The World Cup starts tomorrow, and although we won’t be able to make it to S. Africa in the flesh, I will happily be following along on my couch, in random bars, and various apartments and houses, surrounded by dear friends.
Today Norris (he loves when I name drop him in my blog), asked my opinions on how things will shake down, specifically with the US. I’ve been thinking about it, but not really thinking about it: I’m not usually one for predictions, but as I started to look more closely at their group and the other groups and once I found this bracket, I figured, “oh, why the hell not? It’d be fun to be right, and it’d be interesting to see how wrong I am.” Plus, I thought it might be fun to see what others had to say about it…
I didn’t guess the goal spread and I didn’t really heartily review any sort of “expert commentary” to create this list. I relied in part on the information I do know, in part on my personal opinion, and in part on what I would like to see happen.
Below if my bracket following Round of 16 up to the Final. But in case you’re not interested in diagrams, my bottom line prediction is Argentina takes it from Brazil in a 2-1 game. Italy gets 3rd.
Discuss among yourselves.Round of 16Quarter-finalsSemi-finalsFinal26 June – Port ElizabethFrance2 July – JohannesburgS. Korea
France26 June – Rustenburg
England England6 July – Cape TownGhana
England28 June – Durban
Brazil Denmark2 July – Port ElizabethSlovakia
Denmark28 June – Johannesburg
Brazil Brazil11 July – JohannesburgChile
Brazil27 June – JohannesburgArgentina Argentina3 July – Cape TownMexico
Argentina27 June – Bloemfontein
Germany Germany7 July – DurbanUSA
Argentina29 June – Pretoria
ItalyThird place Italy3 July – Johannesburg10 July – Port ElizabethJapan
Italy
England29 June – Cape Town
Spain
Italy SpainPortugal