When Both Sides Paint The Town Red

Thoughout the afternoon yesterday the Konigstrasse — Stuttgart's main pedestrian shopping area — was a sea of red. The Spaniards were in town in numbers, anticipating the next step on their march to the finals. How could they think otherwise after the dismantling of Ukraine a few days earlier? They sang Y Viva Espana, chanted, and offered us the spectacle of watching troupes of men dressed as matadors, others in folk dresses parading down the strasse, parking every hundred meters or so for another beer. It was another scorcher here. You could call that Spanish weather, but then again Spain was up against Tunisia.

The Tunisians were also decked out in red, albeit a slightly deeper shade. But they had the Spanish beaten on the hat front. While Spain's supporters sported matador caps, the Tunisians had the fez thing going, not to mention some pointy red numbers. Spain answered with castanets but Tunisia countered with ghaitas. Then, on the way to the game, I spotted one guy carrying a hookah. So we'll give the nod to Tunisia as winner of the pre-game antics.

And when the whistle blew at the Gottleib Daimler Stadion, the Tunisians got right down to business. I have always liked to watch the North African teams such as Morocco and Tunisia take on the big guns. They are an absolutely fearless bunch. "What's that, you're a big European nation? You don't mind if we kick you around the park for awhile." They go at it and don't seem to worried about losing, which is a good thing, because inevitably they lose a lot.

Tunisia got Spain's attention early, scoring in the 8th minute thanks to a some workmanlike efforts from Zied Jaziri who centered to Jaouhar Mnari who scored on his own rebound. And the lead held until the 71th minute, when Spanish subs Joaquin and Raul combined to right their ship. Minutes later, Spain was ahead for good on Fernando Torres' great run and finish. He would add a penalty in injury time, but the Tunisians, as usual, gave you your money's worth. Welcome back to the Cup, gents.

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What's Missing From This Picture?

If Holland, Serbia, Côte d'Ivoire and Argentina make up the Group of Death, what does that make Croatia, Japan, Australia and Brazil? How about the Group of Dearth?

Something is missing here. Perhaps it's the lack of competent competition. In yesterday's game against Australia, both Roberto Carlos and Ronaldinho stepped on the ball and fell down while trying to make one of those dazzling Brazilian wiggles. And you thought you had a lock on that move while playing in your pub league. "Make the ball happy," goes the tagline in one Nike ad. The ball is not very happy in this group. It told Time it was seriously ticked off at having to be kicked around fruitlessly by Japan and Croatia, two sides that couldn't find the ocean from the beach, never mind the goal.

And it has certainly expected more from the defending champions. Brazil struggled for most of its 2-0 win against an Australian team that, while it provided big thrills for Oz in the last 10 minutes of its opener against Japan, is still a very ordinary one. Only when Robinho was added to the mix did things even get interesting, his shot off the post providing an easy tap in for Fred. For my money, the best player on Brazil so far is the A.C. Milan midfielder Kaka. The guy is liquid.

The Socceroos squandered a couple of great chances for goals. And on Brazil's first, Australia had five defenders back, only to have one lax moment:they left Adriano alone to collect a pass from blubber-boy Ronaldo, and paid for it when Adriano's shot went through the legs of Scott Chipperfield and in.

The Socceroos weren't the only ones to pay for a moment's lapse. In Leipzig, French defender Willy Sagnol lost the ball and his mark on Cho Jae-Jin's long cross to the back post for just an instant, and France paid a huge price in pulling a 1-1 draw out of game they had all but won. Cho Jae-Jin found the ball before Sagnol and nodded it to the onrushing Park Ji-Sun, who fumbled it past Fabien Barthez. That leaves France needing a win against Togo to have a chance to advance, given that Switzerland easily dispatched the African team. And French midfielder commander Zinedine Zidane is suspended because of yet one more idiotic referee's decision. Pas très bien, mes amis.

