World Cup 2010 Blog: “Soundoff: What Will You Remember From World Cup 2010?” plus 9 more

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• Soundoff: What Will You Remember From World Cup 2010?
• World Cup Final Match Review & Highlights: Netherlands 0-1 Spain
• Podcast: World Cup Final Review
• The World Cup Trophy Streaker Falls Victim To World Class Clothesline.
• World Cup 2010 Awards (official FIFA ones, not ours)
• Did Johnny Heitinga Deserve to be Sent Off?
• Andres Iniesta’s Tribute to Dani Jarque
• Iniesta’s Late Late Goal Makes Spain World Cup Winners
• The Spanish Win As Seen By Spanish Papers
• Get Ready For The Second Iniesta Baby Boom

Soundoff: What Will You Remember From World Cup 2010? Posted: 12 Jul 2010 12:00 AM PDT World Cup 2010 is over. Feels weird to say. But it is. We’ll spend the next few days reviewing the tournament here on World Cup Blog (as well as beginning to post club team news on The Offside again), but right now I’m interested in what everyone will take from this World Cup. Not so much what you remember right now. Because if you’re anything like me then the whole thing is a blur of octopus tentacles and Dutch yellow cards at the moment. But in the slightly longer term (let’s say a year from now) what will you remember from South Africa 2010?

World Cup Final Match Review & Highlights: Netherlands 0-1 Spain Posted: 11 Jul 2010 10:50 PM PDT Honestly, it wasn’t a great game to watch. Not unless you’re a big fan of seeing free kicks awarded. So I don’t have too much to say about this game that hasn’t already been said. The basic facts are that there were a lot of yellow cards (nine for the Netherlands, five for Spain) a lot of missed chances, a couple of very good saves, one red card for Johnny Heitinga (second yellow) and one extra time goal from Andres Iniesta to win the game. The Netherlands can consider themselves unlucky that Robben didn’t finish when one on one with Iker Casillas, and possibly unlucky that Heitinga got a second booking for what didn’t look like too much of a tangle with Iniesta. If that hadn’t happened, we’d probably have gone to penalty kicks. But it did happen, and then Iniesta scored, and so the World Cup goes to Spain. Selected highlights and links to blog posts for further discussion below… We should have known this was going to be an odd game when a pitch invader (possibly Jimmy Jump) came within inches of getting a hat on the World Cup trophy before kickoff: And we knew this was going to be rough when Nigel de Jong gave Xabi Alonso a studs-up chest tattoo in the first half: It was 0-0 after 90 minutes, and I still argue that the key incident was the sending off of Johnny Heitinga early in the second half of extra time: Because just a few minutes later (and with only four minutes until penalty kicks) substitute Cesc Fabregas set up Andres Iniesta for the winner: Extended highlights of the rest of the game… All of which = Congratulations to Spain, World Cup winners 2010. - More at the Spain blog and the Netherlands blog.

Podcast: World Cup Final Review Posted: 11 Jul 2010 10:25 PM PDT Not too long after the World Cup final was over, I sat around a table with two of my Total Football Soccer Show co-hosts to record our reactions. I should preface this podcast by saying that some of it is maybe a bit knee-jerk. Listening back (as I did when editing) I think we’re probably a little harsh on the Netherlands, so please bear in mind that we’re not impartial journalists, just three football fans sitting around and talking after watching the World Cup final. The show is just over 30 minutes long, so click the play button below to listen… If you like the show then give it the thumbs up on Facebook and/or subscribe via iTunes. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

The World Cup Trophy Streaker Falls Victim To World Class Clothesline. Posted: 11 Jul 2010 05:43 PM PDT Someone tried to…do something with that World Cup trophy before the game, just after it’d been handed over by Fabio Cannavaro and placed on the fancy pedestal for the world to gawk. The “streaker” (generic term) – oh, twas just Jimmy Jump – ran onto the pitch and looked to be putting a beanie on the trophy before being laid out by a World Cup-quality clothesline by security. What a @#$%ing hit. Look at that blazer arm not only flail around to knock him down, but also do so without allowing the trophy to touch grass. Astonishing technique, really. New Golden Boot standings: i. Paul the Octopus ii. Security guard iii. Diego Forlan

