World Cup 2006: Ukraine v. Switzerland

This was the type of game where you didn’t want either team to lose; you wanted both of them to lose. Dreadful performances from both sides led to 90 minutes of give-away followed to 30 overtime minutes of the same. The horror show was mercifully ended by a...

World Cup 2006: Italy v. Australia

It seemed to me that the Italians were the clearly more talented side, but they didn’t play like it for much of the match as Australia held a nearly 60-40 possession advantage. An iffy red card reduced Italy to 10 men early in the 2nd half. On the whole, the...

World Cup 2006: Portugal v. Netherlands

Soccer purists may disagree, but I thought this was the best match of the Cup so far. Sure, the ref handed out a record-tying 16 yellow cards and tossed players right and left. Sure, in the second half teams held one scrum after another which had to be broken up by...

World Cup 2006: England v. Ecuador

Just when you think England can’t get any more boring, they churn out this clunker against Ecuador. Aside from an admittedly brilliant Brazil-like free kick from David “Mr. Spice” Beckham, the English stunk. What was worse was that Ecuador played no...