I’m so sorry for posting like crazy but this song is so great!

…Remember how Mesut Oezil did that rap for the World Cup?

Well, now it turns out that German band “Basta” made an awesome, awesome song!

It’s called “Gimme Hope Joachim” (German coach = Joachim Loew)

LOL France! LOL naked Ronaldo! LOL Podolski and Schweinsteiger holding hands! LOL Angela Merkel, Beckenbauer, THE POPE, Lena from Eurovision, yay!!!!!!! : D : D : D

Ooh, and here are the lyrics, translated by mrs_obsessive @ Livejournal.

The Africans have Vuvuzelas
The Englishmen have humour
The Australians have a strong defense
but we have the prettiest goal

The Spaniards have the best referees
Ronaldo has a gorgeous body
David Beckham has a foot made of steal
But Jogi Löw has the nicest hairstyle

Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim for the Weltpokal (World Cup(?))
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim hope for South africa

The Koreans showed emotions
The Mexicans have a hard shoot(?)
The Italians have a good goalkeeper
But we have the biggest bus

The Frenchmen stand together
And the Englishmen have a sex ban
The Argentinean suffer in the jungle camp ( I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here! )
Only Jogi smears Nutella-bread

Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim for the Weltpokal (World Cup(?))
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim hope for South africa

The Serbs are he high-achiever
Everything’s running smoothly for the USA
The Dutchs are still present
But nevertheless Jogi will get us the cup

Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim for the Weltpokal (World Cup(?))
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim hope for South africa

Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim for the Weltpokal (World Cup(?))
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim hope for South africa

Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim for the Weltpokal (World Cup(?))
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim
Gimme Hope Joachim hope for South africa

I don’t listen to music much (because I just don’t like metal/rock/pop/whatever), but I do enjoy these fun little songs so very much. They are so humorous and just plain awesome.

I just wish there were more songs like this! From other countries too!

English tabloids need to shut it

Seriously. They do.

Before every single World Cup, the English media arrogantly praise the English team to the clouds and look down upon the other teams.

After every “early exit” of the English team at the aforementioned World Cup, the tabloids lose no time in starting to blame the coach, the unfairness of it all, and Wayne Rooney’s chest hair.

Yes, Wayne Rooney’s chest hair, for god’s sake –

“As he trudged off the field after swapping shirts at Bloemfontein yesterday following the 4-1 annihilation by Germany that ended England’s interest in the finals, he showed a chest devoid of hair.

But did this flirtation with personal grooming account for his loss of powers, just as it did to the once superhuman Samson?” — The Daily Mail

How, just HOW can they even come up with the above quotation and still be hired?????

Now I will post some pictures that demonstrate how unbelievable these tabloids are, courtesy of, as always, the Dirty Tackle blog:

The picture on the left side was published right after the group draws.

EASY, huh, the Sun?

How arrogant was it to automatically assume the final standings of the group matches and put pictures of English players on the trophy?

Except, as it turned out, your group wasn’t quite as…EASY.The “Yanks”, the team which you predicted would be last in the group, turned out to be first.

The picture on the right was published on the day of the England vs. USA match.

Look at how they are trying to “imitate” the way Americans speak to mock American English and show their British superiority?

“Totally awesome strikes past the goaltender in the soccerball world series” indeed.

You do realize that people in North America don’t actually talk like that.

And of course we’re all familiar with the term “Golden Generation” describing the English team, coined by, oh who else? The English media.

Has it occurred to any of these tabloids that it might be a good idea to not count your chickens before they hatch?

The following are pictures of how the tabloids prepared for the England vs. Germany games:

This is actually from the Euro '96 semifinals against Germany.

Ah, the English tabloids really do love their stereotypes, do they not?

By the way, Germany won. On penalties. Conjuring up another hissy fit from these delightful tabloids.

And now for Sunday’s Round of 16 game:

This.

And this.

Uh, yeah, sure. Germany was totally terrified of the three FEMALE lions.

And what is with the Rooney boxing pose? Rooney’s been nothing but useless without his chest hair.

Of course we all know what actually did happen on Sunday.

So here is how the English tabloids responded to the 4-1 loss:

SAD WAGS AND JAGGS - *brain explodes*

*HOT*?Most importantly, why is most of the page occupied by TWILIGHT?

Most terrible photoshopping. Ever.

Pfffff.That is one freaky-looking woman.

What is with that ad?????

And of course denial is also a common approach employed by the tabloids. This is from the website of one 2 hours after the defeat:

...

I just wonder how these tabloids consistently come up with such flashy, cheap-looking, degrading, brain-burning acid. Something about the English tabloids just seriously hurts your brain. Just stare at those pictures. I dare you.

Anyways, so that’s that. I demand that the English tabloids be less detrimental to the health of the general public. Wow I’m talking like Dylan.

* If you don’t want to waste your time reading a horribly long and potentially offensive rant from me, then please do not read on! If you have nothing better to do, then read on! : D*

I do feel for England fans though. They deserve to read better stuff.

Speaking of England fans, there are a whole lot of them. Almost every single person I knew was supporting England on Sunday. The Bloemfontein stadium was around 75% filled with England fans, I think. So why didn’t I just jump on the bandwagon and support England like most of my friends?

I’m actually not just supporting Germany because I’m taking German next year. I actually support Germany because I like the team.

I feel like the difference between England and Germany is that England is always so…overhyped and yet never really lives up to all the hype, whereas Germany is sort of the opposite. No one ever makes such a big deal about the German team before the big tournaments (In fact, no one really expected anything out of this German team because they’re so young, their captain was injured, their goalkeeper was injured (and the previous one died), most of their experienced players couldn’t make it and yada yada), but Germany somehow never fails to achieve more than they’re expected to.