It's a good thing that when England and Sweden meet tomorrow in the third game of the round, the game will be played in the evening. Seeing these two northern teams play in the first round has been a little like observing dentistry: You've got to admire the professionalism and skill, but it's a little painful to watch. In its first game England was gifted a goal by Paraguay in the fourth minute and then gasped to victory, blaming the oppressive heat for the flat effort. There was no such heat to blame for their torpor in the second game against Trinidad and Tobago, just a determined bunch of islanders-some of them live and play in England —that had already held Sweden to a draw on the heroics of West Ham keeper Shaka Hislop.

That seemed to be the likely outcome against England until forward Peter Crouch, the human mobile phone tower, climbed the back of his defender to head a David Beckham cross past Hislop and put his team into the second round. It was a classic English goal, one whose DNA is a boggy pitch on a winter day in the Midlands, but it was good enough. Steven Gerrard, who took most of the afternoon off, added a second in the 91st, in typically Gerrardian fashion, driving a left footed 20-yard shot past Hislop.

Sweden, which had slanted through the T&T defense like sunshine through a palm tree in the late afternoon heat — with no reward for it — looked to be coming up equally goalless against Paraguay until Freddie Ljungberg nodded them to safety in the 88th minute, thus ending nearly two games worth of frustration. One of these two gets to play Germany in the second round-in the afternoon.

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This Could Be A Monster Of A Game

The road from the U.S. team's headquarters in Hamburg to its second World Cup match in Kaiserslautern leads through Frankenstein, Germany. At least mine did. Frankenstein turns out to be a pleasant little burg in the beautiful Rhine Valley wine country. But it also provides a fitting metaphor?

The American team is going to have to have a monster game to avoid elimination at the hands of a revitalized Italian team. At a pre-game press conference, American Claudio Reyna called on his teammates to be focused and competitive for 19 minutes. In their first game against the Czech Republic, an early lapse led to a Czech goal, and the U.S., dazed and confused, was never in it again. The Americans will need much better performances out of Landon Donovan and DaMarcus Beasley, who were uncharacteristically passive against the Czechs, and goalkeeper Casey Keller, who was one of the best backstops in the German Bundesliga this year, will need to show it.

Reyna said the team needed a day or two to put the loss behind them, but that they had practiced well and had looked forward to the game with Italy. Certainly, there should be an ample American presence in the Fritz Walter Stadion. Kaiserslautern is smack in the middle of a couple of massive American military bases. The U.S. team, in fact, is staying at Rammstein Air Force Base, which by the way should take care of any security issues as well.

Defending against the Italians, however, is another matter. Not much had much had been expected of this Azzurri going into the tournament. Italian soccer has been in the throes of an enormous scandal in its top league, the prestigious Serie A, with allegations of fixed games, fixed referees assignments and even tainted player deals. Italy's top teams, Juventus N and AC Milan, are neck-deep in it (Imagine the Yankees and Red Sox being accused of fixing games). A massive investigation is under way. Yet the Italian players have used the scandal as a rallying point. And in their 2-0 win over Ghana in their first game, looked like the powerhouse counter-attacking Azzurri of old. Their top striker, Francesco Totti, limped off injured against Ghana, but he is expected to play today, and even if he doesn't, Italy has other options.

The U.S., on the other hand, has none. A loss here today sends them home, early.

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The Pain For Ukraine Is Dished Out By Spain

How enjoyable was Spain's 4-0 thrashing of Spain? Well, if you're from the U.S., it's a little dose of mercy from the soccer gods. Now we can say with the utmost authority: Geez, we really suck, but at least we're not as bad as those Ukrainians.

Spain's display on a torrid, 87-degree afternoon in Leipzig had to send its fans home dreaming (again) of the Cup. The Spanish were up 2-0 within 20 minutes, the first coming off a short corner that Xabi Alonso bravely tucked away. The second came following a stupid foul by Andriy Rusol, 20 yards in front of his own goal; David Villa knocked his free kick off a Ukrainian head and the ball caromed into the goal. The game was not in doubt from there, given the Spaniards sensational demonstration of creating space on the soccer pitch.

