Ivory Coast Are The New Croatia

It’s now well accepted that Slaven Bilic’s dive to get Lauren Blanc sent off in the 1998 semi-final was the most cynical bit of cheating in recent World Cups. However, the bit of Ivory Coast cheating to get Kaka sent off in this match has elevated cheating to a new high. Keita, who dumped himself to the floor having run into Kaka, has effectively lied to the entire planet and cheated his way into the record books. Like Croatia, let’s now hope that Ivory Coast get everything they so richly deserve and are consummately dumped out of this competition. You could argue that Keita is merely aping the floppy diving style of renowned primadonna Diveba, whose writhing on the floor is legendary, but it’s not acceptable here.

Brazil Are Beginning To Turn It On, Ivory Coast Turn It Off

3 – 0 up and Brazil start to play some nice little passing things, but they were given a bit of licence in that Ivory Coast failed to play the Mourinho Discipline. You have to suspect that, like most of the African teams here, they don’t have the inclination or the managerial instruction to do this. You would have thought that a team that boasted both Toure bothers and Zakora would have the nous to be able to play a more accomplished defence (or indeed a more adventurous attack). I recall the Ivory Coast from the last World Cup and they were just a fantastic dynamic attacking side, whose progress was only impeded by being in the Group of Death with Holland and Argentina. This World Cup, in addition to giving them the kind of draw that would make you feel that FIFA is against you, has seen them become less adventurous, interesting and turned them to the dark side of football.

Brazil Are Going To Explode

And not just in a footballing sense. They will be a bit grumpy about Kaka’s sending off and will be pretty insistent that FIFA rescind it. In some ways it doesn’t matter, Kaka will only be suspended for one game and Brazil have all but qualified – their match against Portugal is something of a formality. But you would like to see some kind of justice done. Also it is an indication of the pressure that the refs are going to come under in the latter stages of the tournament, where grabbing and manhandling in the box are likely to be rife and every incident is going to be viewed from multiple camera angles in high definition. It will only take one really bad decision for FIFA to be getting out the video replay machines.

29 Down 35 To Go 31 Teams Remaining