Argentina deserved winners

Messi guides Argentina to Olympic title. Argentina defeated Nigeria 1-0 in the final. Angel Di Maria scored the winner in the 58th minute. Nigeria should be happy with the silver medal. They played gloriously to loose in the final. In my blog dated July 12, 2008, “Olympic Football 2008: Argentina and Nigeria are favorites”, I mentioned that these two teams are favorites. I am happy that it matched.

Argentina is the deserved winners. They played beautifully in the whole tournament. Nigeria started slowly but in the knockout stage they were superb. Argentina mesmerizes Brazil in the semifinal and Nigeria did the same thing with Belgium. Brazil played very poorly in the semifinal.

Brazil though defeated Belgium 3-0 to finish third they do not deserved a place in the final. I think we had a final between the best two teams. This is Argentina’s second Olympic title. They won these consecutive in 2004 and 2008. Great Britain (1908 and 1912) and Hungary (1964 and 1968) achieve the same feat. Yugoslovia is the only team who played 4 consecutive finals from 1948 to 1960. But they won only in 1960. Hungary played three consecutive finals from 1964 to 1972.

Match of the titans

What a mouth watering semifinal we are going to have in the semifinal. Argentina vs Brazil or Ronaldinho vs Messi. Whatever you say football will be the winner. Both the teams required extra time to defeat their opponents. Defending champion Argentina rode on Messi to defeat Netherland 2-1. Brazil defeated former champion Cameroon 2-0. They avenged their defeat at the hands of Cameroon at Sydney Olympics in 2000. Messi was brilliant in the other game. Netherland fought their heart out but still could not save the game.

Italy the most impressive team in the group stages were stunned by Belgium. They played with 10 men for most of the game but still managed to win the thriller 3-2. They came from behind twice. They will meet 1996 champion Nigeria. Nigeria easily defeated Côte d'Ivoire 2-0. Both the semifinals will be thrilling to watch.

Big Guns Firing

Ronaldinho started his comeback. He enthralled the Chinese crowd with two goals. Brazil defeated New Zealand 5-0 to enter the quarterfinals. This is Brazil’s second consecutive win. Pato, Anderson and Sobis are the other scorer. Belgium defeated China 2-0 to keep their hopes alive.

Argentina and Italy also enter the quarterfinal. Argentina defeated Australia 1-0 to register their second win in as many matches. In another group A match Côte d'Ivoire defeated Serbia 4-2 in a thrilling match.

Italy registered another fluent victory. They crushed Korea 3-0. This is their second 3-0 victory in group D match. Cameroon scrapes past Honduras 1-0 in another group D match.

Nigeria defeated Japan 2-1 in a group B match. Netherlands scored in a last minute to hold USA 2-2. USA and Nigeria are leading the group with 4 points. Netherland with 2 points is also in the fray for a quarterfinal berth.

Brazil, Italy and Argentina started with a Win

Brazil struggled to beat 9 men Belgium in their opening match in group C. Hernanes scored a magnificent goal in the 79th minute for Brazil. Brazil struggled for most of the part of the match. In another match of group C host China drew 1-1 with New Zealand.

Messi was the star for Argentina. He helped Argentina to register 2-1 win over brilliant Ivory Coast in group A. Messi scored a goal and also assist the second. Australia drew with Serbia 1-1.

USA defeated Japan 1-0 in their opening match. Italy registered a easy 3-0 win over Honduras. Cameroon drew 1-1 with Korea and Nigeria drew 0-0 with Netherlands.

CAS Ruling

I am very disappointed with CAS ruling. According to me a player should give more priority for his country than club. I do not understand why one should not be playing as he likes.

Brazil The Champion

Brazil won the FIFA Beach Soccer world cup for third consecutive time. Brazil defeated Italy 5-3 in the final. They actually owe it to their team game. They didn’t depend on any individual player, they played as a team. Daniel was the hero in the quarterfinal match whereas Andre bailed them out in the semifinal. Italy was 0-5 down before recovering in the third period to score three times. But that was not enough to stop Brazil for third win.

Madjer the scorer

Madjer for the third time won the Golden shoe. He scored 13 goals. Amarelle of Spain won the Golden Ball and Roberto Valeiro of Spain won the Golden glove. Amarelle also won the Silver ball award. Russia won the fair play award.

Portugal won the third position by defeating Spain 5-4. Portugal had a very good tournament. They are really improving year by year. Spain depended on Amarelle too much. Italy was the surprise team of the tournament.

Great comebacks in the Semifinals

Brazil thrice came back from behind to score 5-4 win over favorites Portugal. This will be third consecutive final for Brazil. They will meet Italy who defeated Spain 1-0 in the penalty shootout. They also came back thrice against Spain. The game ended 4-4 in the scheduled time. This is first final for Italy. Portugal will meet Spain in the third place playoff. Belchior and Majder scored their 10th goal of the tournament.

Will Italy become the first team in three years to defeat Brazil?

All European Final?

The semifinal lineup is finalized, Portugal to meet Brazil and Spain to Italy. For the first time in FIFA Beach Soccer World cup three European teams have entered the semifinal. Will this year be all European final after 2005? Spain is having a great year in sports. Will they go all the way here or Portugal will have the last laugh? Don't forget we have Brazil also.

The best quarterfinal was between Brazil and Russia. Russia twice taken the lead, 2-0, 3-2 but failed to keep them. Daniel was the hero for Brazil, scoring a hattrick in 6-4 win. Buru was shown the red card and will miss the semifinal. It is a bog blow to Brazil.

Portugal continued their good form against Uruguay. They won 6-3. Madjer scored his 50th goal. But the star of Portugal is Belchior. He is top scorer with 9 goals along with Madjer. Belchior is frontrunner for both golden ball and golden shoe. He will be the main threat against Brazil.

Spain played a very tactical game against Argentina in their 2-0 win. This is the fourth occasion in this world cup where a team failed to score. Nico scored two goals for Spain. Argentina again failed to break the jinx of the quarterfinal. Italy defeated the host, France, 5-2 to enter the semifinal for the first time. We have seen that most of the teams are defensively very strong. So we may have less number of goals. FIFA this year introducing a new award Golden glove for the best goalkeeper. Roberto Valeiro of Spain, Andrey Bukhlitskiy of Russia, Marcelo Salgueiro of Argentina and Luis Rodas of El Salvador are vying for the award.

Portugal and Spain should be in the final. Without Buru Brazil will be a weak team though Benjamin is playing well. Benjamin along with Belchior is the frontrunner for golden ball. Portugal is the last country to beat Brazil in world cup. Portugal so far scored 32 goals and Brazil 24 goals. Spain should win easily against Italy. For me Portugal and Spain are favorites.