The French team is in disarray, a bunch of millionaire tosspots refusing now to train to add farce and heaven knows what else to the disgrace of Nicolas Anelka and his yobbish verbal assault on the admittedly hopeless Raymond Domenech.
England may not quite be in similar disarray, though question marks are being raised about commitment and squad solidarity. Darren Bent – as has been said here more than once – is best out of it, though it’s clear his presence could hardly have failed to equal if not improve on two games, one goal (not from a striker).
But at least Paraguay, our Paraguay that is (not the Paraguay of past rulers we would consign with Anelka to some far-off, inclement and pest-ridden island), continue to do us proud.
One cheer for the red and white stripes. Another for Paulo da Silva. And a third, and fourth, for Cristian Riveros, scorer of the second goal (with a PDS assist) in today’s 2-0 win over Slovakia.
As our own contributors have put it:
Luke Harvey: Not sure when a Sunderland player last scored a World Cup finals goal, but I was glad to see this one! (Even if said player probably hasn’t seen the city of Sunderland yet.)Nice finish as well, a midfielder who can hit a ball sweetly and score a goal is ideal for us.
Bill Taylor: A goal laid on by another Sunderland player. Gotta love it.
For the record, Riveros was – wiith Vera – joint man of the match for the French football site football.fr and PDS, not so far behind, also received generous praise.
Vamos Sunderland, ha’way Paraguay.
All quiet here in France.
French/Anglais staring at the ground.
Scots trying to start up conversations but its no good.
Paraguay-Aye-Man!!!!
RI’m up in Little Italy again, which has been colonized by Brazil fans. Very noisy – drums are preferable to vuvuzelas, though. Apparently it was funereal here as the Italy-NZ game progressed. Wish I’d come earlier.
Nos vamos una fiesta.
Viva el Lads
Interesting comments Bill. I agree. Italy are playing on their reputation at the moment. An incredibly ordinary side who the opposition give respect to because of their tradition; not what they are facing on the pitch. The commentator was driving me made in the Italy and NZ game for the last half hour because it was going to be a draw. That only tells a part of the tale for me. Had NZ, like Paraguay been just a trifle more ambition then they would have won this game. A draw was a good result for the Kiwis but they could have caused a bigger upset altoghether.
Riveros had a much better game, today. For me our lads are looking like they could go a long way in this competition. Great result. Vamos Paraguay!
They didn’t look quite as strong in the second half but if they’d played like this against Italy the other day, they’d have won that one, too.
Italy must be very unhappy about their draw with New Zealand but it was a fair result. Yet another upset for the top teams. And someone should be signing the Kiwi goalie, Paston, from Wellington Phoenix. He’s a solid pair of hands and very confident.
And now let’s see what Cote d’Ivoire can do against Brazil. Off to find a nice patio….