I Dislike Your Favorite Team

I think if you take my predictions, and move the numbers around a bit, I was a 100% accurate. And that's pretty good. ugh.

Brazil 3, Ghana 0. Well, I was actually pretty accurate on this score, and the game. It was a good game, fast-paced. Ghana had some excellent chances, and either Dida played great, or he was lucky, or a bit of both. Brazil definitely got some love on their second goal, as Adriano was offsides on the play. On balance, a much closer game than the score would suggest, with Ghana dominating the run of play for a solid 25 minutes before Brazil broke out for that (offsides) counter-attack goal. Ghana didn't seem to regain their composure after that. Brazil faces the winner of...

Spain 1, France 3 Fuck me. I had predicted Spain to disappoint at the beginning of the tournament, after the first round, and constantly mocked their ability to crash out early. And then, when it came time to actually remember that, I looked at that old, underperforming French squad and said to myself "No way does Spain fuck up against them." But THAT'S WHAT MAKES SPAIN SPAIN, dammit. This is exactly the time and the kind of team that gets them out of a tournament. And it was a perfectly Spanish way to lose--a hospital backpass from Torres to Fabregas that gets eaten up by a French midfielder, who plays it into space in Spain's defensive third. A Spanish player was clearly en route to the ball before Henry was going to get to it. Puyol comes in to cut off Henry (somewhat unnecessarily) and Henry sells a foul simply did not happen--going to ground holding his face, when maybe Puyol's elbow glanced his chest. Fucking Lame, Henry! All the same, the classless fucking dive gives France a free kick about 20 yards out that Zindane delivers beautifully, it gets flicked on, and Viera, unmarked on the back post (because he's not dangerous on set plays? puts it in). Classic Spain mixture of bad luck/ref screw job, and absolutely boneheaded playing. Let's call it now, shall we? Spain crashes out in 2010 in the Round of 16 in South Africa.