World Cup 2010 Blog: “World Cup Moments: The Graham Poll, Mwepu Ilunga & Diana Ross Trio of High Comedy” plus 2 more |  |
- World Cup Moments: The Graham Poll, Mwepu Ilunga & Diana Ross Trio of High Comedy
- World Cup Moments: France’s Green and White Stripes Shirts From 1978
- France World Cup 2010 Team Profile
| World Cup Moments: The Graham Poll, Mwepu Ilunga & Diana Ross Trio of High Comedy Posted: 07 Apr 2010 05:40 AM PDT Most of the World Cup’s greatest moments involve tears from someone – either good or bad. These also involved tears, but more the “bellowing into laughter” kind – the light side of football. Zaire had a rough go of World Cup 1974. While Holland were enthralling with Total Football, they were being totally blown out. A 3-0 with Brazil gets the most pub, but that was a close game compared to the 9-0 they suffered against Yugoslavia the game previous. As one would expect, 9-0 losses typically represent the low mark of a World Cup experience. (If it doesn’t, support groups should be formed.) Ilunga, like any good footballer, disagrees with the notion he did anything wrong and stands his ground. ***
There are many times when football fans think a referee should retire based on a colossal faux pas. Most don’t comply; Graham Poll, however, did. In the final group match between Australia & Croatia, the Aussies needed only a draw to advance through to the knockout. Between the 85th & 87th minutes and the score an even 202, both team had a player sent off, making it 10 v 10. In the 90th, Croatia were handicapped further after Josip Simunic – that’s Australian-born Josip Simunic – received his second yellow. Only Poll hadn’t noticed two yellows equal a red, and allowed Simunic to continue on…until the 93rd, when he received his third yellow and a long (well, three minute) overdue shower. Australia still went through and Poll retired from international refereeing on the back of his little oopsie. ***
If there was ever proof the only diva who should be taking penalties is Cristiano Ronaldo, this is it. Ridiculous things happen when non-footballers, particularly non-footballers wearing non-footballing shoes, are asked to perform the simplest of footballing tasks. This was to be the case when FIFA asked Diana Ross to “kick off” the 1994 World Cup with the simplest of tasks: put the ball into an exploding goal frame. Diana tried the Paradinha-with-backslide, which even the greatest of footballers would find difficult. She failed miserably.
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| World Cup Moments: France’s Green and White Stripes Shirts From 1978 Posted: 06 Apr 2010 07:10 PM PDT
Explanation #1 is that Argentinean television was to blame:
Explanation #2 is that this was a mistake caused by both teams bringing only one set of jerseys to the game, which were both the same colour:
I’m inclined to go with explanation #2, if only because you can see in the above photo that Hungary clearly had their white away kits handy. So if France had brought their blue home kits, there wouldn’t have been a problem. Either way, the the game was apparently in danger of being abandoned unless a solution was found, and so someone had the idea that France could borrow the green and white striped jerseys of local team Club Atlético Kimberley. So France played against Hungary in the 1978 World Cup wearing the slightly queazy combination of green and white striped jerseys with their traditional blue shorts and red socks. Which is at least one too many colours for a successful uniform.Also, because the French jerseys were 50% white, and the Hungary jerseys were 100% white, it’s still pretty hard to tell the teams apart if you ask me.
France won the game 3-1 in their one-off jerseys, but had already lost 2-1 to both Italy and Argentina and so failed to progress. Maybe they should have worn the green and white for all three games? - More World Cup Moments here.
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| France World Cup 2010 Team Profile Posted: 06 Apr 2010 08:44 AM PDT
Either way, read on for the France team profile, and don’t be afraid to disagree in the comments.
FIFA World Ranking as of March 31st 2010: #8
Player with best YouTube video: I expected it to be Thierry Henry, but this Franck Ribery compilations wins hands down: Player with best name: Steve Mandanda. Because it’s fun to say. Player with best nickname: I love that Henry happily goes by “Titi”, but the award has to go to Lassana Diarra, who’s shirt at Real Madrid simply reads “Lass”. Qualification: France made a poor start to UEFA Group 7, losing the opening game 3-1 to Austria, and eventually finished in second place, one point behind Serbia. This meant a playoff against Ireland, which has now gone down in football history thanks to Thierry Henry. If you don’t know about this infamous incident already, then Henry handballed (not one, but twice) to set up the goal for William Gallas that won the playoff for France and sent them to World Cup 2010. Interesting: French singer (and former “adult” film actress) Catherine Ringer became an internet sensation last year with a song professing her attraction to Raymond Domenech: “Je Kiffe Raymond”. National Anthem: “La Marseillaise” (”The Song of Marseille”) Kit: Blue shirt, white shorts, red socks. Like the flag. World Cup History: Expectations: I’d suggest anything less than quart-finals would be considered a failure. Squad: TBA Blog: We have Sarah, Laurie, Jeff, Inara and new signing Jean-François covering Les Bleus on the France blog. - More World Cup 2010 Team Profiles.
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France will be in Group A, along with South Africa, Uruguay and Mexico. All is not rosy, especially with coach Raymond Domenech, but this is still a team with talent galore to choose from and still the nation that only missed out on winning World Cup 2006 on penalty kicks. Or was it headbutts?
Coach: Raymond Domenech. Possibly the least popular coach in international football right now. Most fans can’t believe he wasn’t fired after France’s Euro 2008 performance. Whether he’s selecting players based on astrology or proposing to his girlfriend on television after exiting a major tournament, it’s impossible to guess what DomDom will do next. The major source of frustration for France fans right now is Domenech’s insistence on playing two defensive midfielders and only one striker.
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Cup, ending Brazil’s 24 year World Cup drought. He also coached Kuwait in the 1982 World Cup, the United Arab Emirates in the 1990 World Cup and Saudi Arabia in the 1998 World Cup. He also returned to coach Brazil at the 2006 World Cup. But that didn’t go as well as the first time. Parreira took the South Africa job in 2007, a big name for a big job, but had to resign in 2008, due to his wife’s illness. Compatriot Joel Santana was his unsuccessful replacement, and Parreira returned to the job in late 2009. 
World Cup previews. They can be a bit dull and not particularly helfpul when it comes to predicting who will qualify from each group. One reason for this is that they focus too much on things like players and formations and not enough on the really good things. Like quality of 
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