Goodbye Little Miss Critic.

Congratulations to Germany

When the days leading to the football world’s biggest competition – the world cup crept by, I wondered how I was going to get through an entire month of watching a sport I no longer had interest in. I say no interest because after my brother left everything I knew about the English Premier League, Champions League and basically the Football world’s machinations flew out the window during those years of his absence.
As luck would have it; the matches took place later in the night and the month has gone by surprisingly fast. Since he is around, watching some of the matches together brought back a little of the interest and the critic I used to be. It was never my intention to critique the matches and players because my knowledge on the current football world is a smidgen not enough to act as evidence in a court of law somewhere.

In my opinion, it was the beginning of the end for Brazil after that boring opening ceremony. The country is known for it’s vibrancy, colour, dances, some famous models and the ever popular carnival but it chose to tout the rainforest and river like those were its selling points. Not forgetting the performance from Jennifer Lopez, Claudia Leitte and Pitbull which was fraught with problems from poor audio to malfunctioning lift. Even the promise of Shakira’s honest hips couldn’t make me sit through the closing ceremony after that debacle.

Honestly, Brazil put up a less than spectacular performance from the get go. They were floundering in all their games. There was nothing reminiscent of it’s former glory with all the young men on the team and their 7-1 defeat proved it. Before the defeat, I’d caught the news earlier where an anchor said, ‘Germany was looking forward to beating Brazil on Brazilian soil’ and it tickled me pink. Kaka who had World Cup experience hadn’t been called to the national team. I might be wrong but I believe his four matches weren’t used up. Germany had 40 year old Klose for goodness’s sake and Netherlands had Diego Forlan!

I wasn’t really into the tournament until the need to thoroughly annoy my brother arose. Oddly enough;  whatever I said just to irritate him came to pass. On Brazil’s defeat, I threw it out there the final would be between Germany/Argentina before Argentina and Netherlands battled. The realist in me knew Germany was taking it because those Germans had played quite a good and sometimes aggressive game. It somehow felt as if it was their time.

I’m glad the tournament ended. I felt so sad for the Argentines when they saw the chance of winning the cup on their nemesis’ turf explode into nothing after the Germans scored. You could literary see the disappointment and heartbreak on their faces plus the endless crying. The cameras kept showing Messi and his demeanour, his attitude with the receipt of the golden ball and medal. I kept thinking the lack of privacy is what reigned in his urge to cry and he would so once off the pitch.
That has been my time at the World Cup. And now that it is over, little Miss critic shall now go into retirement! I can not promise her return in four years but then again, who knows?