It wasn’t the most exciting game ever, but we won, so YIPPEE! I do feel that the lack of excitement can be partly blamed on the referee, Marco Rodriguez , who seemed to have got the whistle stuck in his mouth, because he blew it as often as he possibly could, which did breakup the smooth flow of play. He also bore a remarkable resemblance to a vampire, which may explain why he was so against the players nipping to the sidelines to grab a drink of water – obviously he thought they should stick to blood.
Being serious for a moment, considering the high temperature within the stadium during yesterdays match, it was necessary for players to take on extra fluids, and I do think FIFA should make refs aware of this. Of course players must stick to the rules, but no one should be expected to succumb to dehydration for the sake of a game. Alternatively, Sven could have taken a leaf out of Jack Charlton’s book, and handed drinks out himself. Charlton even gave them to the opposing team.
picture courtesy of www.ce.cn/
If you are bored with all this football talk, but don’t want to be left out, pay a visit to Philippa’s blog where you can vote on the ugliest and the hunkiest players, currently and all time. A big thank to Philippa for adding Batigol, a prime example of why football is called the beautiful game.
Technorati Tags: world cup, england versus paraguay, marco rodriguez, jack charlton, batigol, gabriel batistuta
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Kate
Mum, blogger and editor based in the north of England; interests include fog knitting, cat herding and jelly juggling. If you want to get in touch for any reason you can find me on Twitter, LinkedIn or drop me a line via the contact page on my portfolio. Alternatively, you can follow this blog via it's Facebook page, or subscribe to the feed.
Jack Yan
Just seen this on technorati- thanx for the reference. Glad you liked the pics. Pippa http://philippasdailynewsplanet.blogspot.com
I haven’t seen this yet. The live matches are on Sky, but I can’t be bothered getting it if, during the other three years when the World Cup isn’t on, I couldn’t care less about the TV programmes!
have you seen what alastair campbell thinks of us ladies and football? I’ve just posted on it. Avoided swear words heriocally. Pippa
Just re read post and couldn’t agree more about the water situation. Did they want the players to pass out or something? I wonder if Sven will make an official complaint about Rodriguez?
Jack – we have Sky, but not the sports package, usually the stuff on there is pretty boring, bowls, darts etc. When they do show football you have to pay extra.
They don’t have the rights to show the World Cup in the UK, it’s being covered by the BBC and ITV. Sky are heavily plugging their film channels instead, with an emphasis on chick flicks.
Pippa – As far as I know the FA have said something to FIFA about it. I don’t know if it is actually a complaint, but they have certainly expressed their dissatisfaction, and asked for provisions to be made for future games.
Apparently, the team drank 70 litres of water during the game, and lost between 4 and 10lbs in weight. I know they are all very fit, but that is a lot to lose in such a short time – doctors recommend people on diets should lose no more than 2 – 3lbs per week!
Sheeesh man that is scary! thanx 4 comment on campbell. Pippa
Wise move on Sky’s part there, Kate. With us, all of soccer is on their channels, live, while we plebs have to put up with delayed coverage. The odd game (first and final, let’s hope) is on TV One (state broadcaster), so I imagine I should not complain. But at a hotel tomorrow, so there is Sky there—not sure how much work I will do!
Have you seen this article in the Scotsman? It’s a hot topic – 124 comments when I looked! What a palaver.
http://news.scotsman.com/politics.cfm?id=862182006
Diddums – Thanks for the link. I just had a look – wow that has certainly stirred up some controversy. It’s all a bit silly though, as far as I’m concerned the Scots can support which ever team they like.
I blame the media, over the last couple of weeks there have been quite a few reports about this, I’m sure no one would have given it much thought if it hadn’t been for that.
Jack – Sky did have a monopoly on football for quite a few years, but recently the terrestial channels have started to fight back. Most domestic matches are still on Sky, but more and more are being shown on the ‘normal’ channels. And Sky have never been allowed to show big events exclusively, World and European Cups, the FA Cup final etc. are all available to everyone.
“TV One (state broadcaster)”
Is that the NZ equivalent of the BBC?
Hi Kate: you got it in one. TV One would be the equivalent of BBC1; TV2 the equivalent of BBC2. It’s amazing how many parallels we have here, except we’re some years behind. Only now are we having the discussion about the change from terrestial to digital channels via a set-top box.
Jack, I didn’t know anywhere else had state broadcasting. It usually seems to be portrayed as a peculiar British habit LOL
We are due to switch to a wholly digital service between 2007 and 2012 – apparently areas with a high number of retired people will change at the later date, the thinking being they are slower to upgrade equipment.
Hi Kate: ooh, yes, we even had a Broadcasting Fee to pay until recently. Now it just comes out of our taxes! The same digital discussion is happening here, so I think we are in parallel with the UK on this.
We still have to pay a licence fee which isn’t popular, especially since all the satellite channels started broadcasting because you do feel that you are paying twice. Having said that, I wouldn’t like to see the BBC raising revenue through adverts, paying through taxation seems better, you still pay, but it’s less obvious.
The bad thing is that our state broadcasters have ads, but with a small population it’s probably needed. It wasn’t always the case. When I was a lad, advertising on weekends was not permitted, and that typically meant that even previews could not be shown. For those families (like ours) who had VCRs, we recorded some nice movies with no breaks whatsoever. That all changed in the mid- to late 1980s, I believe.
Jack – Yes, one of the good things about the BBC is the lack of ads during films. It’s a shame you miss out on that now.