Headline of the week: Has to be: "Ricardo the weak link", in Saturday's Telegraph, over an article by Bob Wilson. Granted, he was talking about the Portuguese goalkeeper's general ability (or lack of it), not his penalty-saving skills, but still. In hindsight, a touch unfortunate.
Tributes to England
"England are through thanks to a big stork (maybe with avian flu) called Peter Crouch, whose football sounds as bad as his name and whose photos can't be published even in a family scrapbook." Italian newspaper La Repubblica.
"Eriksson decided to make Crouch, a two-metre asparagus, the constant reference point. Their football is flat, grotesque and contaminating." Spanish newspaper El Pais.
"England continues its absurd World Cup campaign. With each passing game, it gets worse." Spanish newspaper El Pams.
"England, the home of football, should be grateful that the WAGs (wives and girlfriends), anorexics addicted to shopping with hollow, lobotomised heads, are in Germany, there to detract from their team's poor football skills." Brazil's Gazeta Esportiva.
Spat of the week
Der Spiegel (German weekly magazine): "The Italians are slimy, parasitic, big mummy's boys."
Rino Gattuso (Italy): "The editor of Der Spiegel maybe wrote those things because his wife betrayed him with an Italian, or maybe because he's been beaten up by an Italian."
Poll of the week
(Not Graham). Last we looked, Ecuador's Luis Valencia was, somewhat bizarrely, leading Fifa's poll for the Best Young Player of the World Cup, just ahead of Cristiano Ronaldo. Lagging a little behind is England's third-choice goalkeeper, Scott Carson, who has only impressed 566 voters by the way he's thrown water bottles on to the pitch for his team-mates. Theo Walcott, though, isn't out of contention yet, he's already amassed 2,626 votes. True, England are out of the World Cup, but we sense that isn't necessarily relevant for those voting in this particular poll.
Most devoted fan
"When the neighbours shouted 'fire!', I took my little baby and ran out in my nightclothes. My husband paid no attention to the danger, just grabbed the television and put it under his arm. After getting out of the house, he then set about finding an electric socket to plug in and continue watching his game."
The wife of a Beijing man who refused to allow the small matter of his house going on fire disturb his viewing of the game between France and Spain. Fair enough.
Fail-safe flutter
You could get 13 to 8 on Franz Beckenbauer being shown on television more often than Diego Maradona during the Germany v Argentina game. When we didn't see Maradona appear once on the screen we began to suspect the television director had had a flutter on Franz. Not so, turned out Diego went off in a huff when they wouldn't allow one of his pals in with him to the game (because, according to Fifa, he had been "rude repeatedly during the World Cup and even became almost physically aggressive"). So, 13 to 8 proved to be very lovely odds indeed.
Grumpy pundit
"I'm tired of Scots emailing, texting and constantly calling the BBC, banging on about England not deserving any luck. If they had a footballing nation to be proud of like I do with England, then they'd have something else to shout about."
Who else but Ian Wrightie Wright.
Some, eh, tributes
"Joe has got broad shoulders and big nuts."
- John Terry doffs his cap to Joe Cole.
"Kasey Keller is a very educated man - he wears spectacles off the pitch."
- Commentator John Helm on the US goalkeeper.
Chancer of the week
The Chinese entrepreneur who is selling "World Cup air" for 5 a bag. "The air was packed at the World Cup venues while the workers were cutting the grass before matches," explained Li Jie, "you can still smell the grass."
Jie suggests that World Cup fans hang the bags around their necks so they can breathe in the, eh, German air while watching games. "And whichever stadium you like, I can give you its air," he declared. Chancer. (We opted for the Berlin stadium bag).
Most curious
"I have black, Gypsy and Japanese friends, including one whose job is to determine the sex of poultry."
- Spanish coach Luis Aragones. What can you say? Not a lot.
So professional
No contest for Commentator of the Week: Huang Jianxiang of Chinese television for his impartial response to Italy winning a last-minute penalty against Australia, and then converting it: "Penalty! Penalty! Penalty! Grosso's done it! Grosso's done it! The great Italian left back! He succeeded in the glorious traditions of Italy! Facchetti, Cabrini and Maldini, their souls are infused in him at this moment!
"Grosso represents the long history and traditions of Italian soccer, he's not fighting alone at this moment! He's not alone!
"Goooooal! Game over! Italy win! Beat the Australians! They do not fall in front of Hiddink again! Italy the great! Left back the great! Happy birthday to Maldini! Forza Italia! The victory belongs to Italy, to Grosso, to Cannavaro, to Zambrotta, to Buffon, to Maldini, to everyone who loves Italian soccer!
"Hiddink . . . lost all his courage faced with Italian history and traditions . . . He finally reaped fruits which he had sown! They should go home. They don't need to go as far away as Australia as most of them are living in Europe. Farewell!"
When ordered to apologise for his outburst, Jianxiang confirmed pretty much what we knew already: "I don't like Australians indeed."
