well…sitting here waiting for the chicken to cook and remembered that I neglected to do a World Cup update today…and there were unusual happenings to report. First, the US got robbed of a win by the most atrocious officiating I’ve ever seen; the ref calling off a good goal that would have won it for us for no reason whatsoever. Even the English announcers were appalled by the call…why can’t they get these things right? At least it was a tie and a point for us.
The bigger shocker was England and Algeria ended in a 0-0 tie which leaves us with a better tie-breaker in goal differential. But England looked terrible with no pace or creativity…what is wrong with those guys? Even the US looked better in the match…
Now, we have to win Wednesday against Algeria or we go home….should be fun..Algeria looked pretty good today but I don’t know if they can keep up that level of play…
Well…the World cup took a turn this morning when Switzerland defeated the heavily favored Spanish team by a score of 1-0. These guys were favored to take it all but I think that rating may have been a little too optimistic given that the US beat them in the Confederations Cup last year. I know, Spain has only lost like 2 games in the last hundred years but these tournaments can be surprising…just look at our tie with England which easily could have been a win for the US.
On thing I have noticed is that there haven’t been any teams, from the matches I’ve seen, that have played up to level that I expected…I was prepared for some elegant soccer like you see in the EPL and Champions league but most of the play looks disjointed, although Spain did put together some short spurts of beauty that you can’t help but marvel at…even Brazil looked ordinary yesterday…maybe we have a chance? Hope so….
Well…need to say a few words about the USA/England match from Sat afternoon…walked over to a local bar owned by an Irishman who, when he saw that my son-in-law was English, gave us pretty good service. But, we were there at about 9:30 for the 1:30 game so that was a long wait; especially for me since I could only have a couple of beers with coming back home later in the aft. Had corned beef hash and eggs for breakfast and it was some of the best I’ve had…not the weird tasting stuff you get from a can but really tender, home-cooked corned beef.
Oh, the game, I thought it was a good result for the USA to come away with a tie 1-1, but my son-in-law and the other Englanders were despondent that they could tie with the lowly US. I have to say congrats to Tim Howard, our goaltender, who took what I thought was a red card play when the English player came in studs up and put both feet into his chest. This was early in the match and he stayed in and made so many game saving plays it was hard to count them…doesn’t say much for our defense, though….
Now we just need to beat Slovenia Friday morning and we might get to the knockout stage…..
Well…that last one had a full days worth of outrage, don’t you think? So I’ll turn to a little sports to lighten the mood somewhat. Just wanted to say that I’m glad the NHL has tonight’s game on NBC so more people can watch…including me. I’m still going to root for the Blackhawks to win…and part of that is that I want Marion Hossa to get his name on the cup…it would just be too much to get to the finals in three successive years, with three different teams and to lose in them all. So, go ‘Hawks….
Well…it was a little encouraging to see England struggle in a World Cup prelude soccer match with some South African all-stars and only score 3 goals. I had hoped to see a little weakness that would possibly give us a chance Saturday and it did occur. I guess the coach was so disgusted he didn’t even go into the locker room at the half to talk to them. Now, I’m not usually one to celebrate others’ failures, but I have to grasp any straw possible that the US may not be as embarrassed as I anticipate. Remember, this is soccer that has a different set of rules for us fans than other sports….much more rabid than we are all used to…well, if you exclude college football.
On hockey, GO Blackhawks!!! (I know, I’m a Wings fan but this is a midwest team that hasn’t won the cup since ’61).I had to explain to one of the youngsters during Sunday Funday how I can root for the Hawks…it goes like this: The Hawks are in our conference for one, second, I have to root against any east coast team especially when it has Ville Leino who dogged it in Detroit and got himself traded…now he’s a superstar in Philly? I know, I shouldn’t hold that against him since he wasn’t getting playing time in Detroit. but, as Babcock says…you earn playing time by working your butt off….and Ville just didn’t have any fire. Maybe more later….
Well…don’t like the idea of Philly getting even with the Blackhawks in the Stanley Cup playoffs….but that will make it more interesting to watch the game that I can see Sunday since it’s not on Versus. Still want the Hawks to win, though.
Oh, and the USA beat Australia today 3-1 but looked like crap….if they play like that next Sat against England, it will be 6-0 England in the first half…guys, let’s avoid going out in the first round again, please.
Well…as you already know, one of the Detroit Tigers pitchers lost a perfect game this week due to a bad call from one of the umpires. What surprised me was the reaction of the pitcher, umpire, and Tiger’s manager to the mistake… and of the Detroit fans the next day; cheering the ump and Armando Galarraga (the pitcher) when he brought the lineup card to the ump who was the home plate umpire that day.
This was a display of class that I thought I’d never see again in my lifetime…thank you for making me smile…
Well…this is a post I didn’t want to write…our Wings lost to the Sharks last night and are out of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. I don’t know how I feel about this right now…as you can tell, it’s late in the day and I couldn’t bring myself to write anything until now.
One of the things that makes this a sad day is the all too real possibility that we have seen Nick Lidstrom play his last game for the Wings. It’s hard to let go of one of your favorite players, but even harder to let go of such a great person as Nick; the only other time I felt this way was when Stevie Y retired…I’m glad I got to see his last game and that I stayed up to watch all of Nick’s.
I know we’ll have a revamped team with many of our favorites gone next year; that’s something I’ll touch on tomorrow.
Well….game time is almost here and I am getting excited…this should be fun if Howard can keep us in it for about the first 10 minutes or so…or if Frantzen can do the same thing he did last game. Have never seen a performance like that but I did see his hat trick against Colorado two years ago live and only 7 rows from the glass with G. Man, you could feel the wind from the players coming down the ice and the speed just seems so much faster in person; it was also cool to have them slam the glass and have it rattle like crazy.
Well..that was a good game last night…had a ton of fun out with G and feel kind of crappy this morning. But, in my opinion, what we saw was more like a supernova burning off the last of its fuel than a sustainable move to higher energy and performance. I love the guys but to expect them to do that again is probably what I said to T last night…”an irrational hope”. But, I’ve never been accused of being that rational….