Cheeky Half

I had get up early for work this morning, so gave last night’s games a miss. Looks like I missed the first penalty shoot out of the tournament with Paraguay beating Japan 5:3.

I wasn’t so fussed about missing that game, but was sorry I couldn’t catch Spain vs Portugal, one of the better World Cup match ups. I had high hopes for Portugal, who were one of the big guns in the Shoddy Dozen . Unfortunately they lost 0:1, so now I have my eye on Germany and possibly the Netherlands as my greatest weapon against the favourites.

Speaking of favourites, I still have yet to see Argentina or Brazil play a match. That’s typical of this World Cup and it’s lousy time difference . You can catch Botswana vs Narnia after dinner, but will have to either do a gram of Crystal meth and stay up, or go to bed and rise with the fucking Dairy Farmers to catch a decent match up.

Quarter Finals start in two days, anyway. Hoping for a few upsets, else the Shoddy Dozen will be down to the Shoddy One.

The current odds for outright winner of the World Cup:

Brazil 3.50

Spain 3.75

Argentina 5.00

Germany 8.00

Holland 8.50

Uruguay 17.00

Ghana 41.00

Paraguay 51.00

Limeys out too

As the old adage goes: a team of champions will never beat a champion team.

This has been a very shaky World Cup for the England side, it started with Beckham’s injury, then Terry sticking his willy where he shouldn’t losing the captaincy in the process, then Ferdinand injuring himself and losing his captaincy – and all of this happening before a single minute of World Club football had been played.

Things didn’t go much better once the Cup started, with Rooney not climbing the mountain of expectation that had been laid out in front of him. English fans were irate at the poor performances, causing them to boo their team off the field, which caused a frustrated Rooney to complain about the fan’s lack of support – an act that he later apologised for (!?).

In between the matches Terry called a press conference and tried to organise a coup against Capello which was not backed up by his team mates. This conference was bested by a second English media outing, in which the coach and captain only asked five minutes of questions, and refused to answer any questions from non-British reporters.

As for Fabio Capello, I’d be very surprised if they renew his 6 million pound a year contract – I’ve seen Soccer managers booted out for far lesser indiscretions than this World Cup debacle. For those living in London, expect the tabloids to hunt down the official that didn’t allow Lampard’s goal, and post his picture under clever play on word headlines as they enjoy their new villain of the hour.

Anyway, we see one of the favourites drop out of the race, tipping the scales ever so slightly into my favour.

Now if only Argentina weren’t playing so well...

The Shoddy Dozen

The group Stage has finished, and the World Cup line up has now been halved. There were a few shock exits (last tournament's finalists France and Italy have not gone through), and a few long shots came agonizingly close (host South Africa, and fuck me New Zealand had a decent run), but we now have our “Shoddy Dozen”.

I’ve created a diagram of teams, complete with sentient flags coloured in a childlike scribble, and put them in the shoddy blog header above so that you can follow my progress.

As mentioned, if any of the Shoddy Dozen win the World Cup – I’ll win $220. Any of the favourites (on the right) win, I do not win $220.

Even if you have no interest in the World Cup at all, you can support my bid to win money. I’ll put the cash to good use. If I win, I’ll buy myself a new multi purpose hat that can be worn to weddings, funerals, basically any social gathering.

Betty Boo

So I lost $10 on the wager that Australia would finish their group second, and another $10 that they would be eliminated in the Quarter finals.

Amusingly, the $5 wager that Australia would win the tournament was not lost. Here is an email I received from Sportsbet verbatim:

Dear Simon,

Australia was robbed! Two dodgy red card decisions cost the Aussies a fair chance of qualifying. We'd have been more competitive against Germany and probably beaten Ghana, and we put up a traditional Aussie fight to defeat Serbia.
So close. Only if those whistle blowing clowns had been consistent....

Doing things the Australian Way means giving people a fair go. We'd like you to have a fair go with your money wagered on Australia, so we have refunded all bets on Australia in the Outright Winner and To Qualify (Group D) bet markets.

Your cash is now in your account. At least it's some comfort and a refund helps be rid of the nasty bitter red card pill we've all had to swallow in 2010. Enjoy the rest of the Tournament.

God bless those crazy cats at Sportsbet. So now I am 20 bucks down on my bets, the $100 wager on the field still stands of course.

Looks like all four favourites (Brazil, Spain, Argentina and England) have made it through, and I have 12 other teams (what I like to call my Shoddy Dozen) to support.

If one of those 12 win, I win $220. Zing.

Good Ruddance

Did you like my clever play on words in the title?

I guess not.

Anyway, woke up today to find that we had a new Prime Minister, our first female one at that. K Rudd is out and Julia Gillard is in. Crazy times.

