from Lukaku. Belgium still don’t really look like a
cohesive team to me and I do wonder if they’re overhyped because of all their
Premier League players.
Then it came to England in the evening. It didn’t get off to a great start when
Ashley Young was selected and Southgate also picked Jordan Henderson, because
he hates me but to be fair, Henderson had a really good game. England started
brilliantly and should’ve scored twice before Kane put us into the lead,
knocking in after ex-Saints goalkeeper Mouez Hassen pushed out the Stones
header. We were totally in control until we had a pretty harsh penalty given
against us as Walker tried to let ball run in the penalty area and caught a
forward with his arm. 1-1. The second half was largely terrible with Raheem
Sterling, Ashley Young and Jesse Lingard constantly taking the wrong option and
giving the ball away. On came Rashford and Loftus Cheek for the last 20 minutes
and made a huge difference. With Tunisia hanging on, quite literally as Kane
was repeatedly wrestled to the ground when we took corners, a 92nd minute set
piece won it for us with Maguire winning a header and Kane poaching from 3
yards out. A winning start and much to work on. From a Saints point of view, It
was a tough 90 minutes watching Ashley Young be absolutely garbage at left back
when Ryan Bertrand is sat at home and Danny Rose is obviously not fit. The main
talking point of the game what’s the use of VAR. I’m sorry but that was totally
corrupt. How England were not given two penalties when Harry Kane was basically
the victim of one wrestling throw and one guy jumping on his back quite
literally is astounding unless of course you subscribe to the conspiracy theory
that Russia have not reacted terribly well to the fallout from the Salisbury
incident.
Group H finally got on the way with what were on the face of it to surprise
results with Colombia losing 2-1 to Japan and Poland losing by the same score
to Senegal. The Columbia v Japan game was incident packed with Colombia having
a man sent off after three minutes for deliberate hand ball. Penalty and 1-0
until just before half time when Radamel Falcao reminding everybody what a
fucking diving shit he can be, buying a freekick on the edge of the box which
Quintero cleverly passed under the wall into the corner past at the flapping
goalkeeper. Playing with 10 eventually caught up with Colombia though and Osaka
score with a header in the second half to give Japan and our own Maya Yoshida a
decent chance of making it to the next round. You would expect Colombia and a
fully fit James Rodriguez to still have a large say in that however. More
Saints interest in the second game with Jan Bednarek on the bench to Poland who
were 1-0 down to a deflection when he
came on in the second half. Unfortunately he was involved in a classic incident
where are Senegal player was being treated off the pitch and was waved back on
by the referee at the precise moment that Krychowiak played a shit back pass. On came the ‘injured’ player, sprinting straight
from the dug out, past Bednarek, knocked the ball past Sczezseny and put it
into an empty net. Classic shithousing. Krychowiak got a goal back with a
header but it wasn’t enough for Poland who are now severely up against it with
Colombia and Japan still to play.
So the first round of matches hasn’t had a single 0-0 draw and in the main so
far, it’s all been decent. Empty seats in the grounds is not a surprise but if
you think it’s bad this time round, wait till Qatar in four years time. For me,
the team looking most likely to win it at the moment is Spain …. oh and
Germany of course.
League 1 Minus 10 
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