FIFA World Cup 2010: The best and the worst of the greatest football show!
There can be no two opinions for the fact that Spain was the best team of the 2010 FIFA World Cup. The players played in unison as a team and showed that even by passing the ball to one another; a team can win the World Cup. They may have scored just 8 goals en route to the trophy, yet they scored when it mattered the most.
Thomas Mueller proved to the world that a virtually unknown 20 year old German can change the destiny of his team by excellent performance, something superstars like Wayne Rooney, Kaka and Cristiano Ronaldo were unable to do for their sides.
The best performance by a team came in the quarter finals when the Germans proved their supremacy over Diego Maradona’s side. Germany played like champions and managed to score as many as 4 goals against the Argentineans, who couldn’t figure out what hit them, until it was too late.
The best stadium was undoubtedly the Soccer City Stadium in Johannesburg, where the opening and closing match of the series was played. The worst stadium was not far away, in the same city by the name of Ellis Park. It was not only hard to get into but was also dangerous to get out of, as claimed by all those who had been there during the event.
Germany proved to the best young team in the event as they played the way they were coached to. They never let the opponents settle against them, always scored when they got the chance and kept the opponents under pressure. They failed to do so twice - once in the upset against Serbia and then in the semi final against eventual winners Spain.
The defending champions and four-time World Cup winners Italy landed in South Africa as a side that didn’t want to win. Just like the other finalists of 2006, the French, they crashed out in the first round of the tournament and proved to be the biggest disappointment.
The refereeing throughout the competition was criticized, if one yellow card decision is to be chosen as the ‘worst‘, then the Thomas Mueller yellow card takes the cake. It was not only unnecessary but also unwanted since the youngster didn’t do anything to deserve a send off like that. Lionel Messi’s pass hit Mueller on the left arm, yet the Uzbek referee Ravshan Irmatov thought the German had deliberately handed the ball. He gave Mueller his second yellow card of the event which forced him to miss the semi-final, which his side lost to Spain. All he could do was watch and regret.
A lot was said and done during the event by Diego Maradona‘s comments and antics were the most entertaining part of the one-month extravaganza. When asked why he hugged his players all the time, he replied, “No! I like women! I’m dating Veronica. She is 31. She is blond. She is very pretty! Don’t start rumours about me. I may have my weaknesses towards some of my players, but that’s normal.”
That’s Maradona for you. He may have been the most entertaining, but the best coach of the tournament was a Dutch and a German. While Bert van Marwijk of the Netherlands made his boys achieve the impossible, his German counterpart Joachim Loew proved that big names are not needed to secure a medal in the World Cup.
There was also Fabio Capello, the Italian coach of England who watched his team do nothing that he taught them in the matches they played. He fielded Robert Green, when he had David James in the side, and Green’s miss in the match against U.S. proved that no matter how big you might be, not every decision you make can yield positive result.
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