Rudd’s popularity had been on a downward spiral, and support within his own team had dropped to the point where they said “Fuck it, let’s dump this Shit-Elf and give the reigns to that fiery haired vixen”.

I’m not that big on Politics – when I voted in the State Election in March, it was the first time I had voted in 12 years. I voted for these guys, purely because I liked their logo:

That being said, I wasn’t a fan of Kevin Rudd – and I’m glad to see him go.

A family friend worked in Rudd’s office, and told us tales of an angry man with a violent temper. One rage fuelled day, he ripped his desk phone out of it’s plug and smashed it against the wall screaming at his aides. This isn’t Russel Crowe we are talking about here, this is supposed to be the leader of our fine country.

The dummy spits were often followed by apologies and begs for his staff not to quit, but it didn’t work as 260 staff walked out on Rudd in just two years.

One day he reduced an RAAF flight attendant to tears because she couldn’t get him a “special” meal. Christ, what a momentous dick. A bully with poor anger management skills, Rudd is the Gordon Ramsey of politicians. That is certainly not a compliment, those who’ve been reading the Shoddy Blog for a few years know how much I detest that wrinkly fuck head Ramsey.

Oh well, Rudd is gone now. Time for a new PM. So what do we know of this Julia Gillard?

Gillard was born in Wales in 1961....wait, what? You don’t have to be born in Australia to become a Prime Minister? I’m pretty sure you have to be born in the USA to be President, don’t you? Does this mean anybody can become our Prime Minister? Can we vote for guy? I like his style:

To be painfully honest with you kids, unless they reduce the tax on alcohol and movie tickets, I’m really not all that fussed with politics. Still, it’s good to see Rudd chucked out. I’ve tried my hand at political cartooning to commemorate this momentous occasion:

Gillard is hard to illustrate, so I drew Grimace instead. Hope you don’t mind.

I also just found out Gillard was raised and schooled here in Adelaide. Rock on.

Limeys through, Convicts out.

I finally got to see an England match – England winning 1 nil against Slovenia in last night’s game. Although it was a win, England still aren’t showing the form everybody has been expecting of them, and star striker Wayne Rooney was actually subbed off at the 70 minute mark. Props to Jermaine Defoe for the goal, and geez that guy is a short ass. Five foot seven, but that’s the great thing about Soccer, you don’t need height to dominate the game. Argentinean star Lionel Messi, Fifa’s player of the year, is also five foot seven.

If one of these guys stood in front of me, their head line would reach somewhere between my second and third nipples.

The Australia vs Serbia match was on at 4am (of course), which was a little inconvenient for a Thursday morning. I set my alarm to go off at half time so I could check the match scores, not just the Australia game but also the Germany vs Ghana game (whose outcome would decide our fate). The third round matches of the Group Stage are played simultaneously in modern World Cups to ensure all teams play to their best ability. In 1982, Germany and Austria went into their third game knowing the score of the other match (Algeria vs Chile) who had played a day earlier, and therefore knowing that a German 1 Austria 0 score line would see both Germany and Austria go through. After Germany scored, the game lost all meaning and both teams pretty much kicked the ball about lazily for the remainder of the game - Why risk an injury or a red card if you know you are through? The FIFA has stopped such vaginal antics though, and simultaneous play means everybody has to go their hardest (or as hard as Soccer players can get).

I got up at 4:45am to check the scores, if Germany were losing and Australia were winning – I would stay up to watch the last half. At half time the scores for both games were nil all, so I went back to bed.

I checked the scores a few hours later before leaving for work, Australia had won 2 – 1, but unfortunately Germany’s 1 nil win over Ghana put us off out of the competition. England and Ghana are now through to the round of 16, Australia will have to wait until 2014 to try again.

The Socceroos did alright in this tournament, a draw against Ghana and a win against Serbia is very respectable – but that 4 nil drumming by Germany pretty much left us Goosed on percentage.

Round Two Completo

Round two of the World Cup has been completed. Already, a few teams have qualified for the round of 16 (Netherlands, Brazil).

Australia really needed a win against Ghana in their second game, but their draw doesn’t necessarily mean they are out. If Ghana beat Germany, and we beat Serbia, then we will go through. That’s a pretty slim chance, but better than the alternative – if Germany beat Ghana, then we will need to beat Serbia by four goals.

Let’s get an update on my Sportsbet odds:

Outright Winner:
My odds: 101 to 1
After Round one: 401 to 1
Current odds: 751 to 1

Group Exacta (Germany finishes group first, Australia second):
My odds: 7 to 1
After Round one: 10 to 1
Current odds: 23 to 1
Out of interest, there are slightly better odds for Ghana to go top, Australia second : 21 to 1

Australia is eliminated in the Quarter finals:
My odds: 12 to 1
After Round one: 41 to 1
Current odds: ?

