Sweet 16 Preview

Dumb and Dumber...and Dumberer...and Dumberest... - The World Cup rests in the hands of these men.


The Picks: Germany, Argentina, Italy, Switzerland, England, Portugal, Brazil, Spain (with Mexico, the Ukraine, and France the most likely candidates to spring an upset).

Germany vs Sweden

The hosts should have enough to win this one, assuming they get the requisite calls from refs swayed by the hometown fans. Sweden has plenty of firepower, with Ibrahimovic and Larsson and Ljungberg as feared an attacking trio as you can find this side of South America, but they haven't been at their best yet, save for a second-half flurry against England. Germany has played some of the best soccer in the Cup, attacking with a reckless abandon never before seen from ze Mannschaft. With Ballack healthy again, Klose leading the chase for the Golden Boot, and a young team gaining in confidence with every win, expect Germany to move on to the quarterfinals.

Argentina vs Mexico

Argentina has been, without question, the most impressive team in the tournament thus far. A 6-0 beatdown of Serbia & Montenegro is testament to that. On the other hand, Mexico has been a huge disappointment, unable to beat Angola despite playing a man up and losing against Portugal in the last group game. So why do I think that Mexico will give the Argentines a real run for their money? A few reasons. Mexico's coach, Ricardo Lavolpe, is an Argentinian who knows that team inside & out - he'll have his muchachos ready to play. And just last year, Argentina played Mexico in the Confederations Cup, an international tournament in Germany (see the parallels, yet?) and both countries fielded teams similar to the ones that will take the field tomorrow. The result? Argentina on penalties. I see tomorrow's match heading to extra time and possibly even penalties, too, but like Argentina to squeak by in a match much closer than anyone expects.

Italy vs Australia

Italy will win this one, but it will be a return to the 'catenaccio' style of the Azzurri's past - a real grind-it-out affair, probably no more than a goal separating the two sides. Australia has proven that they can play with the best sides in the world, as evidenced by their impressive performance in a loss to Brazil. Meanwhile, Italy has only looked good in their win against the Czechs; if Marcello Lippi is smart, he'll make sure to get Filippo Inzaghi into the starting lineup. He might not be 6'5", young, fast, or in any way intimidating, but all 'Pippo' does is score goals. Guess what? That makes him a pretty damn good striker. Italy still does not convince me, but they've got an easy road all the way to the semis. If they can beat the Socceroos, they'll face the winner of...

Switzerland vs (the) Ukraine

This is one of those match-ups that a lot of people (but not all) wouldn't expect to see in round 2 of the World Cup, two historically weak footballing nations, one of whom will make it all the way to the quarterfinals. I'll take the Swiss, but they sorely need a healthy Phillippe Senderos (how many Arsenal fans would ever have expected those words to be written a year ago?). The big defender will be counted on by the Swiss to shut down Ukraine's Andriy Shevchenko, one of the world's best strikers. This weekend will be the first edition of what should be a series of long, hard battles between these two: Senderos plays for Arsenal, while Sheva just signed for Arsenal's cross-town rivals Chelsea. My money's on Sheva to score, but the deeper, more battle-hardened Swiss to advance. Don't believe me when I call the Swiss battle-hardened? (And why would you - these are the Swiss) This is a team that, with bottles and bags of urine raining down upon them, needed an armed escort out of the stadium in Istanbul after eliminating Turkey in a World Cup play-off. And the game-winning goal that put them in round 2 was a header by Senderos, who in the process opened up a massive wound on the bridge of his nose, blood gushing down his face as he celebrated his goal.

England vs Ecuador

Another team that has been nowhere near as good as it could or should be, England continues to disappoint. Sven-Goran Eriksson has already announced that he's quitting after the Cup, but that won't stop him from hurting the team in the meantime. The British midfield desperately needs a defensive, hard-tackling ball-winner to free their two stars, Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard, for more offensive duties; Owen Hargreaves fits the bill, but it remains to be seen if Eriksson will start him and, if so, whom he will send to the bench. There have been calls for Beckham to be the one riding the pine, but he should keep his spot and Joe Cole, after a man-of-the-match performance against Sweden, has to keep his place. My guess is that he'll play with a 4-5-1, with Rooney on his own up front and Crouch - who is no great loss - on the bench. Why have I not mentioned Ecuador? Because they've had their run. Congrats on making the second round, thanks for playing, and have a safe flight back to Quito.

Portugal vs Holland

This should be the pick of the litter for the second round. Two teams that met a few years ago in Euro '04 will be at it again; Portugal won that one, but the game was played on their home turf and the Dutch have a markedly different squad. Marco Van Basten has been a coaching revelation in the past few years, having gutted the Dutch squad of many of its big-name players and called up a lot of internationally-unknown players from the Eredivisie, but it's worked wonders. The Oranje looked great in qualifying and, while not looking overly impressive in the group stage, still managed wins against Serbia & Montenegro and the Ivory Coast, as well as a draw against Argentina. This game is really a pick 'em, but I'll take Portugal; with Figo, Ronaldo, Deco, Pauleta, and more, they've just got too much firepower for Van Basten's boys. And guess what that would set up? An Eriksson-Big Phil rematch in the quarters. Giddy up!

Brazil vs Ghana

Sorry to rain on the parade here, but I'm not about to start drooling all over Ghana. It's a great Cinderella story, but this team looked good against the Czech Republic and that's about it. They looked overwhelmed at times in the opener against Italy and were under siege against the US before Markus Merk bailed them out with a gift of a penalty. And now, they'll be without Essien when they need him most. Stephen Appiah came through with a man-of-the-match performance for the Black Stars against the Americans - he'll need to be five times as good against the Samba Boys. Brazil looks to be coming together just in time, with an inspired performance to close out the group stage with a 4-1 win over Japan. Ronaldo is scoring goals again, Kaka is on-form, and Ronaldinho...well, you know he's due for a big game here. I still think Brazil looks far more beatable than anyone would have expected two weeks ago, but they'll cruise through this one. Brazil in a romp.

Spain vs France

From Cordoba to Zaragoza, everyone in Spain continues to delude themselves into thinking that this will be the year when Spain finally breaks through and makes the semifinals. As a huge admirer of la Seleccion and their high-quality, possession-oriented play, I'd love to see that happen. With a fantastic core of young players like Torres, Fabregas, Alonso, Garcia, Reyes, Joaquin, and Sergio Ramos, the potential is there. Then again, it's always there with Spain. France has looked dreadful at times this tournament and their coach, Raymond Domenech, is the Rich Kotite of world soccer, but something tells me they could win this one. Although les Bleus didn't impress against Switzerland or Korea, they were on the wrong end of some bad calls that could have changed things for them. Against Togo, they had about 59 scoring chances before scoring twice in the second half to advance; a quadruple-amputee could have done better than Franck Ribery. Unfortunately for the French, a lot depends on what Domenech does with striker David Trezeguet. Against Togo, Trezegol started in place of the suspended Zidane and was very active up front. Now Zizou will be back in the line-up against Spain, leaving Domenech with a decision to make. Here's one idea: play them both - Zidane on the left of midfield, Ribery on the right, with Henry and Trezegol up front. If Domenech does that, France could win this. Then again, seeing as Domenech makes fewer rational decisions than a drunk college kid in Vegas, the Spanish armada will probably live to sink another day. One more thing: there's a Spanish word, "morbo", that doesn't really have a direct translation to English, but it basically means a combination of "history", "rivalry", "intrigue" and "hatred" (Phil Ball wrote a fantastic book titled "Morbo" - for a history of Spanish soccer but even more importantly amazing insight into the country of Spain, read it). For example, there is a ton of "morbo" between Barcelona, a club symbolic of all things Catalan, independent, and liberal, and Real Madrid, symbolic of Castilla, Spain, Franco, and conservative tradition. A more American example of this would be the rivalry between the Red Sox and Yankees. Consider these examples of "morbo" between France and Spain: Zizou, in what could be his last game ever, will be playing against many of his old teammates from Real Madrid; Henry gets his chance to exact some revenge for a racial slur directed at him by Spain's coach Luis Aragones last year, when he encouraged Reyes, a teammate of Henry's at Arsenal, to "show that black s*** that you're better than him"; and it was none other than the French who eliminated the Spanish six years ago at Euro '00, when Raul skied his penalty over the bar and sent the Spanish home broken-hearted yet again. All of this "morbo" should make for one highly-charged encounter, one that will in all likelihood come down to a few breaks here and there - given the Spaniards' track record, the aficionados in the land of sangria & siestas have plenty of cause for concern. I'm picking la Furia Roja to win it, but a confident pick it is most certainly not.

Whoever advances to the Elite 8, this is shaping up to be a great series of elimination rounds: all of the top teams, save the Czech Republic, have qualified for the knock-out phase. Potential quarter and semi-final match-ups are as mouth-watering as even the most optimistic soccer fan could have hoped for when the tournament began. Even if there are some upsets in the sweet 16 - and more likely than not there will be - the most likely underdogs to advance are teams like Holland, France, Mexico and Ukraine, all of whom would still be worthy quarterfinal opponents. There will be no Senegals or Turkeys in the semis this time around, which should make for some amazing games in the next two weeks. More than anything else, let's all hope that these games aren't marred by horrific decisions by the referees. It's been a disastrous 48 hours for these guys: yesterday Graham Poll showed three yellow cards to the same player and Markus Merk awarded a non-existent penalty against the US; today Horacio Elizondo allowed a Swiss goal despite his assistant clearly flagging for offside and Jorge Larriondo (Balboa's favorite) failed to award the Tunisians a penalty for a Ukranian handball and then just minutes later called a highly dubious penalty in favor of Ukraine. Please, on behalf of the world I beg you, stop the insanity!