C. Ronaldo Suffers From His Antics

Cristiano Ronaldo's antics have caught up with him. The FIFA committee selecting the best young player award gave the nod to Lukas Podolski over CR in large part because of the negative points of CR's ref-baiting and flopping.

In other wacky World Cup news, German police have arrested the pranksters preying on the stupid and drunk among the WC fans. Hey, at least they didn't paint, "Can you head this?" on the balls. Now that would've been Darwinian! The 10 Spot has a few items on the World Cup. Check out their take on the pranksters. I think he was talking about Portuguese players.

Also in the funny (but completely unrelated to the World Cup) department, check out Star Trek 2.0 on YouTube.

Back to soccer. There seems to be a consensus that this Final game will be very tight. Oddsmakers are not picking clear favorites (which means it will probably be a blowout). Some say Italy by a hair because of its defense.

Coach Domenech is not worried about his older players ability to recover in time for the Final. While not as popular as Juergen Klinsmann is in Germany, Raymond Domenech is one of the odder coaches in the World Cup. I agree with Clauio Rainieri that Italy has the coaching edge with Lippi. Domenech is too cautious and conservative. If he tries to sit on a one-goal lead with Italy, I believe the Azzurri will eat France alive. Jamie Trecker says its the French by a goal.

The ongoing match-fixing scandal in Italy could result in a fire sale of top talent. Gianluigi Buffon? Arsene Wenger, are you listening?

Reports are that Big Phil will quit the Portuguese team in coming weeks. Where's he going to? Hopefully not America. While we need a coach with the tactical genius of Big Phil, the last thing we need is the sight of Landon Donovan and Company becoming another side of divers and whiners.

And finally, my daughter's team got off to a great start in their tournament, winning 5-0. It looked like a replay of the Czech Republic-USA match. Serious mismatch. Today's game should be tougher. But if we continue to play smart, attacking football we should do well.