They’ve suspended bets on Australia’s stage of elimination, they’ll probably crank those again if we make it through to the round of 16.

It’s not looking great, and I think that $25 I outlay on Australia might have gone down the drain. Could the money have been better spent elsewhere? I just put “25 bucks” into Google image source, and found out I could have purchased any one of these replica pellet guns:

Imagine pulling one of these out in a strip club. Fun!

The end of Round Two means that we should check out our tipping competition again:

Oh wait, that's an old shopping receipt. here's the tipping table:

Most of these scores haven’t changed since last round, leading me to believe many of the punters have forgotten to update their tips (also – I was having quite a few headaches getting the tipping site to work a week ago, so if you’ve given up on the bastard I can hardly blame you). As I was checking this, I scratched my head and thought ”hang on...have I updated my tips..?”, as it turns out I missed five matches:

A shame, as I would have picked the winner in three of those matches.

I’m doing AFL footy tips at the moment, plus a half hearted attempt at an AFL Dream Team. I joined the shoddy jinggez tipping comp, then for some reason I joined the World Cup tipping comp on the AFL site, and then I saw Sportsbet had a tipping comp too.

Five tipping competitions I’m in kids. I don’t know why I did that, as I don’t have anywhere near the time management skills to warrant such a decision. It doesn’t help that the AFL site allocates the tips by group, Sportsbet by date, and the shoddy jinggez has split the whole first two weeks into three rounds. Naturally, I’ve missed the cut off point for tips in all three competitions. Cursing the Sportsbet one, as I wasn’t doing too bad in that comp (I was in the top 10% of tippers), and they have prizes for the top 40 tippers. Cash, or a car, or a hand job from Justin Bieber or some shit.

As always, I’ve stretched myself too thin. I think there might be a lesson to learn here. Is it this?:

Yeah, I think that might be the lesson.

The hype balloon deflates

After all those months of hype, Harry Kewell played one game of Football – and was red carded 25 minutes in. It looks like that will be it for Kewell, it’s doubtful Australia will make it to the Round of 16, and even more doubtful injury prone Kewell will be around for the 2014 World Cup (if Australia even qualifies for that one).

That’s the anti climatic nature of global sport’s tournaments, we spend the lead up months reading and watching commercials about the “Super Stars” of the game, only to reach the matches and find those stars...missing from the big action moments.

The Australian media was saturated with Cahill and Kewell (instrumental in the previous Cup), who have both been red carded.

I read lengthy interviews with Michael Ballack and Rio Ferdinand – only to see those gun players injured a few weeks before first kick off.

I must have seen that NIKE ”Write the Future” commercial a dozen times now. It stars Cristiano Ronaldo, Didier Drogba, Wayne Rooney, Franck Ribery, Andres Iniesta, Cesc Fabregas, Theo Walcott, Ronaldinho, Landon Donovan – a veritable who’s who of players underperforming, and even benched for this World Cup tournament.

But fuck, it’s still early days and those “champions” still have time to make an impact. If anything, this tournament will make a few household names out of lesser known players, as they step out of the shadows and make a proper go of it. I read of Messi, Veron, Mascherano, and Tevez going into the Argentina Korea game – but it was a 22 year old Gonzalo Higuain and his hat trick of goals that stole the show.

It all makes me a little nervous about Australia's future - we have the oldest team in the cup, and not a single player under 25 played last night.

Time will tell.

Slov

12:35am at my end, quick post before I hit the sack (gotta get up for work in six hours), but it looks like Slovenia are doing well currently leading 2:1 at the 53 minute mark of their match against USA. If they win this game they will be one of the first countries to make it through to the round of 16. They started this tournament at 601 to 1, so one of many surprises at this year’s World Cup.

Prior to that match, Serbia caused a bit of an upset with a 1:0 win over Germany. This doesn't actually change much of the outcome for Australia. We still need to win our next two games (and not concede a draw in either) to progress.

Only difference now, is that if we win our next two, Ghana beating Germany would knock them out of the running.

Tip and Gamble Update

Every team has played at least once now, so let’s check out the Shoddy Jinggez Tipping Comp:

Christ almighty, I’m winning. One thing I realised after a couple of games was that I hadn’t picked enough draws (I only chose who I thought would win, and no draws), though this might be the reason I’m winning the comp so far. I’ve gone with a few draws for the next round however.

