WC Whingealot

The month of celebration, fun and inevitable tears that is supposed to be the World Cup is a whole six days old and already the level of criticism may have surpassed that of any previous World Cup. For my part, try as I might I can’t seem to get excited for the early stages ... however I am starting to find the complaints irksome and now bordering on the embarrassing.

Vuvuzelas, lack of goals, the Jabulani ball, the lack of big name stars (covered previously on this blog), the England/Italy/France/Insert your own team and possibly the whole of Commercialism itself have come in for criticism in just a short space of time.

There must be a combination of factors contributing to this global whinge-fest. Firstly the massive, barely controllable proliferation of communications channels has enabled any Charlie Fat-Fingers to tell us all their two pence worth. Whether it be the dedicated football website, news channels, twitter, blogging (ahem...) or specifically targeted projects (such as the Guardian Fans Network), we can all have a say. This is obviously a good thing but it does tend to exacerbate any issue, big or small, into a big issue. For example it is right for millions to comment on the European debt crisis, but when a similar number are blogging on the ‘disgrace of Vuvuzelas’ it is more difficult to take it seriously.

Secondly, the unfamiliarity of a WC on African soil seems to have thrown a lot of broadcasters. Of course a lot of focus should rightly be given to this, and with it being Sepp Blatter’s personal mission to stage the event here we cannot be surprised; however the coverage of the ‘African-ness’ is threatening to overshadow the actual event. If we are honest, do we watch Holland-Denmark to see a live game being broadcast from this continent for the first time, or to watch Robin Van Persie try to get the better of Daniel Agger?!

I’ve actually enjoyed the fact that the organisers refuse to bow to Commercial pressure to ban the Vuvus, but that may be because I don’t mind the noise too much.

Then maybe throw some general discontentment at the state of the Global Economy, worries about the little fishies in the Gulf of Mexico*, Alan Sugar being a Lord... and you can see why people might be stressed and over-reacting to the standard timid opening games. My philosophy on this has always been to allow all the teams the first dull games and lay into them from the second game onwards as any primary result should in theory stimulate a positive response; Won? Keep it going. Drew? Try harder. Lost? Try hardest!

Enough doom and gloom!

Here’s what we have to look forward to, which will hopefully kick us all out of the rot:

- Last round of Group matches. Big name are you? Lots of History, but failed to win against a minnow or suffered a shock loss to a team from some God-forsaken land? Well it’s Big Boy Time my friend, step up or step on the plane home. Psst: We all kinda want to see you crumble, even if it means less quality in the latter stages.

- Token bad guy, villain, scoundrel, unlucky scapegoat. This can be a player (think Rivaldo in 2002), referee (step up Graeme Poll), or whatever causes either the Host nation or your particular country to be knocked out. I still can’t believe Phil Neville went through that Romanian player in the last minute. Twerp.

- Knockout stages. Even if this World Cup was being staged on Neptune, on a cold day (do they have these?), in the middle of rugby season, the latter stages are where it’s at. Heartbreak? Check. Big boy tears? Check. Red cards, penalties, Germans? Check.

- Race for Golden boot. Probably between functional Teutonic goal-machine who utilises his one skill perfectly and some sort of Hispanic flair-o-magnet from Brazil or Spain (whichever doesn’t implode in the QFs).

- Your team being eliminated. Snotty tears, angry jeers, soul-searching, finger-pointing...and finally the sweet release of acceptance.

ROLL ON THE NEXT BATCH OF GAMES! AUPA!

* Apologies for the sarcastic tone, I appreciate the full impact of this disaster