A visual history of the balls used for every world cup over at the NY Times. Check it out.
My favorite is Mr. Crack.
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General Knowledge
I Miss the Vuvuzelas
A whole day without any oversized kazoos overwhelming my aural sense. What to do? Well, first I downloaded the vuvuzela app for my phone, but it wasn’t quite enough, so I went hunting for online options. Best I could find is actually an anti-vuvuzela game, which because of it’s fit-inducing drone is simply NSFW. Here it is anyway. Have fun!
General Knowledge
Cultfootball Fans Exposed!
Yesterday’s USA match created some pretty wild celebrations, duh. Some of the Cultfootball.com faithful were with a group of burly men at a local waterhole and made their way into the pages of the NY Daily News. Go buy yourself a copy and check out the inside of the front page for a shot of Messrs Stadlen and Shepard. Bring the sexy, boys.
EuropeGeneral Knowledge
Where in the world is Slovenia?
Something I’ve been asking myself over the past couple weeks. Here is the 1st hit upon Googling the title of this post.
The Slovene lands were part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until the latter’s dissolution at the end of World War I. In 1918, the Slovenes joined the Serbs and Croats in forming a new multinational state, which was named Yugoslavia in 1929. After World War II, Slovenia became a republic of the renewed Yugoslavia, which though Communist, distanced itself from Moscow’s rule. Dissatisfied with the exercise of power by the majority Serbs, the Slovenes succeeded in establishing their independence in 1991 after a short 10-day war. Historical ties to Western Europe, a strong economy, and a stable democracy have assisted in Slovenia’s transformation to a modern state. Slovenia acceded to both NATO and the EU in the spring of 2004.
So a Slovenia v Serbia matchup would be quite interesting–but unlikely to happen in this tournament.
CommentaryGeneral Knowledge
Today’s mathematics: 32 games done, 31 to go
We just crossed the halfway point of the tournament, when measured in terms of number of games played. The tournament consists of a total of 63 games, of which:
32 games have been played over the past 11 days: 4 games in each of the 8 groups;
there are 16 games remaining in the group phase: 2 games in each of the 8 groups, with 4 games per day over the next 4 days (Tues-Fri);
16 teams will advance to the knockout phase: 2 teams from each of the 8 groups;
15 games will be played in the knockout phase: 8 + 4 + 2 + 1.
So the total # of 63 can be broken down as follows:
63 = 32 + 16 + 15 = 8*4 + 8*2 + (8 + 4 + 2 + 1).
Let me know if you see anything wrong with the math here.