kick off

well, last night, it finally kicked off at 1:00 am here in korea. more than ten of us--meaning non-koreans, save for my wife-- met up at a neighbourhood pub to enjoy the festivities. we arrived around 12:15-12:30 to settle in. the pub was far from full, of course, being after midnight and involving matches in which korea weren't playing. the pub's servers have witnessed our descent onto their pub before (but they've seen nothing like they'll see tonight for the england match!) and they kindly put up with our demands for beer, beer, and more beer--and not a few plates of snacks, too. our table of about ten was divided between fans for germany (including taylor, gene, marc, and dylbut), fans for costa rica (led by carlos and me), and fans for "who cares?" the rest of the pub dwellers, all koreans, were heavily in favour of the host germans, not the least of which because the most famous korean footballer ever plied his professional trade in germany and now his son is following in his footsteps.

match 1: germany v. costa rica

after a clicking of glasses and enduring the obligatory nuisance that drunk koreans professionally possess once they're drunk and they see a band of non-koreans barge into a place, we got down to the business of watching the match. just at kickoff, dylbut decided that he wanted to bet me KRW10,000 that germany would win. of course, i couldn't resist and took him up on it.

within 6 minutes, much to my and carlos's chagrin, the damned bavarians scored, which sent most of the patrons in the pub (and 80 million of the host nation's inhabitants) into paroxysms of joy--including marc's way-in-my-and-carlos's-face celebration, as if he were german and we really costa rican. that's another of the million great things about the world cup: you pick a team in a match between two teams to which you have no allegiance and then, for 90 minutes, cheer them on as if your life depended on it. it's a beautiful thing to taunt or be taunted about a match involving two teams you really could give a rat's scrotum about.

fortunately for the costa rican contingent, the "ticos" scored about 7 minutes later and all was square, 1-1. it was satisfying to hear the silence among the german dolts in the crowd, but it wouldn't last long as the costa rican defense got loose again and allowed the teutonic plague bearers to score again. the pub erupted again and carlos and i began to realise that the it was going to be tough for the "ticos" to win the match if they kept up their shoddy defending. hello? don't they teach in central america to mark opponents when they have the ball deep in your end? and why were the "ticos" defenders giving the germans so much space? you could've landed a space shuttle in the area between the german players when they had ball possession and their costa rican defensive counterparts. it was pathetic defending.

however, when the first half ended, the score was still 2-1, germany, meaning that as poorly as the central americans had played, all it took was a flukey goal and it would all be level again. it truly was mystifying how germany only led, 2-1, after dominating as they had the first half.

the second half wasn't much better for the "ticos", as they continued giving up launching pad-sized areas of the pitch to germany. when the bavarians scored the inevitable third goal--on a goal where the scorer was more closely marked by a drunk liz sitting in our pub in korea than any of the costa rican players on the pitch. costa rica tried to give us a lifeline by pulling one back in the 73rd minute, but it was all for naught when the germans scored their fourth and final goal of the match, a goal that very well could stand up for the next four weeks as the goal of the tournament, first game or not. i mean, it was a fantastic pile-driver of a shot that three goalkeepers wouldn't have been able to stop. that shot should've come with a "sharp curve ahead" sign tacked on it. if it weren't for the fact that the match was played in the home of the "autobahn," it most likely would've been ticketed for speeding and endangerment to all sentient beings. sensational shot, torgsten frings.

thus, the match ended with the hosts whipping a disappointing costa rican side, 4-2.

match 2: poland v. ecuador

by this time, it was after 3am and i was already thinking some 19 hours ahead to tonight's england game, so seung-hee and decided to call it a night at the pub and head home where i could watch this match in peace. again, it was a match involving two teams toward which i have no allegiances, but it's the world cup, so you watch anyway. i decided to stick with my pro-latin american allegiance and threw my hat on the pitch in favour of ecuador. by the time kickoff sauntered around at 4am, i was very sleepy and, in fact, dosed off and missed the first quarter-hour. i was able to stay awake for awhile after that and noticed that ecuador was the stronger of the two teams, surprising in the fact that south american squads normally don't play well in european world cups and doubly so because i thought poland would make a better effort this time around after embarrassing themselves in 2002.

justice was served in the 24th minute when the equatorialists were rewarded for being the better side on a nice heading goal to take the lead, 0-1. i lost track of time through resting eyelids until around the 70th minute, only to see that i'd missed nothing, since the score was still the same. a few minutes of watching confirmed how little i'd missed, as the south americans were still running their staid european counterparts ragged. a fine performance by ecuador--from what i understand--was capped off ten minutes from time when they doubled their score on a fine goal. at that point--around 5:30am, the sky light from what would have been the sun had it not been brutally kidnaped by a gang of thuggish clouds--i figured it was time for bed. no way ecuador would give up two goals in ten minutes to a team that had, until that point, looked less likely to score than tom cruise at a brooke shields orgy. no way, right?

well, fortunately, my confidence was not battered by a miraculous polish comeback. final score: poland 0, ecuador 2.

all in all, not a bad start to the 2006 rendition of the world cup at all. what impressed me: eight goals in two matches, the overall performance from ecuador, the offensive performance from germany, the fine effort from the scorer of costa rica's two goals (paulo wanchope), and frings's goal. what disappointed or didn't impress me: germany's shaky defense, costa rica's worse defense and, aside from the two goals, their inability to create much offense, and poland's overall play.

can't wait for matchday 2 to start in several hours.