The French, the English, the Americans and the World Cup

I don't know what about this event I find so interesting, but I love watching the World Cup. As I sit down to gather my thoughts this morning the French team is falling apart after two poor outings, a player was dismissed from the team, someone leaked locker room information to the press, and now a coach and two officials have quit. This kind of typifies the tournament so far.

Many countries where soccer is king (England, France, Spain, Italy, just to name a few) have gotten off to poor starts. Teams that are loaded with stars, but they don't seem to play well together. The English are too tense to shoot (according to the Scottish commentator); the French are fighting everything but the opponent, and the Italians needed a flop in the box to tie New Zealand. Yes, that would be the New Zealand, with no domestic soccer league. The New Zealand who had never scored a goal, or been ahead in a World Cup game. I wish I could read Italian this morning...Wouldn't it be great to read what the Italian press has to say.

This morning I watched Portugal play an artful first half against North Korea. The Portugal's first goal was one of the most beautiful I have seen to date. A brilliant through ball that arrives at the edge of the box at the same time a forward shows up to direct it into the net. Great stuff. I can't speak to the rest of the game (which turned into a seven-nil rout).

The North Koreans. There is a player from Japan whose parents are from North Korea and he is playing on the North Korean team. If you look at his jersey, they sewed his name over someone else's. They don't even have enough money for jerseys for all of their players. How very sad. I hope players from other nations are treating the North Koreans with kindness - Take-a-North-Korean-Player-to-Dinner ought to be an official human rights campaign.

I liked watching the North Koreans. Their players didn't (at least in the first half, when I was watching) take dives for calls. They didn't curl up as if mortally injured one minute, only to be fine 60 seconds later. I never saw a North Korean player belly ache to a referee about a call. Good stuff. When I play in the World Cup, I want to play like a North Korean...