World Cup - After the First Matches

With the 1st-game nerves out of the way, the tournament should become much more exciting. In order to get to the 2nd round, a team needs to win at least once and nobody wants to count on their last games to achieve that. Thus the second games are must-wins for many of the countries. They can no longer rely on their defense-first and play it safe approaches.

The luck of the draw is going to be a factor. With 2 games left in the group stage, would you rather play the stronger opponent first or the weaker one first to bag 3 sure points?

In their 1st game, Germany shone with their youngsters. They must now be considered a worthy dark-horse although I don't think they can win it all due to inexperience. It will be fun to watch them play against Argentina in the quarterfinal.

Spain tripped badly off the gate but they should have no problem recovering. The issue is if they finished 2nd in the group, they'll have to face Brazil right away. Italy performed better than expected because they left their old fogeys on the bench. Brazil, South Korea, Netherlands, Japan and USA all held their own while Ivory Coast, Slovakia, Serbia and England disappointed.

U-S-A. U-S-A. U-S-A. A lot of the English media said that the Americans got a lucky draw, not facing the facts that Don Capello made personnel and tactical mistakes. The untouchable now becomes the emperor with no clothes. Although it was true that the Americans scored due to Green's error, same can be said that Gerrard scored because of Clark's error. Howard's 2 saves on Heskey and SWP were no flukes either. They were split-second mano-a-mano decisions based on experience. With England out of the way, the USA must now aim high and look to win the group. The 2nd placed team will have to face the Germans, in their fine form, next. The group winner has a good chance of winning their quadrant against the likes of France, Uruguay, South Korea, etc. - all good but not scary teams.

Credits must be given to some superb managers. Carlos Alberto Parreira is an excellent coach as he molded South Africa from nobody into a very respectable team. Whether they can get out of the group stage or not we should still consider Parreira's job a success. Ottmar Hitzfeld is one of the bests ever and his 2-year project with the Swiss led to the 1st major upset of the tournament. Marcello Lippi retired after winning the last World Cup. He had to be re-hired in 2008 to try to take the Azzuris to more glory. Despite what I said about their older team, the Italians cannot be counted out.