As for the Australia bets, here is how the odds have changed now that Australia has lost their first game 0-4. If you’re unfamiliar with gambling, my initial bets still stand at the odds I backed them at. The comparison of odds is to show that my choices have become even more unlikely of succeeding.

Outright Winner:
My odds: 101 to 1
Current odds: 401 to 1

Group Exacta (Germany finishes group first, Australia second):
My odds: 7 to 1
Current odds: 10 to 1

Australia is eliminated in the Quarter finals:
My odds: 12 to 1
Current odds: 41 to 1

The three Australia bets are looking shaky. But the big 100 dollar bet is actually looking slightly better, thanks to Spain losing their first game, and England proving what many of us feared (11 awesome players doesn’t necessarily make for an awesome team).

Field against the Top Four:

My odds: 2.2 to 1
Current odds: 2.1 to 1

England isn’t actually considered a “Top Four” team at this present time, dropping into sixth place behind Germany and Holland. Argentina has taken top spot on the list of favourites (it was Spain initially). Their first game wasn’t great, but then they killed South Korea 4:1. Brazil is sitting in second place. Spain is looking quite good, they had the majority of the ball in the Switzerland match, and a tonne of attempts at goal and so they are still holding third place. Their loss to Switzerland was quite a shock (but seriously, well done to the Swiss). One dilemma for Spain though, is that historically no team has ever won the World Cup after losing their first match.

Current top ten odds for the outright winner as of this afternoon (prior to the next round of games starting with Germany vs Serbia):

Argentina 5.50

Brazil 6.00

Spain 6.00

Germany 8.00

Holland 9.00

England 9.00

Italy 15.00

Portugal 31.00

Ivory Coast 41.00

Mexico 41.00

Of course, these odds will all change over the next few games. I’ll keep you posted. One thing is for sure, my Soccer bets and tips are looking better than my AFL Dream team.

Jesus Christ.

BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

Vuvuzelas, hey?

Fuuuuuck.

I was unaware of these bastards before watching the World Cup. I tuned in for the first match last week, and initially thought my TV was fucked – there was no way that incessant drone could be coming from the stadium. My old lady was in the kitchen, and she thought I was watching a car race.

We were both wrong.

The Vuvuzela has been the subject of much debate over the course of the tournament, with everybody from the casual observer up to the players themselves (Cristiano Ronaldo has been pretty vocal) complaining about the annoying buzz. TV channels are now offering a service that allows viewers to filter out the noise, and it has come to light that the horns can actually give you hearing damage. The demand for earplugs actually outstripped supply in South Africa.

The South Africans have been getting stroppy about the complaints. The South African Goalie complained that the Vuvuzelas wern’t loud enough (!). The President of FIFA Sepp Blatter commented:

"I have always said that Africa has a different rhythm, a different sound. I don't see banning the music traditions of fans in their own country. Would you want to see a ban on the fan traditions in your country?”

But for most, it isn’t the quality of the sound – but the pure and utter pointlessness of it. It isn’t used to inspire a lagging team, or celebrate a goal, but a constant annoying buzz that lasts from before the game until after the conclusion. It has been said that if Australia gets the World Cup for 2022, we’ll hand out Eucalyptus leaves that people can whistle through, non stop, for each and every game.

Strangely, I’ve gotten kind of used to the sound. I even showed off my own Vuvuzela skills when I sat down for dinner with my parents, blowing a buzz sound through a watering can. Mind you, this was after a couple of bottles of red.

As always, a picture is worth a thousand words, and naturally the Vuvuzela has become a popular internet meme. Here is a few favourites I’ve seen. You probably have been emailed a few of these already in a “FW: FW: FW: FW: FW: FW: OMG LOLZ!!” email string, but fuck it – you can look at them again.

The Vuvuzela Manual:



And finally,turn up your speakers and click here for the Shoddy Vuvuzela experience.

Baiowolf

I watched two Euro Cups and a World Cup while living in London, and it’s a pretty fantastic city to watch sporting events like those. I was keen on getting back to London for the World Cup this year, to spend the period drinking in the pubs and watching the games. There is no doubt a great atmosphere in the London bars right now. Australia, South Africa, England and New Zealand are all in the World Cup at the same time – you can’t tell me that happens too often.

Sadly, I couldn’t make it over - partly due to work reasons, but mostly because I am broke. I invested a fair bit of savings into my Baby Portrait Studio, which hasn’t been returning the dividends I had hoped it would.

Besides from catching up with the London crowd, there were two reasons I wanted to watch the Cup in London: better times for the games (London is only an hour behind Cape Town), and people are generally more interested in the tournament.

