Days 9, 10, 11: Group stage drama continues

A little worse for wear after a, I am back in Berlin for the weekend to stay with my friends Aaron and Tanja. What I can say about the matches this past weekend? The USA and Italy game was the dirtiest game I have ever seen in my life. These teams clearly had no respect for each other and there was so much foul play. Thanks goodness is was just a draw. Why is it that the Italy and USA game was so heated? According to my good friend Professor Andy Markovits (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor) it maybe has to do with a apperception in Europe that a victorious USA in football is really feared. And it’s not because they generally have a problem with the US politically or think the USA shouldn’t be good enough to win. The real issue is that if the USA does win, nobody in the US really some to notice in care. Funny, huh?

The drama continued with Korea’s draw with France, putting les bleau in a precarious position to not qualify from the group stage. At least France finally scored a goal. They had gone 4 world cup matches without scoring the goal. Oddly enough, the last time they scored was when they won the World Cup at home in 1998. Football’s funny that way.