I mean, I understand why England is always considered a favourite before tournaments. Because if you look at their individual players, they have some of the biggest stars within their Premier League.

But the thing is, these stars fail to play well together. Time and time again.

If you look at the record of England’s World Cup appearances, you’ll see that other than winning once (and that was in 1966 when they hosted the event and the win was controversial) and coming in fourth place once (in 1990), they’ve never made it past the quarter-finals on any other occasion (the same amount of final-four appearances in the past 44 years as Belgium and Bulgaria). They did not qualify three times. And they haven’t really beaten any traditionally strong teams.

So why is it that time and time again, before every single World Cup, the English media hypes up the team as one of the favorites to win the whole tournament?

Wayne Rooney, according to tabloids, is the best striker in the world (some broadcaster even claimed that he was better than Lionel Messi…@_@). And John Terry, Lampard and Gerrard were all made into such big deals.

There’s nothing wrong with confidence, but I feel like the English media is borderline delusional.

The more you hype something up, the worse you’ll look when your predictions don’t come true.

I just wish that for once the English media will gloat after they actually win.

And the funny thing is, when they lose, the English team always tries to come up with some ridiculous excuse of why their superstars didn’t perform well.

This year, England coach Fabio Capello not only tried to blame everything on the referee, he actually tried to explain England’s poor performance in the whole tournament as caused by the players being tired.

Tired? They were TIRED?!?!?!?!!

That has to be the lamest excuse ever.  As if all the other teams were any less tired.

And the English have a tendency to feel hard done by every time they exist the World Cup early.

They always feel like it’s bad luck and that they deserve better.

Like when Germany beats them on penalties, it’s just bad luck.

But, you know, being able to do well on penalties is a valuable skill too.

And when these early exits happen 10 times in a row, I think it’s more than just bad luck.

I just think that England could do to get rid of that “hard done by” and “It’s not our fault but Wayne Rooney’s chest hair’s” attitude.

And that whole “Oh we’re totally going to win the World Cup” attitude way before anything actually happens.

On the other hand, individually, the German team may not look like much.

But somehow, every time these players don the national team jersey, they perform better.

Miroslav Klose and Lukas Podolski hadn’t done that well in their respective clubs for the past season. Yet they’ve both already scored two goals each for Germany at the World Cup. Klose had scored 12 goals at the World Cup so far – the same number as Pele, who is one of the greatest players ever.

I found this article, which pretty much sums it all up:

“If you look at the names, one against one, you’d have to consider England as stronger than us. On paper, they were more renowned, more famous, but that didn’t translate into their performance.

“England have fantastic players. In the dressing room, we asked ourselves ‘is this England team better than their Premier League teams?’ Simple answer, yes. Look at their players; they’re world class, that’s the long and short of it. Yet the key thing is presenting yourself as a team and I don’t think England did.”

It was also, he felt, down to a self-belief which has imprinted itself on German World Cup sides for nearly three generations.

From where did this confidence emanate, he was asked. “Good question,” he shrugged. “It’s down to a certain quality we know we possess. You see it every day in training, the importance of being a true team. This is what helped us take the winds out of England’s sails.”

This repetition of the theme only rammed home the comparison. Klose was the perfect team man in Bloemfontein, a selfless leader of the line who seemed to be freed from his miserable season’s labours as soon as he donned his national shirt for the 99th time, while so many of England’s players appeared to find the weight of the red shirt utterly oppressive.”

And that’s why I like Germany – because of their unity and team spirit. Because of their way of being understated yet always producing results (in the last World Cup no one expected them to end up with the third place).

I know I’m probably massively biased, and that only a minority of English people are overconfident, etc, etc, so England fans please don’t kill me.

More random World Cup stuff! (I.e. not really about football.)

More links that I want to share from the Dirty Tackle Soccer Blog (which is, like, God):

1. No wonder France was such a big failure – just check out their “training method”. And no wonder Germany beat England – check out MEGA GERMAN!
2. What is the German team’s “ideal” preparation for a game?
3. I don’t really know what to make of this video. Although this might explain why the referees are so bad – maybe they spent all their time coming up with perfectly synchronized dance routines.
   Ha. Hahahahahaha.
4. Ultra-Mega-Fail:
   
   So apparently kicking a stationary ball can be incredibly difficult.
5. Random musings of tootballers before they fall asleep…
   This is actually a series of posts. Every single one is hilarious. Please check out Brooks Peck’s posts @ Dirty Tackle. (Also hilarious are the “Artur Boruc’s Friday Rage Lists“).

   By the way, how much do you love Philipp Lahm and his eyebrows? Even though I’ve put up two pictures already, I just can’t possibly resist putting up another one:

   

   Just look at them.

   See, what I like the most about Philipp Lahm is that he’s just completely normal. He’s not so vain like lots of other football players (i.e. if you google image him, there are not any pictures of him in whatever underwear ad — I’m looking at you, Cristiano Ronaldo), and he has a normal girlfriend (not some trophy wife) and he doesn’t have kids. Do you have any idea how rare that is nowadays? 
   Plus you can make all these jokes about his eyebrows and his name. Plus he plays for Germany. Extra extra bonus points.

All right. That is all for now. Thanks to the Dirty Tackle blog for such fantastic random stories!

Germany vs. England – Germany wins 4 – 1!!!!!!!

This morning I suddenly woke up at 6am because I guess subconsciously, I really didn’t want to miss the big game between Germany and England. (I went back to sleep afterwards, but still.)

And it turned out that the game was worth every single second of missed sleep.

