Well, that went a lot better than I'd expected. Weird thing to say after a 3-1 loss but given our limitations and inexperience - and how useless we were in the first 15-20 minutes - I wouldn't have been surprised if there'd been a blowout. Having said that, our set pieces were terrible and the second goal was just embarrassing - three blokes standing around admiring their opponents instead of actually defending harked back to the bad old days when we'd play the likes of Argentina and some star-struck "professional" would gibber about hoping to get some of Maradona's sweat on him. Chile probably deserved the win but (even though I'm obviously biased) I reckon 2-1 would have been fair enough and 2-2 would have worked, too. Football isn't fair, though, and the third goal was just cruel.
Thank God for Tim Cahill. The bloke is brilliant. We'll be screwed when he retires.
Missed the Mexico-Cameroon game but Spain-Holland was a bit of an eye-opener. Not having seen either side play since the last World Cup I wasn't sure what to expect but seeing Spain basically fall apart was remarkable. Maybe if Silva had gone for a percentage play instead of the smart-arse effort he attempted and Spain had gone 2-0 up, it might have been different. As it was, van Persie's bit of brilliance and some remarkably inept defending and keeping made the result almost inevitable. Given the performances of both teams I'm not really looking forward to our matches against them. It's hard to imagine that Spain could be that appalling again and Holland could destroy us.