I’m lucky to have a few Soccer fan peers here in Adelaide (mostly workmates) that I can chat about the World Cup with, but they are certainly outnumbered by those who clearly don’t give a fuck. The problem for the average Adelaidean is threefold:

1. Apathy for Soccer in general: We love Aussie Rules in the winter, and Cricket and Tennis in the Summer. For most of the population, Soccer never really enters the equation.

2. Soccerwhos?: Some locals find it kinda hard to get enthused about a tournament Australia is not usually associated with. True, Australia qualified and performed better than expected last World Cup. But from a year before I was born, up until a few months before my 29th birthday, the Socceroos did not qualify for a World Cup. The tournament just doesn’t have the same green and gold tinge as, say, the Cricket or Rugby World Cups.

3. The time difference: wasn’t too bad when the 2002 World Cup was played in Japan and Korea (half an hour behind us), the other 17 World Cups were played in South America, USA and mostly Europe. Those polar opposite time zones really didn’t help the tournaments following around these parts.

At the end of the day – fuck it. The World Cup isn’t everybody’s cup of tea, and I probably wouldn’t be that interested if I hadn’t had half a decade of Soccer saturation in London. If anything, if you have no interest in the Cup you’re saving yourself a lot of late nights. Also, not having to listen to the mosquito drone of those fucking Vuvuzelas must be pleasant.

The time difference is definitely a pain in the ass at this tournament. There are heaps of matches being played at the reasonable Australian time of 9pm – but Australia has been dumped with two 4ams and a midnighter, and the UK also has two 4ams and a midnight game. When I ask mates if they want to wait up until 4am to watch a game, they usually stare at me like I’ve asked them to drink a pint of Scott Baio.

There’s a grim irony to the schedule – I’ve watched four of the 9pm games, and a handful of midnight ones which usually consist of clashes between minor ranked teams, but then had to miss the first England game which was on at 4am on Sunday morning.

I couldn’t wait up for that one, because I had to be at the Old Lion pub at 9am to head off on the Sea and Vines Tour, a yearly Adelaide Wine Tour to McClarenvale. The day made me a little nervous, as my first beer was at 9am...and I had the Australia vs Germany game at 4am the following morning (luckily a public holiday here in Australia). I was sitting on the edge of a Volcano, staring deep into the lava of a 21 hour session. Not impossible, but throw in a six hour wine tour, and it was looking pretty fucking improbable.

The wine tour consisted of three wineries and six hours of solid red and white indulgence, followed by a bus ride back to the city (I’ll post stories and photos on that later). Our crew of about a dozen wine stained inebriants got to the Alma (who had a late licence for the game) and I was feeling nore than a little worn. I spotted Jimmy (who works at the Alma Friday and Saturdays), and we had this conversation:

Me: How much longer until the game?
Jimmy: about nine hours.
Me: ...fuck.

I instructed my crew to pace their drinking, in order to better our chances of staying up until kick off. For some reason, most of my wine soldiers took this to mean ”buy as many shots as possible”. A rambunctious South African who was with us (and whose name escapes me) bought a round of a dozen Sambucas, a dozen Tequilas, and then a dozen Jager Bombs in the space of about 20 minutes. Kate went him one better and bought a round of Flat Liners (half shot of tequila, three dashes of Tabasco, topped up with Sambuca) – it’s the kind of drink they make you have in Guantanamo Bay.

With tears in my eyes and a throat that felt like I had been blowing the Human Torch I got another time check. Eight hours until kick off.

Twas indeed a long night. I spent most of the evening berating my unpatriotic cohorts for not wanting to stay up until 4am to watch Australia play... and then I ended up leaving the pub at 3:55am, completely and utterly hammered.

After the intense surgical procedure of trying to unlock my front door, I waited for my lounge to stop spinning around the room and leapt onto it. I lay on the couch and managed to catch six minutes of the game, before passing out with the wondrous melodies of those plastic horns ringing in my ears causing me to have feverish dreams of Wasp attacks.

As it turns out, I entered my booze coma two minutes before Germany scored a goal, the first of four in a pummelling of the Australian side that even saw our star player Tim Cahill red carded (that even the German player who was fouled against had to agree shouldn’t have been a red card). After three months of gracing the covers of just about every magazine and Newspaper Australia has the ink to print, Harry Kewell didn’t even play – a fact that didn’t surprise me all that much.

Nobody was expecting us to win, but we were all kind of hoping we wouldn’t lose by that fucking much. Australia has to win their next two games (no draws) now to progress to the round of 16.

It’s looking a little shaky.

Gam Bling

We’ll take a half-time break from my Group Guide to chuck in an article on gambling. I wont have the group guide finished before the first match as originally planned, but will post Groups E,F,G,H within the next week. I hope you have found them educational, especially the information on random porn stars (did you also know that Stephen Clancy Hill played Barrack Obama in a “Nailin’ Palin” porno?).

