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The best 0-0 game you'll ever see and England's Shawn Bradley
June 10, 2006There are never any goals — that’s what I hear from anti-soccer people on why they dislike the world’s favorite sport.
Saturday’s 0-0 game between Sweden and Trinidad and Tobago featured 90 minutes of scoreless action. And it couldn’t have been more exciting.
You had a game played at a fanatical pace, with each team running constantly up and down the pitch.
You had Tobago’s goalie hurt himself in warm-ups, so some 37-year-old backup named Shaka Hislop plays the game of his life in net, stoning more Swedes than any illegal drug ever could.
Trinidad, the smallest country (1.3 million) ever to play in a World Cup, then has to play a man down in the second half because of a red card.
And they tie. Which, if you saw the players’ faces, was basically a win for Tobago and a loss for Sweden.
The Soca Warriors (Trinidad’s nickname- I guess they are a phonetic-spelling bunch) had to beat Bahrain in a playoff just to make their first World Cup, and now this.
It was the best game so far, even without a goal.
Shawn Bradley plays for England?
And this whole time when we thought he’d retired from the Mavericks, we wouldn’t hear from the 7-6 giant again.
But there he was — disguised as England Peter Crouch. Actually Crouch, whose 6-7 frame is just as lanky as Bradley’s was, is a forward for the England squad.
He must have awkwardly fallen down about 30 times, ala Bradley, and the only productive thing he did was pick up a yellow card.
England didn’t even score its own goal in a 1-0 win - a Paraguay defender headed in David Beckham’s free kick.
It was an a rough way to start six hours of soccer watching.
In the final game, Argentina topped the Ivory Coast 2-1 in a pretty good up-and-down match. The Ivory Coast - you know, the country that decided to celebrate its first World Cup by postponing its Civil War - has some speed and strung together some nice passes in open spaces.
But they couldn’t finish, and Argentina, with an ancient Diego Maradona watching from the stands, did.
Argentina was the better team, but the Coast could still create some trouble for Group C teams.
Stat of the day: When Paraguay goalkeeper Aldo Bobadilla replaced an injured Justo Villar in the 8th minute, it was the quickest a keeper had been subbed in ever in a World Cup match.
Looking ahead: There should be two good games tomorrow between Serbia-Montenegro-Netherlands and Mexico-Iran. We’ll see about Angola-Portugal, the last match.
Although keep in mind I thought England-Paraguay would be the best one today. And it was the worst. Can’t win them all.
My soccer-viewing quest: I was able to watch all three Saturday games without interruption, thanks to an understanding wife who probably wanted to do more than lay around the house on her off-day. But that Sweden game even drew her attention at the end — it was that good.
I’ve watched all five WC games, with only 59 more to go.
Posted by at 5:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Comments
I have to agree that the Sweden-Trinidad game was probably the most exciting match so far. Beckham get's a lucky deflection and Argentina performs as expected (nothing special there). That pretty sums up that game. But, when you have fans from Trinidad literraly praying in the stands for a tie, you know something is going on.
Trinidad had no expectations. Their fans spent more money than they can afford to get to Germany just to see their team lose (I'd like to see that happen with another sport). Tying Sweden, who's odds of winning the World Cup are 40:1, is a magnificent feat. Consider that Trinidad's odds are 1050:1.
Sweden better shape up or they'll be afraid to get off the bus back home for a second time.