World Cup 2010 Awards (official FIFA ones, not ours) Posted: 11 Jul 2010 05:15 PM PDT With all the World Cup action over and all the votes tallied, the World Cup awards can now be handed out. And there’s a lot of gold to go around. There’s the Golden Ball for best player (plus silver and bronze for runners up), the Golden Boot for top scorer, the Golden Glove (just one, this ‘aint boxing) for best goalkeeper and the not so golden but still prestigious Best Young Player award (the Golden iPod?) Read on for an overview of who won what: Golden Ball for best player: Diego Forlan (Uruguay) FIFA drew up the shortlist of 10, and the accredited media (so not World Cup Blog) voted the Uruguayan striker (and, based on this World Cup, creator) as the best player of the tournament. No arguments here. Silver Ball: Wesley Sneijder (Netherlands) Bronze Ball: David Villa (Spain) Golden Boot for top scorer: Thomas Mueller (Germany) There was actually a four way tie at the top of the goalscoring chart with Mueller, David Villa, Wesley Sneijder and Diego Forlan all scoring five goals each. Tie-breaker was assists, which put Mueller on top with three. Silver Shoe: David Villa (Spain) Bronze Show: Wesley Sneijder (Netherlands) Villa and Sneijder had one assist each, and so seems from the FIFA top scorer page (and I’m just guessing here) that Villa finishes above Sneijder based on fewer minutes plated (635 to Sneijder’s 652). No top scorer boots for Forlan, as he played 654 minutes, but luckily he’s got that Golden Ball to console him. Best Young Player: Thomas Mueller (Germany) Quite a successful awards haul for Mueller. After being named to a shortlist of three along with Mexico’s Gio dos Santos and Ghana’s Andre Ayew, teh 20 year old Mueller was named as Best Young Player by FIFA’s Technical Study Group. I’m assuming that Mueller being tournament top scorer made this an easy choice. Golden Glove for best goalkeeper: Iker Casillas (Spain) It’s not clear who decides this award, so I’m going to assume it’s the FIFA Technical Study Group again. Despite conceding to Switzerland in Spain’s opening game (which they lost 1-0), Casillas has been cool as a (non global warming threatened) glacier at World Cup 2010. I imagine competition for this award was tight, with guys like Switzerland’s Diego Benaglio, Portugal’s Eduardo, Uruguay’s Fernando Muslera and even Netherlands’ Maarten Stekelenburg all impressing (others too, but running out of space here). Personally I think Casillas deserves this purely for being brave enough to knock Carles Puyol down to get to a cross, but just two goals conceded in seven games plus captaining a World Cup winning team (and making important saves in the final) makes Casillas more than worthy. FIFA Fair Play Award: Spain I forgot they even did this. But apparently Spain’s eight yellow cards in seven games (five(!) of which came in the final) means the team averaged just 1.14 yellows per game, and zero reds. (Spain also wins a thing called the World Cup trophy, for beating all the other teams) (except Switzerland)

Did Johnny Heitinga Deserve to be Sent Off? Posted: 11 Jul 2010 04:05 PM PDT The Wold Cup final wasn’t a pretty game of football. But it was somewhat evenly balanced until the 109th minute when Netherlands defender Johnny Heitinga was sent off, after receiving his second yellow of the game for the above incident. Netherlands ability to disrupt Spain’s passing left the field with Heitinga. Because it’s hard enough to contain the tiki-taka passing with 11 men. With 10? Forget about it, and seven minutes later Andres Iniesta had won the game. So it’s fair to say the result of this final was heavily influenced by Heitinga’s sending off. So it’s an important moment and worth a second look. Definitely Heitinga’s hand is on Iniesta’s shoulder, but only very briefly and certainly not when Iniesta goes down. So was Heitinga’s sending off too harsh?

Andres Iniesta’s Tribute to Dani Jarque Posted: 11 Jul 2010 03:39 PM PDT Nice touch from Spain’s goalscorer Andres Iniesta today, who celebrated his 116th minute World Cup winning strike by whipping off his jersey to reveal a handwritten message on his vest type thingy. The message read: “Dani Jarque siempre con nostros” (Dani Jarque always with us) in reference to the Esanyol player who passed away at the age of 26 after a heart attack in the summer of 2009. Iniesta was inevitably booked for removing his shirt, which I’m sure he won’t worry about too much having won the World Cup and paid homage to a deceased friend/colleague, plus what’s one yellow card buried amongst the thousand others in this final? But this incident makes me think that maybe shirt removal bookings should be dependenet on quality of underlying t-shirt message, as in: tribute to deceased player after scoring in the World Cup final = you get a pass.

Iniesta’s Late Late Goal Makes Spain World Cup Winners Posted: 11 Jul 2010 02:04 PM PDT There were yellow cards galore and more than a few fluffed chances. Until finally – finally – with the Dutch down to 10 men after Johnny Heitinga was sent off, Andres Iniesta received a pass from Cesc Fabregas in the 116th minute, took one touch and then bam, struck the bouncing ball past Maarten Stekelenburg in the Dutch goal. 1-0 to Spain, who are now World Cup winners.

The Spanish Win As Seen By Spanish Papers Posted: 11 Jul 2010 10:30 AM PDT Screen shots of the various front pages immediately after the win – the ones which were working anyway. El Pais: AS: El Mundo: La Vanguardia: Marca: Sport:

Get Ready For The Second Iniesta Baby Boom Posted: 11 Jul 2010 10:05 AM PDT This is really too ridiculous to repeat, so we'll let the AP do the talking: Nine months since Barca's 6-2 home win over their arch- rivals and Andres Iniesta's stunning late strike which took them through to the final at the expense of Chelsea, maternity hospitals are struggling to cope with demand for beds. A survey by COMRadio showed that births this week and those expected next week are 45 percent higher than the average. "When we notice some sort of surge we look for the reason and it's evident that the cause of the increase this week is the euphoria of Barca fans thanks to the huge win and Iniesta's goal," El Mundo newspaper quoted Mercedes Rodriguez of the city's Quiron Clinic as saying. The babies are popularly known in Barcelona as "the Iniesta generation". If Barcelona winning a semifinal against Chelsea could prompt a shortage of hospital beds in Spain, then the national government is in heaps of trouble nine months from now when maternity beds will be harder to come by than World Cup trophies. So what was a theory months ago is now a confirmation: no one causes more sex in Spain than Andres Iniesta. Obviously. Clutchness makes babies.

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