Paddy Power holds his hands up – he couldn’t have got it more wrong yesterday. But he’s confident he’s right to back Holland and Ghana today.
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Well I couldn’t have been more wrong yesterday, unless I’d thrown in a joke about the Holocaust. That would have been really wrong. The over-zealous referee didn’t help Germany’s cause but Serbia made the most of the man advantage and put in a much improved performance. There’s now some pressure on a side which looked set to stroll through the group stage.
The USA were ragged but that disallowed goal should have stood but even a moral victory is a bit of a stretch after I tipped them to win.
And as for England? Dear Lord, from what we’ve seen so far the pre-tournament talk of them being genuine contenders looks laughable. It may have been a friendly, but Ireland still beat Algeria 3-0 recently.
England made them look a better side than they are as the pressure of ending 44 years of hurt looks to be proving too much. Could we be about to see Fabio Capello’s head replaced with a turnip on the back pages of The Sun?
Let’s hope for better things today.
Holland won without playing particularly well against Denmark and if they play with confidence Japan will struggle to contain them. The internal rifts, like that between Sneijder and Van Persie, shouldn’t come in to play until the knock-out stages and though Japan are capable of causing them some problems, the attacking quality of the Dutch should help them to another win.
Without Tim Cahill, coming off a 4-0 defeat and a backline with little pace, Australia need to play out of their skins to get something against Ghana. The African side have plenty of speed going forward and if they can score early this has the potential to be another rout.
The loss to Germany could see the Aussies playing ultra defensively and considering the threat of the Ghanaian counter attack, defending in numbers looks their best bet. Having seen how the loss of Cahill has effected Everton’s performances over the years, I’m leaning towards a second win for Ghana.
Denmark and Cameroon both need to win this one after they struggled to defeat in their respective openers. Samuel Eto’o didn’t look comfortable out right and it’s difficult to understand what Paul Le Guen was thinking, he’s not as bad as Domenech but the Inter Milan striker is most effective playing through the middle.
Denmark were equally impotent against Holland and if we see a repeat showing from both sides then this is a nailed on 0-0. There has to be some improvement in the quality of play but I can still see a draw. With more hope than expectation I’m going to stick my neck out and say 2-2 at 14/1.
I can’t do much worse than yesterday.
