Uruguay: Still Stinking up the Tournament.

Today at the World Cup began with the continuing scandal of Tuesday's (24/6/14) 'match' between Italy and Uruguay with FIFA announcing their punishment of Luis Suarez. The maximum punishment FIFA could have imposed on Suarez for biting an opponent was a 24 game, two year ban. When Suarez bit an opponent in Dutch league game in 2010 he was handed a seven match ban. When Suarez bit an opponent in English league game in 2013 was banned for 10 matches. So FIFA's decision to respond to Suarez's third biting offence - this time on football's biggest stage - by banning him just 4 game and 9 months seems ridiculously lenient.

The only possible explanation for handing Suarez a short ban is that bans of less then two months carry no opportunity to appeal. So although it would have been stupidly lenient it would at least have meant that Suarez would have been sent straight home and the tournament could have begun to try and recover. However by handing down a 4 month ban FIFA have somehow managed to insufficiently punish Suarez while still giving him the right to appeal. The Uruguayan Football Association (FA) have exercised that right of appeal in clear attempt to have Suarez's ban delayed long enough for him to play against Columbia on Saturday (28/6/14). As such I think it is long past time for the Uruguayan FA to be charged with bringing the game into disrepute meaning that the entire team is expelled from the competition. That is because along with their wild accusations that this is all a conspiracy against them it certainly appears that Uruguay don't understand what Suarez has done wrong and as such have no place in international football.

If they had any decency or sense of fair play Uruguay would have already sent both Luis Suarez and Edinson Cavani home from the tournament in disgrace. This is precisely what Ghana did today when they sent home Sulley Muntari and Kevin-Prince Boateng for respectively striking and verbally abusing team officials. This was the latest twist in a long running row within the Ghanaian camp over appearance fees that last night saw the Ghanaian President order a plane load of cash to be flown out to Brazil. This is particularly undignified because for most international players their appearance fee is pretty nominal compared to their club wages so they play merely for the pride of representing their nation. As Muntari and Boateng are both hardly on the breadline playing for Inter Milan in Italy and FC Schalke in Germany respectively my only hope is that they were sticking up for some of their less well paid teammates. Sadly though I doubt that and the incident only serves to underline how unsettled Ghana have been off the pitch during this tournament.

There was also some football played today with the final games in Groups G and H. However even that came under threat when suddenly the climate changed around the Recife stadium where the USA and Germany were scheduled to play with torrential rain causing significant flooding preventing people travelling to the stadium. This also created a risk that the match would have to be abandoned due to a water-logged pitch although that was avoided.

The first bloc of games played were in Group G where literally any two of Germany, USA, Ghana or Portugal could have gone through with Germany playing USA and Portugal playing Ghana.

Despite playing in torrential rain with four points each Germany and the USA were the best placed only needing to draw with each other in order to progress. However Germany are still smarting from that incident at the 1982 World Cup when they conspired with Austria to draw in their last group game to allow both teams to progress at the expense of Algeria. As a result there was no way that Germany were simply going to play for the draw this time so they fielded a full strength side and set about trying to win from the opening whistle.

However Germany have a very distinctive almost trademark style of play. This involves making hundreds of very precise passes in order to slowly move possession of the ball up and down the pitch. The purpose of this is to force the opponent to chase the ball in order to tire them out so Germany can step up their attacks and score the winning goals in the last 10-20 minutes of the game. Although this can appear boring to people who don't understand what is going on it is a ruthlessly efficient style of play and why Germany have won three World Cups. Being heavily influenced by Germany the USA also try and play in this style but over the course of the first half were completely outclassed by Germany. As a result the USA barely had possession of the ball in the first 20 minutes. 

The USA's frustration also began to show with a series of heavy tackles by both Kyle Beckerman and Micheal Bradley for which they initially went unpunished. This is largely a result of the fact that the referees have been instructed to be lenient when showing yellow and red cards. Generally I agree with this but when a player has committed a bad foul for the third or fourth time it starts making a mockery of the rules and leading players such as Suarez to think they can do as they like. As a result it was a relief when Beckerman was finally booked in the 62nd minute even if I think that Bradley should also have been booked.

The only goal of the game came on 55 minutes when Germany's Per Mertesacker shot was blocked by the USA's 'keeper Tim Howard. Unfortunately the ball rebounded to Germany's Thomas Muller who smashed in a brilliant shot from around 20 yards out that Howard could have done nothing to stop. Unlike much of the US team Howard has a well established reputation as a World class player and he knows it. As such I feel comfortable talking trash about him in a way I don't about younger and more unsettled players in teams such as Ghana. After all having played in the English Premier League for the past 11 years including at his current club Everton Howard has heard it all before.