Every time Germany plays England, the game turns out to be dramatic, exciting and, ahem, controversial.

This time was no different.

First, Germany scored two goals, by Miroslav Klose (20′) and Lukas Podolski (32′). Because the England defense sucked. Sorry, but it’s true. Both the goalkeeper and the defense plain sucked.

Maybe they should’ve brought Robert Green back

However, I was getting even more nervous with the two German goals because I knew something really bad was going to happen now. There’s no way this could be so easy.

And of course I was right.

Five minutes after the Podolski goal, England scored a beautiful header. That was a good goal.

And this is where the heart attack moment happened: (I really hope people above the age of 70 weren’t watching this game)

One minute after England scored, Frank Lampard (ENG) kicked the ball onto the crossbar, and the ball deflected into the goal.

Okay that was obviously a goal.

However, the referee did not acknowledge the goal. The goal was not counted. Like that American goal in the USA vs. Slovenia game.

Of course, this decision was very important because if the goal had been counted, then the teams would’ve gone into half time at 2 – 2.

At this point I was feeling very very shitty.

Because I would never want Germany to win this way.

Even though the fault entirely lies on FIFA for refusing to use goal-line technology, if Germany won the match 2-1, every single person would say that Germany cheated and does not deserve the win. I would say that Germany didn’t deserve to win either.

In fact, I would prefer that Germany lost the match than this kind of result.

So throughout the half time break, I was just sitting here chatting with Lena, feeling horrible. (By the way, I got her to watch this game. Can you believe it? She couldn’t believe it either. Her message says, “*Is actually watching football! SERIOUSLY*”. I’m proud.)

I just thought that, okay, Germany, YOU’VE GOT TO SCORE ANOTHER GOAL. You’ve GOT to win by more than 1 goal. Because then you can at least say that even if that goal for England counted, Germany still would’ve won.

And guess what?

Germany did more than that.

Germany scored another two goals. Both my Mueller, within three minutes of each other (67′, 70′).

I was so relieved and happy, I felt like I was going to faint.

Seriously.

Even LENA was so excited. LENA, who doesn’t give a shit about football. Who told me that she wouldn’t be bummed out if Germany lost against England because she just doesn’t care.

We had an all-caps fest which looked something like this:

SZ – WORLD CUP. YAY. said (11:23 AM):
*GOALLLLLL!!!!
Mirai says:
*YES
*!!
SZ – WORLD CUP. YAY. says:
*I KNOW
*I FEEL SO MUCH BETTER.
Mirai says:
*xDD
SZ – WORLD CUP. YAY. says:
*!!!!!!
*Yay Mueller!!
*My heart
*is going to give out =_=
*ANOTHER GOAL
*MY HEART
Mirai says:
*HELL YES
*DAMNIT
*I’M ACTUALLY WATCHING THIS+
SZ – WORLD CUP. YAY. says:
*I KNOW
*ISNT THIS
*SL\Ar[awe[r5aw8et9aetaugpioasjg
*!!!!
*SEE
Mirai says:
*BHNJMK;
SZ - WORLD CUP. YAY. says:
*ITS SO MUCH FUN IF YOU'RE SUPPORTING A TEAM
*AND WATCHING WITH A FRIEND.
*!!!!!
*spiuaspiuaspiugasdg
*I'm like
*HYPERVENTILATING
Mirai says:
*SO EVEN WITH THAT DAMN GOAL! IT WOULD BE 4:2!!!
SZ - WORLD CUP. YAY. says:
*EXACTLY.
*EXACTLY.
*WE ARE TYPING IN ALL CAPS
*THIS IS SO GREAT.
*Yo dude. You know, in 1966 it was England 4-2 Germany
Mirai says:
*XD CAPS LOCK RULZ!!!
SZ - WORLD CUP. YAY. says:
*and now it's Germany 4-2 England!!!!
*It's like
*GERMANY'S REVENGE.
Mirai says:
*YES!

Yeah, so you can see how high we were... :'DDDD

Now it is time for the highlights:

http://www.cbc.ca/sports/soccer/fifaworldcup/watch/highlights/?ID=1531508994

(Sorry, I will embed a youtube video as soon as it becomes available)

Now that I look back, this game was so creepy in its resemblance to that infamous 1966 World Cup final between England and West Germany.

In that 1966 game at Wembley, England got into the exact same situation -- Geoff Hurst (ENG) kicked the ball onto the crossbar and the ball was deflected...onto the goal line.

And at the time, the goal was counted in England's favour.

The final score was England 4 - 2 Germany.

Today, counting the goal that England scored but the referee didn't acknowledge, the final score is Germany 4 - 2 England.

...Mein Gott.

I definitely think that this is Germany's revenge.

Here’s that controversial 1966 goal.

The definition of a goal is that the ball must completely go over the goal line. Which it didn’t.

I quote,

“However, a study conducted by the Engineering Department at Oxford University concluded that the ball did not cross the line entirely and that it was 6 cms away from being a goal (Goal-directed Video Metrology).”

So basically that goal shouldn’t have counted.

And today, when the goal should have been counted, it wasn’t.

Karma? O_O”’

All right, I’m going to talk about how I feel about today’s game now.

First of all, yeah, England definitely should have been given that goal. They scored without doubt.

Even as a German supporter, I was really bummed out by the decision and I felt unfair for the English team.

But, with that said, I feel that the view that the whole match would have been different if only that goal counted and It totally wouldn’t have been a 4 – 2 result is not entirely correct.

Yeah, sure, you could argue that the English team’s mindset would have been different and that England would’ve used a different strategy in the 2nd half of the game had the goal been allowed, yada yada yada, I’ve already heard it all from England supporters.