Last World Cup I placed a heap of small bets on the games I watched – about 14 bets in total ranging from first goal scorer to final score. None of these bets were actually winners, but the final 5 quid bet I placed on the final game came agonizingly close to giving me a 250 pound win. You can relive that exciting post by clicking here, and holy shit, the shoddy blog has been running for so long now that I can reference posts from last World Cup.

I decided to take a different route this year, and outlay $125 right at the start and leave it at that. The bets are as follows:

The Patriotic Bets:

These bets are unlikely, but bare large dividends and give me that soothing feeling of having put some cash on the home side:

Outright Winner: $5 for Australia to win (fuck it, why not): pays $505 (I did this a few weeks ago so got 101 to 1, odds have since dropped to 81 to 1)

Group Exacta: $10 Germany to finish the group stage first, and Australia second: pays $70

Stage of Elimination: $10 Australia to be eliminated in the Quarter Final (and thus go one round further than their last World Cup effort): pays $120. Unlikely, but once again: fuck it, why not?

The Big Bet:

I wanted to place a larger bet that would run for most of the World Cup, one that had multiple options and would keep me involved once Australia have dropped out (which could happen as early as the first round) and England have fucked up the penalty shoot out (which could happen early in the piece as well). I heard you could bet on a past winner winning again and was interested in that bet, as that would give me seven teams (including three of the top four favourites) – but that was only paying 1.67 to 1.

Instead, I’ve gone practically the opposite route – and put $100 on “the field” against the top four favourites at 2.2 to 1.

So if Spain, Brazil, Argentina or England don’t win the World Cup, I’ll win $220. I now have 28 teams to follow, and what I would like to happen is a top four team to face one of “the field” in the final, giving me a financial interest in the entire run of the World Cup tournament.

That’s me chatting with an Eskimo made out of Calamari rings. The Eskimo has a point though, it seems a little redundant to follow a team, but then bet against them. But I’m always doing shit like that, I’m more into gambling for the new slant it puts on situations rather than financial windfalls. It’s been a useful hobby considering the lousy year the Crows have been having, you can still pay attention to the game due to your bets on margins and goal kickers, even when the Crows are getting their arses kicked. Fuck it, I’d be happy to see England win even if it means the 100 buck wager fails anyway.

That’s enough chatting about the subject anyway. There’s probably more than a few of you who have no interest in sports or gambling, so here’s a picture I found of the Futurama characters turned into The X-Men. Click to enlarge.

Gottabecarl is responsible for this, Zoidberg-Wolverine FTW

GROUP D

Germany

Australia’s chances of beating them improved slightly, when captain and star player Michael Ballack pulled out due to injury. I’m kind of disappointed he’s not playing, I’ll miss getting loaded, and screaming “Balalalalalack” in a turkey like gobble every time he got the ball like I did last World Cup.

Still, nobody is really rating our chances in that first match – and the Germans have made it pretty clear in the last few interviews and press statements that they don’t even consider a loss to Australia a possible outcome at all. Kinda makes me hope we beat the arrogant turds.

Population: 82 million
Last few World Cup efforts: Semi final 2006, 2nd round 2002, Quarter final 1998. Won the World Cup in 1954, 1974, 1990
Odds to win the Cup: 13 to 1

This guy was born in Germany:

Bruce Willis.
He spent the Die Hard films (well, two of them) hunting down those pesky German terrorists, when in fact, he himself was born in Deutschland.
More delicious irony.

These guys play for Germany:

Philipp Lahm (Bayern Munich)
Miroslav Klose (Bayern Munich)
Bastian Schweinsteiger (Bayern Munich)

This girl doesn't play for Germany. The dog might though:


Australia

Even though Australia breezed through the qualifiers (finishing first in Asia Group 1) and have a decent line up of players (Schwarzer is considered one of the top four goalkeepers in the tournament), nobody is really expecting too much of Australia this year and the bookies have ranked them equal 14th to win the cup. Landing in one of the toughest groups certainly didn’t help our chances, and hopefully golden boy Harry Kewell can last longer than ten minutes without an injury. I’m hoping Australia last long enough to make the Cup interesting (repeating their 2006 performance would be decent), as I know from experience having a few beers in a pub watching the home side is a damn site more engaging than watching a couple of random countries go at it.

Population: 22 million
Last few World Cup efforts: 2nd round 2006, 1st round 1974
Odds to win the Cup: 81 to 1

This guy was born in Australia:

Flea

These guys play for Australia:

Mark Schwarzer (Fulham)
Tim Cahill (Everton)
Harry Kewell (Galatasaray)

This guy doesn’t play for Australia:

Thoroughly confused injured third world guy. He sure does have some good looking visitors though.

