Unbelievable......

Where do I start? Well, let's try by summarizing the three games that we saw (two at the fan fest and one live) on Friday, June 18th, 2010......



Game 1. Germany vs. Serbia (seen from a German pub at the V&A Waterfront). The group have decided (against some serious nationalistic pride at times) that we would "support" the team who was playing related to group-member's personal affiliations. So, at 1pm on Friday, I adopted the name Fritz and supported the German team...... what an abjectly poor display of refereeing! Miroslav Klose received two yellow cards to be red-carded inside thirty-five minutes, the clearly rattled Germans, down to ten men, conceded a poor goal (we put out an APB on the centre-backs and are still yet to locate them as the Serbians crossed the ball) and were never able to equalize, despite some clear opportunities and the awarding of a penalty kick. So, the first member of our group was now in a bad mood.....



Game 2. USA vs. Slovenia (seen from the waterfront and the hotel). A horrendous piece of (non) defending led to an early goal for the Slovenians, and a subsequent first-half strike seemed to put the writing on the wall for America and an early qualification for the Slovenians, thus increasing the pressure on England... But nobody accounted for the spirit and attitude of "Team USA" (I hate that term) and Bob Bradley's boys turned the heat up with an outstanding goal by Landy-cakes and an equalizer by Bradley jr. To further dampen our mood however, a perfectly good winning goal was ruled out by another inept referee and the US had to settle for a draw. Decent result, considering the start, and a good scoreline for England too....



Game 3. We traveled to Cape Point stadium with Yours Truly in excited and buoyant mood, anticipating an excellent performance by the Three Lions. Instead, we got 11 pussycats who embarrassed themselves over the course of 90 minutes. Despite massive support from a stadium that was 75% English, this team failed to perform in every aspect of the game. Wingers who can't cross a ball, a right-back who can't defend or pass, and a centre-forward called Wayne who spent the entire 9-0 minutes moaning and strolling around like a petulant school kid. I could give a more in-depth "report" on this match, but I realize that children and families may be reading. let's just say I was disgusted with the lack of passion, effort and desire. Pathetic is too nice a description. England had an opportunity to take control of their group. Instead they now face elimination unless they can somehow perform against the best team in the group..... words fail me....
Group consensus from the game was as follows; Glen Johnson is not an international-class player (something that I've said for a very long time), Heskey and James were the only two England players who showed the passion and work-rate to earn their wages (and no, this has nothing to do with Heskey being a Villa player - everyone around us at the game were saying the same thing). Rooney has an abysmal attitude and deserves to be benched (his performance was summed up in two moments - the first being when Heskey ran fifty yards past him to close down an Algerian defender while he was busy berating a teammate for not fiving him the ball, and second when, with less than two minutes to go he committed a needless and time-wasting challenge).
On return from the stadium we spent some more time at Beluga, had a glass of local wine, and the group generously allowed me to whine, complain and generally feel sorry for myself for a couple of hours.
We awoke this morning to another bright sunny day in Cape Town and made our way to the international airport for an internal flight to Johannesburg. We said our goodbyes to Eliot, who had, by now received a further three yellow cards (one for dissent; the next for claiming Tommy Smyth is a good commentator; and the last one for claiming to have baby-sitted Tommy Smyth's kids). It was great to see Eliot after six years....
We were suitably unimpressed by South African Airways, who charged me a "9 kilo overweight baggage fee" on a bag that weighed 28 kilos. When I asked why I was being charged the fee when there was a large sign at the desk saying "baggage limit 32 kilos per piece" I got three different explanations, including two different limits of 20 and 23 kilos! Notably, Chris and Mike had no problem checking their bags, both of which weighed 27 kilos..... Can someone help me with the math here???
It was "celebrity-spotting" time during this trip as we walked past Steve Nash in the check-in area, then were joined by the immaculately-dressed Arsene Wenger on our flight across-country...
We arrived in Jo'burg and met back up with Barry for a couple of hours before he took a Madrid-bound flight, the first leg of a three-stage trip back to New York. On our drive to the airport to drop off Barry our TomTom routed us through a section of the city that made "I'm from Brooklyn" Mike legtimately cower in the back seat of the rental car.....
On arrival at the hotel we were both surprised and shocked. Once again Mike had come through big-style and selected an outstanding property on the outskirts of the city. However, this pleasant surprise soon turned to mortal shock for Chris when we discovered that we were sharing the property with...... the Serbian national team!!! Chris is already planning a midnight raid on their living quarters for a revenge strike......
Having done plenty of sight-seeing in Cape Town, the plan in Jo'berg for the first few days is to focus on the game and really capture the spirit of the tournament. Just like Cape Town, world-cup fever has clearly taken over here.....