But the thing is, if that goal had been allowed, would that have stopped Germany from scoring more goals in the 2nd half?

I don’t think so. The way I see it, England’s defense did suck. Or the first two Germany goals wouldn’t even have happened.

And whatever else you might say, you cannot deny the fact that even with the entire English team attacking the German net non-stop from the 30th minute to the end, England could not score four goals.

And Germany did.

Germany did not need a controversial goal to win. It deserved the victory.

The decision against England was very unfair and tragic, but Germany was the better team today.

I find Fabio Capello’s view that “If only that goal had counted we would not have lost” a tad overboard.

Would you really have been able to win?

Honestly, do you really think that the entire blame lies on that one goal?

Well, here’s a thought, maybe you could have played better: http://www.cbc.ca/sports/soccer/fifaworldcup/blog/2010/06/englands-pathetic-exit.html

I always thought the English team and media are a bit of a crybaby. They’re always so eager to put the blame on someone else.The British tabloids are simply unbelievable.

Okay, so if England really deserves to win this game, then how do you explain the poor performance of the English team in the group stage?

How about the English team just isn’t as good as it should be? I mean, England has all these international superstars (Rooney, Lampard, Gerrard, Terry) with an average of 70 caps, and it was so outscored by a team of players barely over 20 with, what, under 20 caps?

Which is why I think it’s just poor sportsmanship to blame everything on that one blasted goal.

If Capello had just reacted more gracefully towards the loss, then I would feel so bad for England right now.

But you know what?

At the end of the day the Germans deserved to win.

Love you, Mueller.

Love you SO MUCH, Miroslav Klose. (Also your name sounds so cool. Rolls off the tongue like crazy )

I don’t even care if the Germans lost in the quarterfinals (probably against Argentina).

Because this young, inexperienced team that all the experts looked down upon before the tournament has played so well and has scored so many fantastic goals. It’s simply unbelievable that a team with so little international experience, a team who’s so recently lost its captain to injury and its goalkeeper to suicide (……), has played such an incredible match today.

So take that, England, you pre-tournament favorite. Looks like your superstars didn’t do you much good (Have you seen how useless Rooney was?)

And regarding your loss: Please suck it up.

Germany freaking lost the World Cup FINAL to you with a goal that didn’t even go in.

You lost the Round of 16 to a team who played better than you anyway. So if you don’t suck it up, I swear I’ll hate you forever.

(…I apologize for being so, uh, vehement about this.)

G20 protest downtown – Wow. Canadians aren’t as mellow as I thought.

This year both the G8 and the G20 summits are hosted in Canada.

The G20 summit is currently held right here in Toronto, and as you probably know Toronto is the glorious city which we call home (for now).

With any kind of summit, there are always protesters.

Actually, there are protesters for just about anything. What can I say? I suppose people just love to protest.

But the protesters in Toronto protesting against the G20 summit are taking it to a whole new level.

CBC Television actually interrupted a World Cup Round of 16 match to broadcast the situation all around downtown Toronto. Which just shows you how bad it is.

Today at 1pm, the largest ever protest against the G20 was assembled. Even though it was pouring rain, all sorts of people showed up in rain gear holding giant signs. The crowd was estimated to be as big as 10, 000 people.

At first the protest was supposed to be “peaceful”.

However, as these things always do, it gets out of control. Like that Anti-WTO protest in Seattle in 1999.

Soon, people wearing black masks holding sticks and hammers showed up.

They started smashing the shop windows.

Also police car windows

They also burned down police cars.

Holy Mother of God.

And they were just trying to destroy things in general.

Hey, the CBC van is innocent!

The police are in full battle gear to deal with the situation:

And so far, I don’t even know how many arrests have been made.

In anticipation of this, the Canadian government has already spent $1 billion on security measures.

However, as of now the police are not doing anything drastic in fear of provoking even more violence.They’re pretty much just using their shield-thingies to push the crowd back to make sure that they don’t try to break the fences that the police set up downtown.

Yesterday, the Eaton Centre (a very big mall downtown, also, pathetically, a tourist attraction.) had to be evacuated because someone started a fire in the women’s washroom.

In summary, Toronto is NOT a peaceful place right now.

Tourists, just DON'T COME HERE right now.

I have to say, I am a little suprised.

First you have to know that nothing like this EVER happens in Toronto.

We’re usually a pretty passive, mellow bunch.

What’s strange is that most of these protesters aren’t even protesting against the G20.

They’re protesting about all sorts of things that have no connection whatsoever. Everybody’s just using this summit as an excuse to protest against whatever.

Such as “Free Tibet”, “Stop Animal Testing”, “Capitalism Kills”, and “Maternity Rights!!!!”.

Yes, that’s right.

People are protesting about abortion.  At a summit that’s supposed to deal with financial issues.

I don’t really understand these protesters.

What exactly are they trying to achieve here?

As I said before, this is the G20 summit, a summit of finance ministers and bank governors.

So what the hell are all these people doing here??????

And okay, I know that all Canadians have the right to peaceful assembly.

But what the fuck is wrong with that group of people dressed in all black, smashing windows and setting things on fire?

What are YOU guys protesting against?

There is no point in mindlessly destroying everything. I just wish that they would realize that they’re not going to accomplish anything this way.

STOP DESTROYING THE CITY, GODDAMMIT.

And dear protesters:

Please. Go. Home. Wherever you came from.

You’re not exactly doing any good for your causes. You’re just showing everyone how nutty you are.

Edit: Annie here. The reason why people protest the most during G20 and G8 meetings is for the media coverage. The idea is, since all the world’s camera’s are focused on the meeting, what better way to pass on the message? And since these are the top world leaders, hopefully they can see how “far” the protesters will go to achieve their goal.

