With a single goal in extra time, Spain defeated the Netherlands to lift the World Cup and become only the eighth country to do so in the eponymous tournament’s 80-year history.
Deserving winners? Yes, unquestionably.
Spain may have been the lowest-scoring team ever to win the tournament, but at times showed immense ability. Against Germany their tiki-taka style of quick but accurate passing allowed them to dominate possession and neutralize the most dangerous offense in South Africa. The final might not have lived up to expectations, with Spain failing to show the same sort of passing fluency, but this can be explained by the aggressive approach of the Dutch.
Referee Howard Webb set a record when he handed out nine yellow cards to the Netherlands and five to Spain, but it could–and probably should–have been many more. Several tackles by the Dutch will have left the Spanish players feeling more than a little bruised the morning after, and it was hollow justice when Johnny Heitinga was eventually sent off in extra time.
Mark van Bommel should have been given a second yellow card for several bad tackles in the first half, and Nigel de Jong’s studs-up karate-style kick into the chest of Xabi Alonso deserved nothing less than a straight red card. Whether or not de Jong had malicious intent in his “high tackle,” it was an extraordinarily dangerous and stupid thing to do. He could well have broken Alonso’s ribs and left his own team a man short for the bulk of the game.
Just surviving the Dutch assault is reason enough for Spain to feel proud. But even with such talent, the eventual winners emerged with a far from untarnished record.
Spain became the first team to lose its opening game but still win the tournament. Though I doubt many on the streets of Madrid and Barcelona even care right now, just a month ago serious doubts were being raised that the Spanish would even reach the knockout round after Switzerland’s shocking 1-0 victory.
There are, however, two entities that finished this tournament with their reputations unscathed: one sea creature and one small island nation.
Paul the Psychic Octopus became a worldwide celebrity by predicting the results of Germany’s matches (and the final) from his tank in Oberhausen. Before each game he would be offered two boxes, each containing a mussel or an oyster for him to eat and marked with the flags of the two opposing teams. He would choose the winning side by opening the appropriate box and eating the food inside.
It’s not the first time Paul has been called in to offer his thoughts on the German team–he was consulted for the Euro 2008 tournament–but the first time he got the results 100 percent right.
In a World Cup that seemed to defy prediction, eight correct results in eight games seems a pretty impressive feat. After Germany destroyed Australia in the first game, few–apart from one brave invertebrate–predicted a loss to Serbia.
But the odds of picking just a handful of results correctly aren’t exactly staggering: 1/256. Though I’d love to imagine he has some kind of psychic powers or even the ability to influence the results, the cold-hearted scientist in me just doesn’t buy it. After all, Paul would never have wanted Germany to do so well; he was hatched in Weymouth–he’s English.
In comparison to predicting the outcome of a few games, New Zealand had a lot more stacked against it. The land of the long white cloud is not known for its football, with its cricket and especially rugby teams making the biggest waves on the international stage.
Its much larger neighbor, Australia, was the biggest fish in the Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) until it jumped ship in 2006 to seek the challenge of playing in Asia. This opened a path for the Kiwis, and victory over fifth-place Asian team Bahrain qualified them for only their second-ever World Cup.
Only hosts South Africa and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea were ranked lower than No. 78 New Zealand, and while Group F might not have been a typical “Group of Death,” it did include then-reigning champion Italy. No one expected the All Whites to get out of the group stage, and they didn’t.
But at the same time, no one expected the Kiwis to finish ahead of Italy, yet they did.
A team with nine players from clubs in New Zealand and two without clubs entirely left its mark by scoring first against a team picked from the ranks of the Italian superpowers. It entered the final group game with a realistic chance of qualifying for the knockout stage, and while that ultimately did not happen, the Kiwis probably found a few new fans along the way.
They may not have dazzled us with skill, but they stayed together and never gave up in a performance made all the more admirable by the antics of global superstars like the French, who petulantly imploded as the world’s media watched on.
And Stanford can be proud of this. Proud that its first ever representation at a World Cup, All Whites players Simon Elliot ’99 and Ryan Nelsen ’01, left with heads held high, undefeated.