Global Football

Two games and two wins for Argentina with two spectacular goals from its captain and talisman Lionel Messi. So what’s the problem? It was a close shave again for starters. Iran offered Argentina’s attackers as much as courtesy as they might normally extend to UN nuclear weapon inspectors. Elsewhere in …

Show up at their World Cup venue. Get mauled. Repeat. Costa Rica had its game plan drawn up by the rest of the world but, thankfully, “El Ticos” decided to go its own way; and the result has been spectacular. Apart from a Spanish title defence that was shorter than …

England was left tottering on the brink of elimination from Group D today after mad genius Luis Suarez bit twice to seal a 2-1 win for Uruguay. And if English fans are feeling sorry for themselves now, wait until they figure out that Suarez’s winner was probably offside. According to …

There were punching bags that fought back more bravely; and babies who held on to their candy longer. Even when Spain was a genuine global superpower and its conquistadores colonised most of South America, the Spaniards never managed to get Brazil under their thumb. So what chance did they have …

“Everybody out! Crawl back into whatever hole you came from!” Like a crabby parent who returned home too early, Mexico goalkeeper Guillermo Ochoa spoiled the samba party yesterday with a defiant performance against the host nation as Mexico and Brazil played to a goalless draw at Fortaleza. Flip! On went …

The good news is that Portugal played like World Cup champions; the bad news is we mean the 2014 version of Spain and not the one that lifted the trophy, four years ago. After Spain’s 5-1 humbling to the Netherlands on Friday, there was more pain for fans in the …

Argentina was not exactly fluent, there were umpteen misplaced passes in the final third and its two star strikers, Sergio Agüero and Gonzalo Higuain, look like they should be hosed down with WD-40. It was a largely sloppy performance from the World Cup contenders. But there was one Messi moment …

“How would you like it if I have Mario Balotelli kick in your back door, eh? Would you like that?” Italian “wise guys” are renowned for unanswerable questions and the England football team certainly could not find the right response yesterday as the “Azzurri” launched its 2014 World Cup campaign …

Chapter 2 Best of Friends: The Crime Boss and the Boss of World Football (By Carolina Mazzi) IT IS RIO’S WEDDING of the year. The father of the bride is Brazil’s biggest gangster, racketeer and, they say, murderer of 50 rivals. He stays out of jail by paying off the …

Spain football fans might one day log their 2014 World Cup adventure in a file titled: “How to lose a World Cup in five goals.” Defending World Cup champions have made losing starts before; France lost 1-0 to Senegal 10 years ago and, 12 years earlier, Argentina was stunned 1-0 …

Brazil got its 2014 World Cup tournament off to a confident start yesterday with an emphatic victory against plucky but limited opponents in Sao Paulo. But enough about the Brazilian police’s bruising triumph against roughly 300 protesters, two CNN journalists and an Associated Press photographer that got too close to …

The Trinidad and Tobago national football team displayed its battling abilities over the last week with gutsy performances in defeats to World Cup-bound teams, Argentina and Iran. But, closer to home, local football remains in near crisis mode with half of the national teams inactive while the Trinidad and Tobago …