S. Korea/Japan '02
My first summer in the sweltering heat of Chicago, with no AC. I should be grateful that the games were at 2am, but it was still damn hot. This is the world cup I don't remember so much about, and the sleep deprivation is to blame there. I'm sorry to admit that I did start to stay in bed for a lot of the games in the group stages, as I ran out of steam.
England re-united with their hated foes, the Argentinians, and many of the same players were there from the first time, so it was all the more anticipated. The game itself didn't have the same spark that the two teams found in France '98, but certainly, given the history of the two nations, you can't blame the reaction from Beckham's penalty that won the game:
I am so glad Beckham held his nerve there.
The French were just abysmal, it's almost as if the malaise that infected the forwards in France '98 spread throughout the squad. Senegal had their day, in their first game of the tournament, by beating their old colonial power:
Two of their players were poached by Houllier for Liverpool, before the tournament, but neither of them turned out well for the Reds, though Diouf (seen assisting on the goal) seemed to have cured his spitting syndrome and is doing OK with Blackburn.
We went out against Brazil, and I remember anticipating a good run for us, because I believed we could have beaten Turkey in the semi-final, and handled whoever reached the final, even though it could have been the Germans, especially if it was the Germans, given how we unloaded on them in the qualifiers. The memory of standing in a pub shouting "We want six! We want six!" is one of my favourites, sorry Ernst.
The two moments that summed the England-Brazil game for me was Beckham's turnover leading to Rivaldo's goal. I couldn't find a youtube video showing the moment, but before Ronaldhino took off down our midfield, Beckham was supposedly shepherding a ball out of play, ready to claim the throw-in, but he jumped when someone went for the ball, and they claimed it back for Brazil right under his studs, sparking the counter-attack. Ronaldhino was able to advance because the English were still thinking, "what happened to that free-throw?!". The other general moment was our inability to break down Brazil's defense, when they were down to 10 men, which was unfathomable, Brazil playing defensively?!
Korea had a good run in this tournament, beating Italy to make the semi-finals. This 7 minutes video shows a game that is everything that you expect from the World Cup, and is very entertaining to watch:
Ahn Jung Hwan who became the hero by scoring the game-winning goal, was fired by his Italian boss! (He was playing for Perugia at the time). Take note of the journeyman coach of Korea, Guus Hiddink, he's got the Midas touch, and I think it's a shame that he couldn't get Russia through the playoffs, because I've no doubt they would have won a few games, no disrespect to Slovenia.
Finally, Ronaldo had his day, if not a hair-stylist, it was a mundane final, but an inevitable result:
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