World Cup Day Two

Didn't get to watch anything on Day One because of work, but I don't care much about Group A (although Ecuador is poised to be a surprise advancer). Today was when things kicked in. Unfortunately, I woke up five minutes too late to see England's goal and was simply too tired to stay awake past halftime; I ended up not missing anything. I also didn't miss anything scoring-wise in the Sweden/T&T game which I totally slept through, even if Shaka Hislop turned in what may end up being the game of the tournament for any keeper.

I did get to watch Argentina vs. Ivory Coast, the first game in the Group of Death. Pretty exciting, wide-open game, mostly because neither team wanted to pressure the ball, like, at all. So it pretty much became a game of "which team is better at passing" and I think the answer is unequivocally "Argentina." Argentina's goals were helped greatly by the refusal of the Coast defense to swarm; by comparison, Didier Drogba was more or less mauled whenever he got near the ball, and it's a testament to his talent that he was able to score at all. Many of his teammates seemed to be waiting around for him to do something, to the point that he started dropping back into the midfield in the second half just to get more involved. When he did score, in the 82nd minute, the entire team proceeded to go into a shell, as if they were content to settle for a loss as long as the goal differential was only going to be -1. I know this is the Coast's first Finals, but I didn't expect a team whose advancement could continue the cease-fire in the national civil war to look so apathetic after pulling within striking distance of a draw. But maybe they were just tired at that point.

It's hard to say that Argentina looked great, at least on defense - despite how frequently in disarray the Ivory Coast seemed to be, they still were able to get a number of opportunities, although more so in the first half. And the goals, while nice, were helped by Coast defensive mistakes that a better team might not have made. That said, Argentina did what they needed to do. They still have to play the highest-rated team in the group, though, and the stingy S&M defense, so let's not punch their ticket to the knockout stages just yet.

An observation on watching soccer on American TV: 95% of US announcers come in two varieties: the ones who know nothing about soccer, and the ones who assume the viewer knows nothing about soccer. Shep Messing, serving as color man, kept saying stuff like "For our new viewers..." and then explaining the offsides rule. I understand that some people might be watching the World Cup who are less familiar with soccer, but I mean, I'd hope anyone who's bothering to sit down and watch a soccer game can figure out what offsides is.

But maybe I'm just too sensitive, being much more aware of and into soccer than the average American. In that case, I feel more justified being aggravated by Glenn Davis' play-by-play. It's not that Davis didn't know how soccer worked or anything, but he seemed out of his depth somehow. Maybe it was the spoonerisms ("he's bought the breast energy out of the second-half substitutes") or the fuzzy math ("this game has turned 360 degrees!") or not knowing that the stat he was reciting about the US playing in its fourth consecutive World Cup was wrong.

At any rate, I was unimpressed by the commentary for Argentina-Ivory Coast. We'll see if it's better with other commentary teams. At least this time out it looks like they're doing all the games on-site; in '02 there was one live team and everyone else was looking at a monitor in a studio.