Personally, I think setting fire to police cars is going way too far. It doesn’t contribute to their argument at all. Come on people, you’ve all learned argumentative essay writing in school, no need to resort to dumb measures. If you want to get something done, you convince the other party to want to do it, not smash their cars. That’ll just increase their adverse feelings towards you.

I think the protesters are going this far because of the 1 billion dollar security budget. Along the mind set of “well, they spent the money that otherwise could be used on, oh I don’t know, health care or education, and put millions of people out of business for eight or twenty old dignitaries, so why not put that very expensive security to the test? It’ll be a waste not to employ that 1 billion dollars.”

Then mob mentality kicks in.

*Edit edit: Yeah, I suppose mob mentality is a scary, scary thing.And yes, the government spent a lot on security measures.

But on the other hand, the government only spent so much money because they knew that these people are going to show up and destroy things.

Yesterday’s situation just proved that the security was necessary.

Also, the people in black are “anarchists”.

But seriously, if governments and the society didn’t exist, then who’s going to employ you?

We’ll all have to fend for ourselves, and that means we might as well just go farming.

Wait, do you even know how to farm?

Can you honestly take care of yourself if you didn’t get clean water out of a tap and you didn’t have all the facilities that the government provides?

How can “anarchy” work, especially in today’s society, when we can’t really survive on our own?

These people in black are supposedly “anarchists”.

Let’s take a look at the teams’ nicknames.

I’ve wanted to make a post about the teams’ nicknames forever. Mainly because most of them suck.

Nicknames are extremely important because they are what people know your team as.

Which is why it really shouldn’t be the colour of the shirt that you wear (I’m looking at you, France).

Now I shall list the nicknames of the teams in this World Cup and speculate the reasons behind them…

• Algeria – Les Fennecs (The Desert Foxes)
  Why: Because Algeria mostly consists of desert. And these fennec foxes.
  Comments: I like this nickname. Very unique. And very epic.
• Argentina – La Albicelestes (The White & Sky Blues)
  Why: Because their flag and jerseys are white & sky blue.
  Comments: While white & sky blue are a unique combination,  Argentina really deserves something more imaginative.
• Australia – Socceroos
  Why:  Soccer  +  Kangaroos = Socceroos.
  Comments: Love, love this one. While not very formidable, it is very, very VERY appropriate for Australia. And it’s cute.
• Brazil – Seleção (The Selection), Canarinhos (Little Canary), Verde e Amarelo (Green and Yellow), the Samba Kings.
  Why: Because they’re “The Selection”. Because their jerseys are canary yellow. Or just because they like canaries. Their jerseys are green and yellow. The Samba Kings refers to their style of play AND it’s a famous Brazillian dance.
  Comments: Let’s go with the Samba Kings. It’s clever.
• Cameroon – Les Lions Indomptables (The Indomitable Lions)
  Why: There are lots of lions in Cameroon. And lions aren’t particularly submissive. Plus it would be silly to call your team “The Domitable Lions”.
  Comments: Fierce. I love it.
• Chile – La Roja (The Red), El Equipo de Todos (Everbody’s Team)
  Why: Because they wear red. And if you’re neutral like Switzerland, then chances are that you’re going to enjoy Chile’s style of play.
  Comments: Hey, it’s true. I do enjoy watching Chile. Let’s ditch The Red though. Sounds way too much like Spain.
• Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast) – Les Elephants (The Elephants)
  Why: Because there were lots of elephants in the Ivory Coast, which is how the Ivory trade flourished, which is how the country got its name. Which is how there are like, no elephants left anymore.
  Comments: Good one. Not only appropriate for the country, it also reminds us of how important it is to protect wild elephants. Activists will be happy.
  

  Save me.

• Denmark – Danish Dynamite, Olsen-Banden (The Olsen Gang), Olsen’s Elleve (Olsen’s Eleven)
  Why: Danish Dynamite is an alliteration. Plus it sounds cool. And “Olsen’s Eleven” is just about the most epic pun ever.
  Comments: “Olsen’s Eleven“!! I’ll never get over that!!!!
  

  Ocean's Eleven, you've got competition.

• England – The Three Lions
  Why: There are three lions on the English Coat of Arms. Probably to represent how rare lions are in England.
  Comments:
  

  So Germany's supposed to be massively afraid of these three lions.

  But why are the lions female?
  Could this be a reference to the infamous English Wives and Girlfriends (WAGs)???
  I guess so, because they are so totally scary.

• France – Les Bleus (The Blues)
  Why: They wear blue jerseys.
  Comments: …… Even “The Baguettes” would be better.
• Germany – Die Nationalmannschaft (The National Team)
  Why: Because it’s true.
  Comments: Is this efficient enough for you?
  

  We're the Mannschaft! We're manly! And we're efficient!!!

• Ghana – The Black Stars
  Why: I’m guessing it’s because there’s a giant black star on the Ghana flag.
  Comments:
  

  ...See it?

• Greece – Galanoleyki (blue and white), To Piratiko (The Pirate Ship)
  Why: Their flag is blue and white (and might I add very eye-burning). I have no idea where the pirate thing came from, but I found an explanation: “The Pirate Ship was a nickname earned at Euro 2004, when Greek commentator Georgios Helakis referenced a boat in host nation Portugal’s opening ceremony and said Greece should “become pirates and steal the victory”. Which they did.”
  Comments: Yay! Pirates!
• Honduras – Los Catrachos
  Why: I don’t know. And I don’t really care.
  Comments: Well, it sounds creative, so good job, Honduras.
• Italy – Azzurri (Sky Blues)
  Why: Uh. They wear blue.
  Comments: …I suppose at least “Azzurri” sounds cooler & better than “Les Bleus”.
• Japan – Blue Samurai
  Why: Japan = Samurai. Also, it sounds good.
  Comments: How befitting a nickname for Japan.
  

