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Of course any championship that is contested in the summer between eight teams
in an ‘odd year’ is always going to have the rather uneviable “Mickey Mouse” stigma attached to it. That said, this year’s Confederations Cup had shocks, skill, thrills and dodgy decisions too - yes,
all the vital ingredients of an enjoyable football tournament.
Ironically, it was Mickey himself who caused the variety of tremors, USA,
perhaps the most unskilled and undersupported underdog in history, nearly when
and done it. Stellar victories over the aging Italians and pompous Spanish (the
latter was my favourite), they had Brazil two down after half an hour. Bob
Bradley’s boys certainly came here to give it their all and even South Africa put on a
good show.
If Brazil, Spain and Italy really were operating on cruise control then
hopefully some lessons will be learned. The Confederations Cup may be the
ghastliest trophy (no, it probably is) or the biggest inconvenience to club
managers since international football, but its conception is actually a good
idea. Why shouldn’t the top seven teams in the world fight for domination and also give the
forthcoming host nation an extra microscrope to perform under?
The Confederations Cup may well be too frequent and inconvenient, but this year’s at least will go down as nothing short of a rupturous success, both on and off
of the pitch.+
Garth ‘Mad Dog’ Crooks Crack-o-meter
Garth was fired up last night as Brazil’s “crooked” defending tested his patience to the limit. Crooksy turned in the sort of
performance we, and perhaps the Match of the Day producers, rather expected,
the execs just preying that no-one was watching.
We knew Dunga’s boys were in for a pasting as the camera panned back to the studio - Crooksy
was so incensed, he had his head bowed. When he did get his chance he accused
them of “not caring” and his old-favourite, “wishing they were on a beach”. There was even a spectacular forgetting of Charlie Davies’ name, which he somewhat aggresively thanked Gabby for prompting him of. Yes
Crooksy, you will NEVER be on Match of the Day, for good reason!.
(c) ChrisOnline.biz 2009
