Italy would struggle to beat Costa Coffee FC let alone Costa Rica...
21/06/14 18:48
Day 9 in the Footcall (curry) house...
Typical isn't it, I have one evening off from Footcall and we have a goal-fest! Fortunately we have Footcall reporters at all the grounds and as I knocking back the Stella, they did a stella job keeping me up to date with all the action on the pitch.
The opening game of the day was England's lifeline. Surely we had nothing to worry about as Italy were going to crush Costa Rica and give us just a little hope of qualification. Well I'm sure Roy and his boys were disgusted to see just how poorly Italy turned out and Costa Rica bossed the match and they were denied an early stonewall penalty. Whilst Italy defend well they just didn't have much up front and on the 44th minute Costa Rica went ahead with a fabulous header by Bryan Ruiz leaving Buffon lying face down in his goal net. In the second half Italy did have more possession but they had a real problem up front, I'm sure Balotelli's old sports teacher would have been shouting "stay onside boy!" but time and again he was getting caught out. The final whistle blew and Costa Rica were proudly standing at the top of the group with Italy and Uruguay in joint second with England starting to pack their flip-flops and mankinis!
The After-Eight match saw France take on their neighbs Switzerland. Both teams had three points in the bank and it was the French that opened the scoreline with an early goal from Giroud's head. As the Swiss were taking stock from the restart France doubled their lead as Blaise "Marathon Man" Matuidi scored just 66 seconds later! Soon after that France won a penalty and it was looking like a one-team show. Benzema stepped up but Benaglio saved it from between the posts, the follow up pinged off the post. Over and over the French hit them on the break and on the 40th minute Valbuena extended the lead to three zip. After the break they carried on, it was becoming comical as France and their star man Benzema made it four and Sissoko slotted it in the corner to make it five nil. With ten minutes left there was no time for the Swiss to get anything out of the game but they did manage to score a couple of goals before time was up and as the whistle blew for time Benezma lobbed the keeper to make it 6-2. Sadly it wasn't given and the crowd had to settle for a seven goal thriller that finished 5-2.
After a short Timeout the final game saw Honduras play Ecuador. A bizarre little fact about these two countries was that the managers for each club had managed the opposing team. On the 31st minute Ecuador conceded a costly goal as the Honduran striker, Costly, struck a peach of a shot and blasted it left footed in the corner from 20 yards out. Ecuador put some pressure on Honduras and it only took three minutes for them to equalise as Valencia connected with a ball going across the six yard area. In the second half that man Valencia pushed ahead with a well won header. That's how it stayed as Ecuador wrapped it up 2-1.
And so to the Footcall league...
Very few of you had Costa to win including David Wootton, Eric Church, Andy Green and Thomas Frost all picked up a valuable point. France to win was a very popular prediction, I was gutted as I had 6-2 (if only Benzema's goal had stood ;-) those picking up a point for this included Stuart Ives, Graham Weaver, David Blakeman, Clare Hawkins, Peter Nilsen and Will Relf. A few of you at the wrong end of the table also collected a point, Kelvin Lander, Jill (where's Eleanor?) Fuller, Jack Hennebry and Robert (I need a new racquet) Hatch.
The Ecuador result provided a few threes, notably for David (does anyone know where I can get a case of Rioja 1994?) Newton, Jennifer and Simon (Wood and Clark), Daniel Volausek, Dave Hill, Sara Borges, James (the Welsh contingent) Ridley, Neil Jefferis, Dean Smith, Ian (finally I'm starting to show some form again) Barker, David Hitch, Mark Mandry, Peter Breitenbach, Alan Church and Kelly (check me out in 4th) Sains.
Player of the day must go to my old time badders chum, Colin Jessop as he was the only player to guess Costa Rica to beat Italy 2-1, well done Col you've raced into 151st, there's no stopping you now!
Sorry for the delay on this report, another one to come later...
David
PS. Don't forget to check your division standing, for many of you it will make better reading than the big league :-)