  ROAR!!!

• Mexico – El Tri (The Three [colours])
  Why: The Mexican flag has three colours – Green, white and red. So does Italy’s flag So does Hungary’s Wow all flags look the same
  Comments: Well, I guess three colours are better than one.
• Netherlands – The Oranje (Orange)
  Why: It’s the Netherlands’ national colour. Since the country is founded by someone named William van Orange. Also orange is the colour of oranges, which are super cool.
  Comments: Epic.
• North Korea – I had no idea about this one, so to the Internet I went. Apparently it is “The Chollima”.
  Why: It’s apparently a horse from the Korean legend.
  Comments: What? What do you mean their nickname isn’t “Glorious Soldiers of Kim Jung-Il”??????
• New Zealand – The All Whites.
  Why: Well, since the New Zealand rugby team is known as the All Blacks, the soccer team had to make do with All Whites so no one would be confused.
  Comments: My god, this nickname sounds so racist.
• Nigeria – The Super Eagles
  Why: The Nigerian coat of arms has an eagle on it. And it’s a super eagle.
  Comments:
  

  All hail Super Eagle!!!

  I personally love the nickname. Lots of countries use eagles as a part of their nicknames, but Nigerians are super eagles.

• Paraguay – La Albirroja (The White-Red)
  Why: Because their jerseys are white and red. My god. Europeans and South Americans are so boring. The African teams have much better nicknames.
• Portugal – Selecção das Quinas (Team of the Five)
  Why: There are five shields on the Portuguese flag.
  Comment: The Team of Five actually sounds kind of cool.
• Serbia – Beli Orlovi (The White Eagles)
  Why: The Serbian flag has this creepy two-headed white eagle on it.
  Comment:
  

  Whoa.

• Slovakia - Repre
  Why: Repre is short for reprezentacny tim (representative team). So I would say the reason is lack of creativity.
  Comment: No comment.
• Slovenia: Zmajceki (Dragons).
  Why: I’m not sure. Perhaps they like dragons?
  Comments: I like dragons too.
• South Africa – Bafana Bafana (The Boys The Boys)
  Why: Just a cute term of endearment.
  Comments: Rolls off your tongue. I approve.
• South Korea – The Taeguk Warriors
  Why: Taeguk has something to do with Taekwondo. It also might be that yin-yang thing in the middle of the Korean flag.
  Comments: As with Japan, a terribly befitting nickname.
• Spain – La Roja (The Red), La Furia Roja (The Red Fury)
  Why: Red jerseys. Or perhaps red is the colour of bullfighting. Or maybe because they have furious  red jerseys.
• Switzerland – The Schweizer Nati (The Swiss National Team)
  Why: Again, because it’s true. Also, the Swiss are neutral, so.
  Comments: Stop being neutral.
• Uruguay – La Celeste (The Sky Blue)
  Why: Sky blue jerseys.
  Comment: It’s like Argentina’s nickname, except not as cool-sounding.
• USA – The Yanks
  Why: Americans = Yankees.
  Comment: Thank God it’s not like “The Freedom Eagles” or “The Justice of Liberty” or anything like that.

A big thank you to the Dirty Tackle soccer blog where I got most of the info.

And I just realized that there can’t possibly be any nicknames for “Sarah”.

Cool.

Portugal vs Brazil, Spain vs Chile

I won’t lie. I got up at ten, went back to sleep, watched the game, and went back to sleep again. I sleep a lot.

SO NOW YOU KNOW WHY I AM LATE WITH THIS.

So today (well… yesterday by now…) was the last group games. After this is just the all mighty 16 teams that will compete for the awesome world cup and be crown football champions and be adored and fantasy-raped by fans all over the world.

Ahem.

So the games were Portugal vs Brazil and Spain vs Chile.

Portugal vs Brazil was very anticipated. Two of the strongest teams, and facing off already. GROUP OF DEATH, MAN! But seeing as North Korea got kicked off of Group G and Ivory Coast being Ivory Coast, their advance was pretty much guaranteed.

The entire game was a huge stall, basically. Both teams were aiming for a tie, which they got. 0-0.

The highlight of the game for most people was the slow motion shot of Cristiano Ronaldo’s ass.

It’s about two seconds in.

http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/FIFA/Post Game Show/ID=1530173394

Although I do think he’s some sort of cream puff that’s only there for the fangirls, but I have to admit that it was a nice ass.

That’s probably why he was “Man of the Match”, despite being entirely useless. Butts > Usefulness, every time.

Nothing much to say about the match. None of the players really tried.

Now, the Spain vs Chile match –

David Villa is the new hero of the Spain.

DISCO-!

He scored the most goals in the tournament by far. When he goes home, he will be graced with many product endorsements, a bull, and as many women (or men) as he can carry.

Many people are coming into the conclusion that Villa is better than Torres. There is no doubt, for reasons that will be explored in an up coming essay. To quoeth CIBC post match analysis:

Villa is one of the game’s truly undervalued talents. For years he’s toiled at Valencia, quietly scoring goals for fun and going about his business, while more high-profile contemporaries, such as Fernando Torres, stole all the headlines.

But Villa, who has signed to play with FC Barcelona at the start of the new Spanish season this summer, is the true star of this team, carrying the offensive burden squarely on his shoulders and outshining the ineffective Torres.