It got a lot easier early in the second half when Ukraine's Vladislav Vashchyuk was dismissed for a foul in the box, and the resulting penalty was converted by Villa. From then on, with a combination of triangular passing, one-twos and terrific dribbling, the Spanish seemed like they were playing on the steppes. The final goal was a sensational combination, with Carlos Puyol freeing himself with neat spinaround, then playing it to Fernando Torres who hit Raul Gonzalez whose pass ahead to the driving Puyol was headed back to Torres for a final blast into the net. Easily, the goal of the tourney.

So thank you, Spain, for making somebody else uglier than the Americans.

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The Brazilians Do What They Do Best ... But Is It Enough This Time?

An hour before Brazil was scheduled to take the field, the crowds were filling the Fan Fest center in Cologne and the music had already started. On stage, a Brazilian dancer was doing that samba shimmy wearing what looked like two halves of a supporter's scarf. On the streets, flocks of yellow-shirted Brazilians could be seen floating around this city like so many soccer canaries. I watched one group, who were singing, taking endless pictures of themselves, and sort-of-politely grabbing women as they walked by to pose with them, as well as a couple of cross-dressed men.

As game time neared, an unmistakable beat could be heard from around one corner: the thumping, contagious rhythm of a Brazilian drum band, this one nearly all women, pounding instruments of various sizes and timbres, shuffling in place side-to-side as they did. You get the feeling that Brazilians brush their teeth to some kind of percussive arrangement. Cologne is one the Brazilian team's base camp cities (the other being Frankfurt) and the supporters of the defending champions are partying like it's already in the bag.

The pulsing sea of yellow supporters that lined the stadium in Berlin last night had no less expectation. If the Brazilians are football's musicians, with individual prodigies like Ronaldinho, Ronaldo and Robinho capable of the most amazing improvisation, then you can call the Croats, without any derision, a footballing version of tool-and-dye makers: skilled, technical and a team that doesn't get beyond the tolerances set by its coaching staff. And as they proved in 98 in France, that approach can produce some very effective and entertaining football. But the Croats' goal in Berlin — indeed, the goal of any team that plays Brazil — is to stop the music.

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And that the Croats did, for the most part. There were no highlight film displays from Ronaldinho, no flashes of brilliance from Ronaldo. The Croats stuck to the program and ground the Brazilians down. Brazil, like England last week, was happy to grab the three points and run, their lone goal coming on that most ordinary of soccer plays, a square pass to Kaka, whose curling left footer beat Croatian keeper Stipe Pletikosa just before the first half ended.

The Croats took the loss in their own stride. "We played well. In the first half we had too much respect for Brazil but it's always like that we you play against the world champions," said defender Robert Kovac. So the drums played on in Berlin and Cologne, before, during and after the match. But on the field, Brazil had lost the beat.

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The Ugly Face of Boredom

The scene was rude during the Angola-Portugal game last Sunday, with fans jeering some of the players on the field. An ugly outburst of racism that Fifa had so much feared?. Nah, it was the local German fans giving the business to the Portuguese team for stalling.

Portugal, having gained a 1-0 advantage after some neat work by Figo that gifted Pauleta a goal, resorted to ball control after it became obvious that Angola had nothing going forward. They were not going to score on this night, and probably not on any night in the cup if they continue this stuff.

But the Portuguese displeased the locals, whose shrill whistles clearly shocked Portugal's fans. "If this were Germany playing it would have even been worse," said one German fan sitting near me. Bored with Portugal's game, the Germans began singing the song of their local Cologne team. They had a lot of nerve, seeing how Cologne was sent down this year.

The fears of racism were overblown by the U.S. media, where the thought that anyone would boo a player because of race is now unthinkable.

But as bad as racist chants are in some places — Paris St. German, Roma, and in eastern Germany, where German international Gerald Asamoah has had bananas thown at him — this is the World Cup. The worst offenders, the ultras, actually have a role at some clubs. For the World Cup they get nothing special. This is a high-end tournament, a wine and cheese affair more than beer-sodden spectacle — England notwithstanding, of course.

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