More thoughts on more losses (Mexico, England and the unfairness of it all)

It was all too much today - one great goal ignored (Lampard) and one totally, unambiguously offside goal allowed (Tevez). We watched some teams exploit their good fortune, and others collapse in the face of their bad luck.

It's become a World Cup scripted by Emile Zola. I am thinking of his utterly depressing novel L'Assommoir (the word means a dive-bar one goes to only to get hammered). At a key juncture in the story, the lovable drunk Copeau is doing his best to get his life together, but takes a bad fall at work and breaks his leg. His life is a fast downhill slide to abject poverty from there. He just doesn't have the constitution to overcome the kind of bad luck that in fact breaks a lot of people. My students always dig that novel, because this story feels real - the story of bad things happening to decent but very flawed people.

Is it in the service of realism, I wonder, that Sepp Blatter wards off all pressure to use technology to, say, confirm that, indeed, the ball has crossed the goal-line? Is that what he means by human drama - Life is not only unfair, it's a cruel and pointless venture?  

I don't think England had a win in them today - it didn't seem like it. Not when faced with Özil, Klose, and Podolski on the attack.  Germany played brilliantly - and, really, that's why they won.  But, like a character in a Zola novel, England can now stew in its bitterness, feel robbed, and pour more of its energy down the drain in a stream of complaint.

Mexico - oh, my heart.  The first twenty-six minutes of the match today were pure, insane delight. But then the magic fell apart with Tevez's offside goal. Players saw the disaster replayed on the stadium screens (as happened after Lampard's un-goal as well). That could not have helped matters - it was impossible to miss: Tevez was so offside that he must have known it himself.  The hand of God, moving one of his pawns into position. That sort of thing is dispiriting. So a few minutes later we see El Tri give up another goal with a limp pass - the sort of mistake made by someone who feels the decks are so stacked against them that the game isn't worth playing anymore. You feel screwed by the system, so you screw yourself.

Argentina played beautifully, Tevez made sure we knew he was more than a cheat, and fired one of the best shots of the tournament in the 52nd minute. Great teams exploit luck and the other side's error. They are captains of a lucky universe.  The rest of us pretty much just go down with the ship.

South Africa/Mexico: A Game of Nerve

There is not much for me to say about today's match: it has already been said, not even an hour after the match's conclusion. We even broke Twitter, twice the whole network seized up - too many of us telling each other all about it.

It was a game of two halves, and two nervous teams. Throughout the first act South Africa was afraid to attack, and the whole side seemed to play stopper. Mexico was the opposite - too quick to attack, too quick to strike, throwing away one great chance after another. Siphiwe Tshabalala's 55th minute screamer was made the instant South Africa connected as an attacking side - lightening quick and strong it caught El Tri's defense completely by surprise. Mexico's one goal was both quick and deliberate - Guardado found Márquez, who was miraculously alone. With the ball at his feet, the Barcelona center back put the ball neatly and deliberately past Khune (who had had a couple brilliant saves).

The game was a great introduction for newbies to the offside rule which can confuse even experienced players and journalists, especially on corners.  Apparently Martin Taylor, ESPN's play-by-play guy got it wrong when he accused the referee of making a mistake in waiving off a goal as Mexico's player was offside. Twitter went crazy, too as we all tried to figure it out. I thought the call was wrong myself until Univision put up their graphic marker for the offside line and I could see that, indeed, it was.

Corners are especially confusing because the player who directly receives the corner kick (the "first touch") can be in an offside position - Vela did not receive the ball from the corner kick itself, however, but from a teammate - which is why he is required to be behind the second-to-last defender. Normally the last defender is the goalie, but it is not necessarily the goalie. Here, the goalie Khune was the second-to-last defender, and Pienaar was on the line alone.  For a perfect explanation of all that stuff read Erin Bolen's breakdown for News-Leader.

I watched the game at a Oaxacan restaurant with several hundred Mexico fans. We were all feeling quite broken until one woman ran up to the front of the room with a Catholic saint candle (Virgen de Guadalupe?), and placed it in front of the screen. Márquez scored shortly after. Olé!