The future Barcelona star is now Spain’s all-time leading scorer at the World Cup, with six goals, and his 41 goals in 61 appearances in international play is the envy of the strikers around the world, Torres included.

“carrying the offensive burden squarely on his shoulders and outshining the ineffective Torres.”

I might be tapping into Kim Jon Il’s magical mind wave powers, because that was exactly what I thought.

The first goal:

Major goalie fail on the Chilean side.

There were no players on the entire half of the pitch.  What the heck was the goalie thinking? Stay in your net! It wasn’t as if that shot was impossible to deflect. The goalie was halfway up the field. Failfailfail. Even worse than the English goalie. At least he caught the ball. Sort of.

Speaking of which, where were the defenders? Why are they halfway up the field? That’s why you have mid-fielders, damn it!

Amazing kick on Villa’s part, I have to admit. He aimed it over a distance of 40 metres. FORTY. AND IT WENT IN. That’s what she said And we all know how “inaccurate” the new ball is.

Second goal: It was a combination of a good shot, a distraction, a yellow card and… I don’t know really. While it wasn’t a giant clusterfuck in front of the net (hi Denmark), it certainly wasn’t straight forward.

And what is the said distraction? A pretty little lady named Fernando Torres.

Ain’t he pretty?

I can’t find a video, but I’ll explain it as simply as possible.

The ball is passed. The players race towards the Chilean net. Referee races after the players, eye on the strikers.

Torres and Estrada runs towards the net on the opposite side.

Torres trips over his own feet. Falls.

Estrada was like “whut” for a second but keeps going. The three defenders line sparsely outside of the net. Torres remains faceplanted onto the ground.

Ball is passed to Andres Iniesta.  He shoots. Torres is still faceplanted.

The defenders are half confused as to why there is a lady lying in the middle of the field distracted by Torres’s still form. The ball goes into the net.

Celebration on the Spanish side. Torres gets some medical attention for his ovaries.

Estrada of Chile gets a second yellow card and is sent off.

So that’s how the second goal happened. You could say that the Spanish team took advantage of Torres’s womanly distraction powers (so that’s why he’s still on the team!),  but you had to admit that it was a great shot. Even if the defence wasn’t distracted, they wouldn’t be able to save it in time.

I swear to God that Torres fell at least five times while he was on the field. Actually, it seemed that every 10 seconds, a Spanish player fell. Torres being the one falling the most. Or maybe that’s just because the camera focuses on him a lot. Either way, Torres you big girl. Stop getting bullied and grow a pair. PLEASE.

Estrada (of Chile).

This guy.

What can I say about him. Other than I like that he still has a mullet.

He shouldn’t have gotten a second yellow card. Well actually he should. But not because Torres fell but for shoving Iniesta before that. Torres falling is still up for debate, but shoving Iniesta was very obvious.

He also plays the dirtiest of all players. Either that, or all of the referees are all really really biased against him. He’s got the most cards out of anybody in this tournament so far, and there were a lot of slow motion shots of him shoving the other players.

The referee did seem to give out less cards after he was sent off…

In the first half, the referee handed out a lot of cards and free kicks and whatever.  In the second half, he barely interfered. It was weird. Referees are strange people. Let the players play, damnit!

So there. Half time, Torres limped off the field to tend to his menstrual cramps.

Chile made a comeback with a goal by Rodrigo Millar about two minutes into the second half.  It was a beautiful goal, mostly because it wasn’t a weird clusterfuck. I think the Spanish defence was stunned by how quickly they bounced back.

There was this one free kick that Villa mussed up badly. It sailed about three metres over the net. I facepalmed.

They continued playing, but neither team really tried at that point. Especially the last ten minutes, which consisted of  La Roja idly passing the ball between themselves.

SO IN SHORT:

Spain: Nice to see that they got their defences back in line, but it seems as if they lost some balls when they lost to Switzerland. Their attacks are careful, and rarely was there any risks taken. It seemed that they just wanted to keep a low profile and win (but not win spectacularly).  Well, better safe than sorry, I guess?

Another observation is that they play incredibly clean games. I don’t think they’ve received a single card in any of the games played so far. Well I guess with the referees they usually train with back home… (HINT: It’s the referee that handed out SEVEN yellow cards and a red card in one match. He is already on his way of becoming a running joke.)

And, as I said in the last post

PLEASE AIM INTO THE NET, NOT OVER IT.

Chile: Needs to attack more. An overall very good team. There is a slight lack of cooperation at times, but it is a minor hindrance. And Estrada — stop shoving people. It’s not subtle at all. My prediction is that they will go into the quarter finals.

That’s it for today, I think. In the future, look for some dashing new reviews about Eurovision, Toy Story 3, and an essay about the ambiguous gender of a certain player (who will remain nameless).

Germany made a rap about World Cup 2010. I swear it’s true.

Oh, my god.

Can you believe that Mesut Oezil (the person that scored the winning goal at the Germany vs. Ghana game) recorded a rap song for the World Cup?

Here’s Ryan Bailey’s comment on this, obtained from this post:

“If you thought John Barnes and Ryan Babel were the only professional footballers to get their rapping careers off the ground, then you’re wrong (they never got their rapping careers off the ground). However, the canon of rapping ‘ballers has now been expanded to include Germany’s Mesut Özil.

Die Mannschaft’s midfielder met up with singer Jan Delay (who’s bigger than Hasselhoff in Germany) in a studio in Bremen prior to the World Cup. He delivers an impassioned rap which refers to South Africa, his youth and – unless my rudimentary German fails me – that his captain once said to him that his trousers weren’t very nice.

