World Cup Fever

I've come down with a case of it. I watched a couple games last week and didn't feel like I was that invested, but it's finally come around and now I can't get enough of it. I wake up every morning wide awake just before 8am and I'm ready to watch the World Cup. It's my first thought every morning now - who won the early morning game? Who's playing next? Which superstars/superteams are playing today? and on and on...


I've been impressed with a few things:

• David Villa of Spain is a stud. I think he kind of disappeared in the Switzerland game, but that guy was eating up every guy on his side of the field yesterday. His first goal yesterday was my favorite of the cup. It was pretty unreal, and an amazing individual effort.
• Landon Donovan. The guy kind of stunk at the last World Cup, and I was really disappointed with him when he couldn't hang in the Bundesliga, but his transfer to Everton this past year really gave him a lot of confidence. The guy is about as good as anyone is right now with set kicks that are of the crossing variety, and he works and does great things for the US. The guy is finally playing at an elite level. His goal against Slovenia was pretty awesome too.
• Portugal. I thought they stunk in the game against the Ivory Coast, and I didn't even see them destroy North Korea, but anytime a team wins 7-0, it's a big deal. Very impressive.
• I always hate Mexico, but Dos Santos is pretty fun to watch. The guy has endless energy and I feel like if he had some more talent to work with, he would be really top notch.
• Is Fernando Torres the most handsome soccer player in the world? He blew some good chances yesterday, but he also had some pretty sweet moments in developing plays. It'll be nice to see him match-ready again.
• I know I'm a little biased because I served there, but isn't Chile kind of fun to watch? Those guys run non-stop and are down on the ground on like every play. They play really hard, and aren't falling all over themselves like so many of these guys in the cup. I hope they advance.
• Brazil looks pretty good to me, but I can't really tell much about them until they play an elite team. That Portugal game is going to be quite the fixture. I don't know much about Fabiano, but he looks pretty decent. The hard part about Brazil is that they make everything look so easy. I thought they played an okay game against North Korea, but then they just kinda packed it in at the 80th minute. They did a similar thing in the Ivory Coast game, but they really handled those guys.
• England looks terrible. They almost have an all-star team, but those guys look so tight to me. Rooney is pressing way too hard, and there is no cohesiveness. There's no way they should have tied Algeria, and they should've had a much easier time with the US than they did. I hope they get it together just because I like most of the guys that they have. Heske looks awful up top. He's a huge black guy that should be a much stronger presence than he has been. They're all looking pretty bad.
  
• I haven't seen any of Argentina's games, so I'm excited for their match against Greece, but those guys seem very formidable. Messi is amazing.

I'm really excited for the pool play to be done with and start having more match-ups between these big time teams. Time for the good stuff to start!