FIFA World Cups

Archive for November, 2010

The amazing game comes to Africa in summer 2010. The world’s greatest football (or soccer as it is known in North America) tournament will see 32 nations from around the world contest for primacy of the planet’s most well-liked sport. In This summer, South Africa is host of this amazing game , the First game is June 11 and the final goes July 11. At the Final of the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa on 11 July, the popular FIFA World Cup Trophy will not be the only sparkling golden object at Soccer City Stadium. Adidas has unveiled the Official Match Ball for the 2010 FIFA World Cup Final, the unique gold-colored adidas JO’BULANI version of the adidas JABULANI, the Official Match Ball of the 2010 FIFA World Cup. The name JO’BULANI is a compliment to host city Johannesburg, commonly known both as “City of Gold” and Jo’burg. Whereas the ball still features the iconic South African-inspired design of the JABULANI, the main color of the JO’BULANI is gold. The trophy will travel to 83 countries in total as part of the FIFA World Cup Trophy Tour by Coca-Cola, spanning a total of 225 days covering 138,902 km in the process before arriving in South Africa on the 4th of May. When flag bearers parade onto a World Cup field, it’s the official start of a battle royal between two teams who have played their hearts out to gain a spot in the FIFA World Cup football competition. This year, some 288 teens from 21 countries will travel to South Africa to bear the flags of champion teams at the 2010 FIFA World Cup competition, which perhaps is the world’s largest sporting event. FIFA and Sony Music Entertainment today announced that “Time for Africa,” a collaboration between global superstar Shakira and critically acclaimed South African music group Freshly ground, has been chosen as the Official Anthem of the upcoming 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa. Germany coach Joachim Low looks set to name Miroslav Klose and Lukas Podolski in his 2010 FIFA World Cup team, even though both strikers have struggled to hit form this season. This is the second time that the Red Devils, making their seventh consecutive appearance in the World Cup, have been in the top 50 this year, as they were also ranked 49th in January. In world cup 2010 the Italy head Coach Marcello Lippi is believe that his experience is the key to success. The head coach is confident that his experienced side will impress at the World cup in South Africa in this summer. Get your Cheap FIFA World Cup Tickets

Christiano Ronaldo is a kind of player who can impress you only through his presence on the field. No doubt, he has great talent and super control on the ball. He becomes FIFA World player at its last even. He beat his biggest rival Argentina’s Lionel Messi by Quite a big margin of votes. Who has better talent you cannot judge them easily. Because, on their given they are equally dangerous.

Christiano Ronaldo came to Manchester United as a 17 years old young boy. Manchester United boss Sir Alex Ferguson brought him into the team in place of super star footballer David Beck ham. At that time, nobody could expect that this boy can full fill the lacking of David Beck ham. However, Ronaldo proved them wrong and not only full filled David’s lacking but become even bigger superstar of football.

He has great sense of the game. He understands the game so well and reacts so quickly according to the situation of the game. He has very good skill of dribbling with the ball and super speed of run through the field. One more great skill he has and that is his ability of scoring goals from free kicks. Whenever he gets a chance to score from free kicks, he gets success most of the time.

In 2007-08 sessions, he scored over 40 goals but not as a striker. His actual position in the field is winger. He can use both of his legs effectively and get success to score with his both legs. He can produce lot of chances to others to score goals also. Some football critics say he is the best professional footballer at present. He started his carrier as winger. However,now he is a successful striker of the game. The way he is playing these days, which is forcing people to become his fans. We can see he is easily the most famous footballer on earth today. Last year two of the biggest and richest clubs of football planet were fighting each other for him to get him in the Team. At last, everything settled down quite nicely. Now Christiano Ronaldo is happily playing for his club Manchester United.

Controversial goals have become a part of all FIFA organized tournaments; and have given undue advantage to some countries, while those who are at the receiving end go back home with heart aches, only to nurse their wounds after being unfairly edged out of a competition they were supposed to have perhaps won.

These controversies have repeated themselves in such a way that there is now the feeling amongst soccer pundits that there must be some conspiracies somewhere to ensure that the world cup keeps going to certain regions. FIFA seems to be helpless about the whole thing, not because they do not know how to address the problem, but because they want the status quo to remain.

FIFA knows for instance, that if there is a level playing ground, Africa and Asia would perform better and the over bloated chances given to UEFA would no longer be justifiable. So the best thing to do is let the match official always pretend to be helpless when certain important decisions need to be taken.

So far the world cup has been rotating between South America and Europe because that is how they want it to be. Poor officiating has never really been a matter of error; it is a deliberate thing.

Now back to those controversial goals: it almost marred the 1966 world cup final match between Germany and the host country, England. England eventually went away unpunished. Ever since, it has been from one controversy to another. If FIFA were serious to address this problem, then they should have gotten a solution since 1966 (44 years now).

In Mexico ’86, it was Diego Maradona who scored the ‘God hand’ goal against England and eventually helped Argentina to win the world cup. In France ’98, Chile needed desperately to advance into the second round, and midway into their match against Cameroon; Ivan Zamorano deliberately placed the ball on the hand of a Cameroonian defender in the 18 yard box. Surprisingly, the centre referee pointed to the penalty spot: the rest is now history.

The current world cup in South Africa has also witnessed several goals scored under controversial circumstances. First it was Nigeria losing against Argentina, because Walter Samuel held down Chinedu Obasi Ogbuke, preventing him from marking Gabriel Heinze. That gave Heinze the ample opportunity to score the only goal of the match. And what did the match officials do? They pretended not to see anything.

In the group match between USA and Slovenia, Maurice Edu’s 85th minute goal was disallowed by the centre referee, Koman Coulibaly, for no good reason. The match the USA would have won eventually ended 2-2. We also saw Luis Fabiano’s second goal against Cote D’ivoire, which he got after handling the ball twice. The goal was allowed by the referee after series of protests by the Cameroonians. The officials pretended not to see the first contact with the hand and then the second one; but they saw the ball when it went across the line into the net.

The second round also produced some wonders as Frank Lampard’s goal against Germany was disallowed after it obviously crossed the goal line. A replay of that goal showed that the referee was not even far from where the goal was scored. I think that decision dampened England’s morale and made them concede one of their worst world cup defeats ever, losing by a scandalous 4-1 to Germany.

Carlos Tevez of Argentina was not left out of the controversy as his off-side goal against Mexico was also allowed to stay. The whole spectators saw Tevez left behind after he lost the first opportunity to score; so when the ball which had hit the goal keeper and rebounded was brought back, Tevez was standing alone and he nodded in the ball to everyone’s utter disbelief.

It is now obvious that the match officials really need some help to be able to give the best judgment and minimize the level of injustice meted out against certain teams. Let it be that a team is losing a match because it deserves to lose, and not because of poor officiating. This is why FIFA needs to consider the use of goal technology in deciding the actual position of certain goals.

FIFA’s arguments that the use of goal line technology would slow down the game, and that it would be expensive, do not hold water. The live score boards are already in the stadiums and it takes only few seconds to show a replay of the goal and a decision would be taken (whether it was actually a goal or not). It would be shown to the whole world, and that would settle the controversy. Both teams would also see clearly who is right or wrong.

I would also suggest some electronic devices be placed on the goal posts and should be automatically activated the moment a ball crosses the line. When activated, it should begin to flash some lights or give a beep directly to the referee through his ear phone.

Matches should be won to everyone’s satisfaction and no one should feel cheated anymore if the right things are done. Crowd violence which has often been sparked off by these controversies would also be reduced to the barest minimum.