World Cup 2010

[Destined]

Spain was expected to steamroll through the tournament until they got to Brazil in the final. Instead, they struggled with Paraguay, Honduras, Chile and Portugal, and lost to the always forgotten Swiss. They simply played down to their competition. Germany was expected to be the flopping power, and struggle in their second choice "group of death" with the Serbs and Ghana. They absolutely destroyed Argentina, shutting them down completely. Did you watch? Because any hype from that game that they got, was all deserved. Today, Germany got it right back as Spain <i>finally</i> put together a full game, but yet they only could score once. Germany had so few chances and couldn't create anything until the pre-pubescent, 20 year old Toni Kroos came on late. Spain surely deserved to win it, but the way Spain played, it could have been 3 or 4-nil. They missed a ton of chances, had trouble finishing, and were stopped by pretty good goalkeeping. That's how Spain has fared all tournament. Villa and Alonso missed PKs, Torres has struggled, and Xavi hasn't been Xavi. Germany however were without Ballack, featured an aging Klose, started two young and inexperienced attackers in Muller(just 2 pre-World Cup caps) and Ozil(10 caps), and had to replace Kahn and Lehman in net with a young Manuel Neuer(5 caps). A side being full of inexperienced players in key roles is "over hyped"? Please. All those question marks are what carried them. Ozil and Muller might be co-Young Players of the Tournment, Neuer has been sensational and Klose could still pass Ronaldo in World Cup goals if he nets a pair against Uruguay. Just like with the US, Germany is my favorite team in the world. And just like the Yanks, I'll take how they played in South Africa every day of the week, they surpassed expectations and didn't beat themselves. I hope Germany gets to play Spain in two years in Ukraine/Poland at Euro 2012, because by then Spain's window will be closing, and Germany will be a fucking machine. Kroos and Muller are 20, Ozil is 25 and Neuer is still a young keeper at only 24, it's going to be a long decade, señor.