Fifty English pounds.
I think that's more than reasonable.
That's the amount IBWM has handed over to it's friendly local bookmaker as a stake toward Mexico and Uruguay ending up in a draw. Which it will. Has there ever been a worse national coach than Raymond Domenech?
I hope you have managed to catch all of the games over the last day or so, dear reader, as there has been a marked improvement to what we have seen so far.
Let's face facts here; despite all the pomp and ceremony, and unless you are German, the first round of games were fairly shy-ite, however you look at it. This was enough for for the blame to be placed squarely at Vuvuzelas, Jabulanis and altitude (aka the three big names from South Africa 2010 so far), by every available commentator.
Twaddle.
These teams only have three games, not a full season, to get it right so the fear of losing the first game is massive, basically. I also think that your clubs are so enveloped in not being relegated or dropping out of the Champions League etc these days that your modern player is well schooled in the 'avoid at all costs' scenario. So with this in mind, cagey performances must be inevitable. Well that's how this correspondent sees it anyway.
Things are picking up though, and the Spain Switzerland game is looking like the watershed. But before we all draw a veil over the first round of games, lets draw some comparisons. You can draw your own conclusions. That's a lot of drawing.
The IBWM science lab team; look just like you would expect them to
Just after the Spain Switzerland game, Professor Liddletowers, our in-house statistician, came running up excitedly from the IBWM science lab with the following (loving your work Dr Graeme by the way!);
I've just been having a little look at the stats since the WC expanded to 32 teams i.e. from France '98.
In the opening 16 games of 2010 there has been 27 goals scored with only 4 teams managing to score more than one goal.
The 16 opening games of 2006 gave us 39 goals scored with 9 teams scoring more than one goal.
In 2002 we got 46 goals with 10 teams scoring more than one goal.
And finally, in '98 a total of 37 goals were scored in the opening games with 11 teams managing more than one goal.
So, what do these statistics show? Well for me it kind of puts to bed the theory that this happens every 4 years. It doesn't, that is a fact.
Either the opening games have been far more cagey this year, or the teams are struggling to score goals for some other reason early on in the competition.
A lot of controversy has arisen about the new ball, fair enough, could be that. It could also be down to just a basic lack of quality.
But interestingly the only time we had another world cup with fewer than 4 teams managing 2 goals in their opening games was Mexico '86 where 24 teams played at altitude.
Maybe the goals will start flying in once they acclimatise.
In the opening 16 games of 2010 there has been 27 goals scored with only 4 teams managing to score more than one goal.
The 16 opening games of 2006 gave us 39 goals scored with 9 teams scoring more than one goal.
In 2002 we got 46 goals with 10 teams scoring more than one goal.
And finally, in '98 a total of 37 goals were scored in the opening games with 11 teams managing more than one goal.
So, what do these statistics show? Well for me it kind of puts to bed the theory that this happens every 4 years. It doesn't, that is a fact.
Either the opening games have been far more cagey this year, or the teams are struggling to score goals for some other reason early on in the competition.
A lot of controversy has arisen about the new ball, fair enough, could be that. It could also be down to just a basic lack of quality.
But interestingly the only time we had another world cup with fewer than 4 teams managing 2 goals in their opening games was Mexico '86 where 24 teams played at altitude.
Maybe the goals will start flying in once they acclimatise.
Comments welcome.
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