Bild refer to this as a “cool World Cup rap,” and while I don’t think it’s a bad song by any means, if you’ve ever driven through the continent and explored local radio stations you’ll understand why they think it’s “cool.”

LOL. Seriously? His captain once said to him that his trousers weren’t very nice?

My God, Germany.

First you get a psychic octopus to predict your matches, and now this?

I love you so much.

More random soccer/football stuff, mwahahaha

I feel so bad about writing post after post after post of soccer/football (uh, well, I suppose I did also write about the Blonde Parade), but since exams are over and summer school doesn’t start until July 5th, I’ve been just lounging at home and watching the World Cup all day long. I bet I’m already more nearsighted than I was in April. Oh shit.

All right. This will be a brief post.

So I found the best soccer/football blog ever, and here are a few of my favorite posts:

1. Maradona being gay himself
   
2. Germany victory predicted by Octupus
   …Wow. This Octupus-Oracle is so epic. Also, HAHAHA, GERMANY. Really? :’DDD


Paul the Psychic Octopus!
(Except then a hundred stupid people started commenting about what the correct plural form of “Octupus” is. =__=)

3. Just watch the video.
4. American restaurant sells lion burgers to celebrate World Cup. WOULD YOU BUY ONE? No way in hell
5. England’s coach is not too bright.
6. Oh my god, PLEASE PLEASE go watch this one –> Fellowship of the Vuvuzela
7. Poor Gerard Pique. I personally watched his pain & suffering @ World Cup
8. So apparently the reason why England didn’t win its first 2 games was because that it has been cursed by a pigeon.
9. This lucky Australian guy is getting paid to live in a giant soccer ball. I’m SO jealous.
10. Fernando Torres tackles himself. I KNEW SOMETHING WAS UP WITH THAT. Wow, Fernando. You’re such a pansy.

Alright. So I’ve been wasting my whole afternoon reading these posts. But they are so funny.

Now I have to go, uh, clean the apartment yeah right so toodles.

Until tomorrow in which I shall write even more about football/soccer! Yeah!

Please forgive me.

Group Matches are officially over!

…And now we’re back to writing about football/soccer/whatever.

It is now the halftime of Spain vs. Chile.

The first goal Spain scored was really nice. However the second goal was weird.

You see Torres and a Chile player running…running…both looking back to see where the ball is…

Then suddenly Torres falls over on his butt and sits there for, like, ever.

The Chile player, Estrada, stopped and went, “What the hell?”

I think what happened was that Estrada’s foot accidentally clipped on the back of Torres’ foot.

Except the referee didn’t blow his whistle and Spain was able to take advantage of confusion on the Chile side and score another goal.

And afterwards the referee blows his whistle and waltzes in to give Estrada his second yellow card of the match.

And now Chile’s playing with ten people.

Ouch. This referee is so harsh on Chile. I mean, Estrada certainly didn’t reach out and KICK Torres. And besides, if the referee’s going to give Estrada a yellow card, then he should’ve blown his damn whistle when the foul was committed, and not just leave it until afterwards.

Also, Torres pretty much fell over his butt ten times already. I bet Torres is acting as a distraction for the Chile team. Blinding all with his beauty:

“I am adorable~ so precious!” (Soundtrack here.)

This article also seems to confirm our suspicion that Torres must secretly be a woman (a future essay explaining why we think so is under construction) — he loves the Dog Whisperer, board games, and SUPER NANNY.

Super. Nanny.

Okay, and now Torres got kicked off substituted again. Now he can go sit on his butt some more and dazzle people from the sidelines.

…WOW. Chile just scored a goal with TEN MEN. Good job!!!!!!!

Actually, this makes the situation even sadder because without the whole Torres/Estrada spectacle, maybe Spain wouldn’t have scored that second goal and maybe the score would be 1-1 right now!!!

Anyway, since Annie is the official supporter of Spain on NFC, she’s going to take over now.

Before I go, I would just like to recommend some excellent, hilarious articles:

• Apparently the North Korean players will be sent to work in coal mines after their spectacular failure against Portugal. Wow. I totally figured something like this would happen.
  http://g.sports.yahoo.com/soccer/world-cup/blog/dirty-tackle/post/North-Korean-team-to-be-sent-to-work-in-coal-min?urn=sow,251341
• The referee appointed for the England vs. Germany game on Sunday gave out red cards for 70% of the games he’d ever officiated in his career. MY GERMAN DARLINGS YOU MUST HOLD ON.
  http://g.sports.yahoo.com/soccer/world-cup/blog/dirty-tackle/post/England-vs-Germany-ref-gives-red-cards-in-70-o?urn=sow,251317
• And this one’s just plain funny:
  http://g.sports.yahoo.com/soccer/world-cup/blog/dirty-tackle/post/England-vs-Germany-ref-gives-red-cards-in-70-o?urn=sow,251317

Right. Fare thee well for now.

_____________________________________________________________

*Edit: I have news on Fernando Torres’ fall and Estrada’s yellow card.

Guess what?

The truth is that Fernando Torres basically fell over himself.

See! The Chile guy just accidentally touched Torres’ foot with his knee because they were both looking back, and then Fernando trips over his own foot.

Which is fine, except that then he just sits there and pretends that he’s so hurt.

That’s just unforgivable. I mean, he was practically acting like someone raped attacked him!

Silly, silly Nando. Such a pansy. I feel even sorrier for Chile now.

Torres, please go man up, like your teammate Gerard Pique. He was knocked so hard his mouth was gushing blood, and yet he didn’t just sit on his butt and pretend that he got fouled.

Okay, sorry. I promise I’ll leave you alone now. ANNIE? WHERE ARE YOU??????

_____________________________________________________________