Serbia
Population: 7.6 million
Last few World Cup efforts: 1st round 2006, 2nd round 1998, Quarter final 1990
Odds to win the Cup: 61 to 1

This chick was born in Serbia:

Milla Jovovich.
Leeloo Dallas mul-ti-pass.

These guys play for Serbia:

Milan Jovanovic (Joins Liverpool in July)
Nemanja Vidic (Manchester United)
Dejan Stankovic (Inter Milan)

This guy doesn't play for Serbia:


Ghana

Population: 24 million
Last few World Cup efforts: 2nd round 2006
Odds to win the Cup: 101 to 1

This guy was born in Ghana:

Kofi Annan.

These guys play for Ghana:

Michael Essien (Chelsea)
Stephen Appiah (Bologna)
Sulley Muntari (Inter Milan)

This guy doesn’t play for Ghana:

That’s Evil Ed, a character from the 1985 Horror film Fright Night (if you haven’t seen it, then shame on you). Evil Ed was played by an actor named Stephen Geoffreys, whose manic energy landed him a heap of Horror roles and off-Broadway stage shows in the 80’s. He had a promising career in front of him, but gave it all away to do gay hardcore porno under the pseudonym Sam Ritter in the early 90’s. Yowzer!

GROUP C

ENGLAND

England are my second team after Australia, and are in the top four favourites for the World Cup. I’ll follow these guys once Australia have been knocked out (which could happen quite early in the piece), though England have had their fair share of problems in the last few months. David Beckham was injured earlier this year, then John Terry goosed somebody he wasn’t suppose to – losing the captaincy in the process. Rio Ferdinand took over the role of captain, only to get injured himself a week ago. Now England are on their third captain in four months, Steven Gerrard.

Population: 51 million
Last few World Cup efforts: Quarter Final 2006, 2002, Second round 1998. Won the World Cup in 1966.
Odds to win the Cup: Was 6 to 1, but has since dropped to 9 to 1 due to recent events.

This guy was born in England:

William Shakespeare

A playwright whose plays would become part of school curriculum, and go on to bore the shit out of school kids for over four centuries. Shakespeare was a suspected bisexual, and his daughter Judith was illiterate. That’s right, Shakespeare’s daughter couldn’t read or write. If a pig converted to Judaism and then became a vegetarian, and then tried to eat itself – it wouldn’t even come close to the irony of that last sentence.

These guys play for England:

Wayne Rooney (Manchester United)
Frank Lampard (Chelsea)
John Terry (Chelsea)

This chick doesn’t play for England:


USA

Population: 304 million
Last few World Cup efforts: 1st Round 2006, Quarter Final 2002, 1st round 1998
Odds to win the Cup: 81 to 1
This guy was born in the USA:

Mel Gibson

These guys play for the USA

Jozy Altidore (Villareal)
Frank Lampard (Chelsea)
John Terry (Chelsea)

This kid doesn’t play for the USA:


ALGERIA

Population: 34 million
Last few World Cup efforts: 1st Round 1986, 1982
Odds to win the Cup: 601 to 1
This guy was born in Algeria:

Albert Camus

These guys play for Algeria:

Karim Ziani (Wolfsburg)
Majid Bougherra (Glasgow Rangers)
Antar Yahia (VfL Bochum)

Whichever kid drew this doesn’t play for Algeria:

Seriously. What the fuck.

SLOVENIA

Population: 34 million
Last few World Cup efforts: 1st Round 1986, 1982
Odds to win the Cup: 601 to 1

This chick was born in Slovenia (back when it was Yugoslavia anyway):

Melania Trump. Donald’s wife.

These guys play for Slovenia:

Mililvoje Novskovic (FC Koln)
Samir Handanovic (Udinese)
Robert Koren (West Brompton)

This guy doesn’t play for Slovenia:

That’s porn star Stephen Clancy Hill. He was apprehended by police last week for killing a co-worker and injuring two others with a samurai sword. He eluded capture by jumping off a cliff. And dying. Um, yeah. RIP.

The Adult Entertainment industry has an unusually high suicide rate, almost as high as Dentistry (!?), and you can watch Stephen shuffle off this mortal coil below.

GROUP B

ARGENTINA

Population: 40 million
Last few World Cup efforts: Quarter final 2006, 1st round 2002, Quarter final 1998. Won the World Cup twice: 1978, 1986
Odds to win the Cup: 7.5 to 1

This chick was born in Argentina:

Adriana Xenides, born in Argentina, raised in Adelaide, and spun the letters on Wheel of Fortune for 18 years. She died this week.
Um, yeah. RIP.