Despite there only being one goal in the game the USA V Germany match was nail-biting until the end due to events in the Ghana V Portugal match. On 30 minutes Ghana's John Boye sliced an attempted clearance into his own net off the post putting Portugal 1-0 up. This own goal rather summed up Ghana's preparations for the game and hugely took the pressure off both Germany and the USA. That's because for Portugal to leap-frog either team into the last 16 they not only had to hope the USA V Germany game produced a clear winner but also beat Ghana by 5 clear goals.

Things got really exciting again on 57 minutes when - moments after Germany had gone 1-0 up - Asamoah Gyan levelled the score for Ghana and became the highest scoring African player in World Cup history. This meant that with the USA losing Ghana only had to score one more goal in order to secure the three points and leap-frog the USA on goals scored. So from there Ghana really set about chasing the game to score the winning goal leading to some dramatic attacking football. If anything Ghana's mistake was that their young players pushed too had and kept rushing to take chances rather than being more patient and allowing more quality chances to develop. They were cruelly punished in the 80th minute when Cristiano Ronaldo scored his first and only goal of the tournament giving Portugal a symbolic 2-1 victory.

Although both Germany and the USA qualified from the group the match was marred late on by yet another sole German pitch invader. I have say that the first time this happened it wasn't particularly funny so the second time in as many matches was really killing the joke.

Things were almost as exciting in the Group H matches because although Belgium had already qualified they weren't certain of topping the group and any one of Algeria, Russia or the Republic of Korea (South Korea/RoK) could have joined them. Either Algeria or Russia stood the best chance of qualification as they face up against each other.

Both Algeria and Russia are strong, physical teams who play the German/European style of possession football. However although both sides are talented their style of play is more focused on long diagonal balls and crosses into the box intended to pick out headers and tap ins to score goals rather than mazey runs and moments of flair. With both teams playing such a similar style and Algeria only needing a draw I was a bit worried that both sides would cancel each other out creating a dull 0-0 draw.

Russia (and neutrals) got a bit of early luck though when Algeria's Sofiane Feghouli bashed heads with another Algerian player splitting his head open in the process. This forced Feghouli to go off for treatment and with Algeria down to 10 men Russia's Dmitriy Kombarov crossed the ball into the area for Alexander Kokorin to head in scoring a classic Russian/Algerian goal that put Russia 1-0 up after 6 minutes. This of course forced Algeria to chase the equaliser although Russia spent the next 38 minutes rather expertly controlling the game. As result the teams went in at half-time with Russia 1-0 up and on schedule to progress to the last 16.

Things got even more exciting though in the dying minutes of the first half of the other game when Belgium's Steven Defour was sent off for an ugly tackle on a South Korean player. Basically both Defour and the South Korean player lunged for a loose ball but Defour lunged with his studs showing and missed the ball completely smashing the South Korean player on the ankle. Due to the angle and momentum this could have damaged any number of ligaments in the South Koreans knee or ankle and could well have just broken his ankle. Although luckily the South Korean escaped serious injury Defour can surely have no problem with the straight red card he received.

With Russia 1-0 up and RoK having a man advantage the stage was set for an absolutely thrilling second half in both games. If Russia continued to beat Algeria and RoK picked up a quick goal in their game it would have been 45 minutes of waiting to see if RoK could score the second they needed to pick up three points and leap-frog Russia on goal difference. Sadly RoK were unable to make a quick breakthrough and Algeria equalised in the 60th minute with a goal that was quite controversial.

Essentially Algeria's Abdelmoumene Djabou won a free kick on the left hand side of the penalty area after he was fouled by Russia's Aleksei Kozlov. As Algeria's Yacine Brahimi lined up to deliver a cross into the box an Algerian fan kept shining a laser pointer/pen into the face of Igor Akinfeev - the Russian 'keeper who clearly complained to the referee that he was being distracted. However the Turkish referee allowed the free-kick to go ahead and a clearly unsettled Akinfeev made a wild attempt to clear the ball allowing Algeria's Islam Slimani to head in the equaliser.

Obviously the conduct of the fans is a matter for the security staff who either need to search fans more thoroughly as they enter the stadium and eject anyone who is throwing objects onto the pitch or using laser pointers/pens. However the Akinfeev had made it quite clear to the referee that he was being impeded so the referee should have stopped play until stadium security could do their job.

RoK couldn't make any breakthrough in the other game and Jan Vertonghen netted a late winner for Belgium in the 77th minute although replays show he was off-side even if it was only his foot and it was well within the margin of human error. As a result Belgium go through as group winners with a perfect 9 points while Algeria came second with 4 points meaning that they finally go through to the last 16 of a World Cup for the first time in their long footballing history.

That means that the winners of Group G (Germany) will face the runner up from Group H (Algeria) and the Winners of Group H (Belgium) will face the runner up from Group G (The USA) in the last 16 knock-out games.

23:55 on 26/6/14 (UK date).