Fifa World Cup 2014 Brazil Column

Fifa World Cup 2014 Brazil Column

Messi to win against the machine / Messi to win against the machine

The moment has come.  The moment is to decide who will take the World Cup home—Argentina or Germany? Who will have the final smile— team with a superstar or an all star team?

11y ago

Goodbye, Big Phil / Goodbye, Big Phil

The Orange humiliation could have been harsher even. Thanks to the pulled-hamstring of Sneijder, Brazilians could get some sort of respite. The margin of defeat could have been more humiliating if not the No. 10 Dutch had to sit out the match.

11y ago

Fifa gains in game of losers / Fifa gains in game of losers

Here comes a game that no one wants to be involved in. What glory two losers can achieve from a third-placing deciding game? For teams, nothing but the Cup matters. It’s just cruel to ask one of the losing semifinalists to lose again.

11y ago

Shock bigger than Maracanazo / Shock bigger than Maracanazo

A tragedy, bigger than Maracanazo, has consumed Brazil Wednesday. Brazil were thrown out of the World Cup; a heart-break that the hosts could get over with. But a 7-1 thrashing by the Germans? No way! Brazil would never be able to swallow the insult.  

11y ago

Will The Cannibal bite or score?

Luis Suarez does not bark; he bites. The Uruguay striker seems to have a clear hunger for goals and opponents. Banned or fined, Suarez keeps biting.

11y ago

Italy tried not to win

Lots of inquests will follow, for sure, the defeat of the four-time winners. But seeing the match Tuesday, one can come only to one conclusion: Italy lost as they did not try to win.

11y ago

Better, the best is yet to come

It’s incredibly unbelievable the way fortune fluctuated in the last eight minutes of the match between the Netherlands and Mexico. Sure winners turned losers. Happy faces suddenly became horrified with heart-breaks. What a turn of events! The World Cup certainly unfolded one of its best dramas in Brazil.

11y ago

An advance goodbye to Ronaldo

Lionel Messi is now relaxed. He is scoring and smiling, just the way he does those for his club Barcelona. This time at the World Cup, Argentina's jersey of white and light blue in vertical stripes agrees well with him. His nightmare with the national team seems to be over.

11y ago

Big guns, watch out!

Salute to minnows. Rank outsiders Iran and Ghana played like champions to offer football buffs a night to remember. Two nail-biting, grinding matches in which biggies nearly bit the dust! They gave their much vaunted opponents Argentina and Germany a good run for their money.  

11y ago

Costa Rica: Cameroon of 1990?

England tumbled out of the World Cup as Costa Rica turned the Group D upside down, beating four-time world champion Italy 1-0. The result causes double heartbreaks for two football giants.

11y ago

Beware! Suarez to stay

Luis Suarez was an instant impact. Back from a surgery table four weeks ago and having trained  with the team only for a day, Suarez appeared as lethal as before. He sat out the first match that Uruguay played against Costa Rica for not being fully fit.

11y ago

Spain succumb to success fatigue!

Luis Suarez does not bark; he bites. The Uruguay striker seems to have a clear hunger for goals and opponents. Banned or fined, Suarez keeps biting.

11y ago

Mexico still Brazil's bogey team

It was because of the outstanding goalkeeping exploit of Guillermo Ochoa the match between the two South American countries ended in a goalless draw. Ochoa could get himself in the right time and at the right position on the goal line to deny Brazil poster-boy Neymar twice and skipper Thiago Silva once.

11y ago

It was Individual Argentina

It's a huge sigh of global relief. Argentina scarped through in their opening match with a 2-1 win against Bosnia-Herzegovina, a team who were playing for the first time in a World Cup.

11y ago