These guys play for Argentina:

Lionel Messi (Barcelona)
Juan Sebastian Veron (Estudiantes)
Javier Mascherano (Liverpool)

This guy doesn’t play for Argentina:

But who needs Soccer skills, when you have a sweet ass Die Hard tat?

NIGERIA

Population: 151 million
Last few World Cup efforts: 1st round 2002, 2nd round 1998, 1994
Odds to win the Cup: 126 to 1

This guy was born in Nigeria:

Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje.
Fucked if I can pronounce that name, but he was in Lost.

These guys play for Nigeria:

Yakubu Aiyegbeni (Everton)
Joseph Yobo (Everton)
Dickson Etuhu (Fulham)

This guy doesn’t play for Nigeria:

Michael Cera. What a PIMP.

SOUTH KOREA

Population: 48 million
Last few World Cup efforts: 1st round 2006, Semi final 2002, 1st round 1998
Odds to win the Cup: 251 to 1

This guy was born in South Korea:

John Cho.
You’ll see him next year in A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas.
No, really.

These guys play for South Korea:

Park Ji-sung (Manchester United)
Lee Woon-jae (Suwon Samsung Bluewings)
Park Chu-young (Monaco)

This guy doesn’t play for South Korea:


GREECE

Population: 11 million
Last few World Cup efforts: 1st round 1994. That’s it. Their only World Cup appearance, consisting of No wins and 3 losses. Kinda weird, considering they won the Euro in 2004.
Odds to win the Cup: 201 to 1

This chick was born in Greece:

Jennifer Aniston. Stupid bitch.

These guys play for Greece:

Theofanis Gekas (Eintracht Frankfurt)
Giorgos Karagounis (Panathinaikos)
Angelos Charisteas (Bayer Leverkusen)

This guy doesn’t play for Greece:

GROUP A

So we know a bit about the Australia team, and can name just about the whole line up for England off the top of our heads, but what about the rest of the competition? There are 32 teams in the World Cup, and we should get ourselves a little more familiar in this week before the tournament starts.

(Note, don’t confuse this with the Shoddy Group Sex Guide that I published last year, but pulled from the shelves after a number of readers broke their thumbs trying to perform “the Flying Bitch Waffle”).

All odds are per Sportsbet.com, which I recently created an account with (Woo Hoo!) .

Let us start at the beginning, with the four teams in Group A.

SOUTH AFRICA

Population: 49 million
Last few World Cup efforts: 1st round in 2002, 1998
Odds to win the Cup: 151 to 1

This dude was born in South Africa:

J R R Tolkien

These guys are playing for South Africa:

Aaron Mokoena (Portsmouth)
Benni McCarthy (West Ham)
Steven Pienaar (Everton)

This guy doesn’t play for South Africa:



MEXICO

Population: 111 million
Last few World Cup efforts: 2nd round 2006, 2002, 1998, 1994
Odds to win the Cup: 81 to 1

This dude was born in Mexico:

Ricardo Montalban

These guys play for Mexico:

Cuauhtemoc Blanco (Veracruz)
Rafael Marquez (Barcelona)
Carlos Vela (Arsenal)

This guy doesn’t play for Mexico:



URUGUAY

Population: 3.3 million

Last few World Cup efforts: 2nd round 1990, 1986, semis 1970. But of more interest, they’ve won the World Cup twice – 1930 and 1950.
Odds to win the Cup: 101 to 1

This chick was born in Uruguay:

Noelia Campo. An actress. Apparently.

These guys play for Uruguay:

Diego Forlan (Atlético Madrid)
Diego Lugano (fenerbache)
Christian Rodriguez (Porto)

This guy doesn’t play for Uruguay:



FRANCE

Cheaters never prosper...except when you are Thierry Henry, who handballed a goal assist in a playoff against Ireland, and then was rewarded with a qualification to the easiest group in the tournament.

Population: 62 million
Last few World Cup efforts: Second round 2006, 1st round 2002, won the World Cup in 1998.
Odds to win the Cup: 19 to 1

This chick was born in France:

Emma Watson, you little booze hag

These guys play for France:

Thierry Henry (Barcelona)
Frank Ribery (Bayern Munich)
Patrick Vieria (Manchester City)


This guy doesn’t play for France:

That’s Ghyslain Raza, a Canadian lawyer who is the president of the Patrimoine Trois-Rivières, a conservation society that aims to preserve the cultural heritage of the town of Trois-Rivières.

Though Ghyslain was a little more famous eight years ago: