The People’s Game Radio Show – 06/29/10
The People’s Game Radio Show for Tuesday June 29, 2010
We keep it simple today with a roundtable discussion about the latest games and the ill-fated Inarritu Nike add where, with Ronaldo’s exit, all the featured stars are now exiled from the mundial. Tony Presido joins us to examine how Spain has turned it around. Then Lukas, a Slovakian blogger in the far east, discusses one of the darlings of the tournament, his home nation which slayed the defending champions, and conveys the passion for the World Cup in Hong Kong.
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Your regular panelist Jennifer Doyle doesn’t know much about football. How anyone can say Portugal is one of the “better teams” in the tournament is hilarious. Certainly no one on the more informed UK/European/Latin American media and blogs view them that way. All they have is an excellent defense – and that’s it. A very poor attack. They could not create anything, in fact they created almost nothing in any of their games. Very poor football.
Also, Fabregas, Iniesta and Pique all appear in that Nike ad.
And you haven’t talked about the fact that Europeans never win outside Europe. Spain will not win this tournament.
Your Spanish panelist is quite wrong about Fabregas. When Spain was struggling in the earlier games, it was obvious they needed Fabregas – and when he did come on, the team looked livelier, more direct. Until he came on, Spain looked blunt and clueless. Against Portugal, Spain finally stepped it up and looked great. But to say that Fabregas isn’t needed bears little relation to reality, as the team would not have struggled so much in the earlier games if del Bosque had started with the more direct, more physical Fabregas. In the upcoming matches, against tough defensive sides, Spain may find they need him very much.
Also, both del Bosque and Villa have said how important Torres has been to enable Villa to score goals. His work on the pitch has been essential in giving Villa space and time to score.