Kevin caught by the chasing Footcall peleton...
30/07/14 01:18
Footcall VIII Day 2...
Whoa! This is a lot of football in one day!
Today saw another 8 matches for the competing teams and if you tried to watch all the games, you'll know how demanding it is especially when you have two if not three games going on at the same time. Then if you wanna watch the archery, curling or underwater windsurfing you could be down A&E with Olympic RSI before you know it! Maybe we could introduce "Watching the Olympics" into the Games in 2016? Surely we'd be world beaters at that, and if we get the IOC to chuck in "Running for A Bus" and "Queueing" I think Team GB would be nailed on for a more certain gold medal than Wiggo, Cav and Radcliffe all put together!
Brazil, in particular Neymar, looked pretty amazing against Belarus this afternoon as they took them apart with a 3-1 victory. Although this result sees them through to the Knockout Stages they have a frailty at the back and are definitely prone to letting the odd goal as we saw in their first game against Egypt. If the boy Neymar ever leaves Santos to come to Europe he has the talent to possibly be compared to world greats of the game such as Messi, Zidane and Shilton! Let's hope it happens, I'm sure 'arry will wanna sign him!
Stars of the show for me today were Senegal as they really dominated the Uruguayans in a match they would be considered second best to win. They took an early lead with that man Konate again only to see his team go down to 10 men with cynical foul from Ba on Suarez. You'd think they would have folded against the formidable Uruguay, not a bit of it, Konate latched on to a corner to put his boys even further in front. They then held on as the opposition threw everything at em and it finished 2-0 to Senegal.
Of course let's not overlook the "magnificent" performance of Great Britain to put us in a commanding position in Group A with a three one win over United Arab Emirates. The boy Giggsy put us one nil up with a rare headed goal, before Cleverley hit the post with his shot to see it agonisingly run across the line and ping off the other post and back into play :-( Then we played the classic Team GB card of letting the opponents back in the game. We did it in our first match which finished in a draw, and this is not just football I'm talking about here if you were watching the British badminton earlier, it must be inbuilt in our psyche to just show everyone how it's done then in true spirit of fair play, just let the other guys have a go! Come on guys, we need more killer instinct than this, surely we can download some off a dodgy website or pay top dollar on eBay, whatever it takes... WIN!
Despite letting UAE draw level we did take our chances and forge ahead again with the scintillating sublime super-sub Scott Sinclair (try saying that with your teeth out!) managed to slot home another to see us take the lead again and he'd only been on the field for 60 seconds. We capped off the win with the goal of the game when Sturridge lobbed the keeper from 20 yards and finish the match 3-1 and top of the group.
And so to the Footcall league...
Kevin stays top but he's been caught by Patrick "I'm on holiday so I can't celebrate" Ferguson. The pack have closed up behind the leaders and for a very brief 90 seconds between Sinclair and Sturridge scoring for GBR, little ol me was top of the league for the first time in Footcall history! Well it was short lived and now I'm down to joint third, who knows where come Wednesday evening.
Bryan "I had no help from William" Relf is right up alongside me as too is Stewart "I'm new to this Footcall lark, WTF is going on?" King. Even Christine "the GLW" Jenner struck gold with two three pointers today. James Vallender and Steve Russell also gathering vital red squares as too did Paul "wasn't I top after the second game today?" Wakefield, chin up fella you can still get back in the game. The ominous sight of Paul "Footcall's Mr Consistent" Firmston once again has appeared on the horizon and Roheet "I'm lovin' this Dad" Gupta also performed well today. Manoj "don't get too cocky son" Gupta fought back with back to back threes. Stephen "wasn't I last place on Thursday?" Hills is now unbelievably up into 22nd! Andy "Don't Hurt Me" Kirchell is not totally wiped out just yet whilst Mark "space light and delight" Horner scored a three as did Spencer "now we are talking" Collins and Adam "as good as a chocolate fireguard" Jones.
Mark "I'm gonna tweet about this" Pedler, David "apparently I won a prize in Footcall 2012" Frost and Russell "I'll show you the way to the top Lauren" Morris were three point collectors. Rachel "how many dresses do I take on holiday? Rowland also picked up two reds today along with Steve "no Sky in my team name this time" Goodwin, Jo "still better than Daniel" Mackenzie, Nathaniel "still celebrating my 2012 victory" Ridley, Andy "all sorted in the nick of time" Booth and Rob "I'm gettin' the hang of this now" Smith.
But player of the day must go to Leigh "triple" Boardman who scored an impressive 9 points in three games with exact scores for each. She's now up into 10th and must seriously be considering a move into the primary positions topside?
That'll do for now, see you Wednesday for the final 8 games of the Group Stages. Don't forget the Knockout Stages entry will be ready to go Thursday morning and you need to get your predictions back in before kickoff on Saturday morning or you won't be able to score any more points in the competition. There will be 24 points available in the second stage and we know from experience just what a difference they can make.
If you are going to be away between Thursday and Saturday then please contact me to make alternative arrangements for your KO Stages to be done for you.
Until then...
David