It's Hitler's Moment.

As I think I explain every time the Olympics is primarily a political event that those in power desperately try to pretend has something to do with sport. By contrast the World Cup is all about sport but being watched by roughly 1 in every 2 people on the planet and seriously followed by roughly 1 in every 7 it can't help but attract the attention of those in power. So while the Olympics is a rather intellectual affair where nobody cares who wins or loses provided lots of political points are scored the World Cup is all about passion.

Unfortunately we saw absolutely none of that in today's first game in Group H between Belgium and Russia. This was almost entirely Belgium's fault. As I explained following their match against Algeria Belgium have been making a big thing about the issue of racism in football. Rather then being an attempt to eliminate racism from football this was all about putting pressure on football's World governing body FIFA and Russia who will host the 2018 World Cup. A significant part of the reason why FIFA awarded the 2018 tournament to Russia is that there is a significant problem with racism and neo-Nazism amongst football fans in that part of the World as you would know if you've paid even the slightest bit of attention to the current unrest in Russia's neighbour Ukraine. So by awarding the 2018 tournament to Russia FIFA was hoping to tackle racism and neo-Nazism in the same way that Russia was awarded the 2014 Winter Olympics in an effort to tackle homophobia.

The problem is that - for reasons known only to them - Belgium's long-term ally Britain got it into their heads that they were going to be awarded the 2018 World Cup. The UK Queen even went so far as to record a Christmas message in which she basically boasted about hosting the 2018 World Cup. Since then Britain has been throwing one of the longest tantrums in sporting history. So Belgium was bringing up racism in football to put pressure on FIFA to strip Russia of the 2018 World Cup and award it to the UK instead by going; "Russia can't have the World Cup - that's racist!"

With the head of FIFA - Sepp Blatter - sitting side by side with the Belgian King throughout the game at that high temple of football - the Maracana stadium neither the Russian players nor the Belgium players wanted to do anything worth commenting on. This lead to 90 minutes of what was effectively just standing. Things got so bad that I'm pretty sure that Russia's Glushakov intentionally put the ball wide of the goal in the 74th minute specifically to avoid scoring the winning goal.

Possibly the only action of the match occurred when Belgium's Hazard walked through Russia's defence before passing it to Origi who slotted it into the net for the winning goal. This all happened in the 88th minute. The 8th letter of the Latin alphabet which is used in English and other European languages is "H." As such "88" as often used as code for "HH" which is the initials for the famous German phrase "Heil Hitler" which essentially means salvation and good health to Adolf Hitler the leader of Nazi Germany. As such neo-Nazis will use "88" as a way to covertly celebrate Hitler. Some of the more extreme neo-Nazi football gangs have even been known to spontaneously burst into a standing ovation during the 88th minute of football matches for no apparent reason.

So rather then being a fantastic Belgian achievement this struck me more as Russia sending Belgium into the last 16 in a very Olympic fashion. It may have also have been an act of charity for the other two teams in the group giving them both a chance of making it through to the last 16.

Much like the USA the Republic of Korea (South Korea/RoK) are very new to football and are still learning how to play at the top level. In contrast Algeria is a nation with a long and passionate footballing tradition. Unfortunately like most other North African nations their domestic league is poorly funded and France keeps stealing all their best players. As a result Algeria have never really achieved the international success their fans so desperately crave. Having both lost their opening games neither South Korea nor Algeria have a single point in this World Cup. So by losing to Belgium Russia stayed on 1 point giving both Algeria and RoK a chance of going through if they drew this game and then won their final games against Russia and Belgium respectively.

However it is clear that Algeria didn't want to risk drawing with Russia so set about the second Group H game of the day with all the gusto and passion that was missing from the days first. Attacking from the outset Algeria's Slimani banged a left-footed shot into the bottom corner of the net to put his team 1-0 up in the 26th minute. Two minutes later Halliche put Algeria with a header from a corner-kick. Defending set pieces are one of the areas of their game that RoK need to develop. In the 38th minute Djabou put Algeria 3-0 up with a left-footed shot into the bottom corner of the goal.

Having established a 3-0 lead by half-time Algeria were prepared to sit back in the second. This allowed RoK to get one back with Son getting on the end of a through ball from Ki to slot home in the 50th minute. Proving that they were resting not giving up Algeria got a fourth when Brahimi put home a right-footed shot from the centre of the penalty area in the 62nd minute. It was at this point that I stopped watching and started writing this because trying to write up three hours of football in 45 minutes is killing me. However I gather Koo got a second for RoK in the 72nd minute and that's how it ended.

As such Belgium are already through to the last 16 with 6 points while any one of Algeria (3 points), Russia (1 point) or RoK (1 point) could also still go through. However Algeria now look the most likely only needing to draw with Russia and hope that RoK don't secure an unlikely win against Belgium by a very high goal margin.

21:20 on 22/6/14 (UK date).

Edited around 00:05 on 23/6/14 (UK date) to add;

The final match of the day saw the USA take on Portugal in Group G. This match was played in Manaus which is deep in the Amazon rain forest. So although temperatures are on average 10-15C lower then they are in Qatar it is still brutally hot. As a result it is pretty much impossible to play high-tempo football which even the fittest South American players often being more interested in finding an excuse to have a little lie down then scoring goals.

Hope for an exciting game pretty much died then on 5 minutes when Portugal's Nani blasted a right-footed shot past the USA 'keeper who was already having a little bit of a lie down. With this one goal lead Portugal then proceeded to rest their players for their final game against Ghana thinking that there was no way the US could get back into the match. So there was lots of slow, neat passing and Ronaldo got plenty of opportunity to show off  his ball skills.

As such I thought most of my write up of this game would be about the fact that Portugal's Christiano Ronaldo always plays in the number 7 shirt so has trademarked the phrase "CR7." I think this is a little unfair because CR7 is also the start of my Croydon postal/ZIP code. Therefore if there was to be political gossip about  the match most of it would have centred on how effective the US had been at containing the threat presented by CR7. After all although he's not as good as he likes to think he is and Portugal are certainly not a one man team Ronaldo is certainly a player capable of causing the USA (and most others) a fair few problems. Meanwhile the UK have certainly been trying to portray my local area as the most dangerous place on earth. As such I have to say that for the most part this was largely a moot point because Ronaldo - along with most of his teammates - did most of the work containing themselves.

Then in the 72nd (while I was in the bathroom) the USA's Jermaine Jones equalised with a curling right-foot shot from around 20 yards out. Although this wasn't quite as good as Lionel Messi's goal for Argentina against Iran that inspired it it was certainly worthy of the comparison and most people were just shocked that the USA had scored at all.

We got even more surprised in the 82nd minute when the USA took the lead with the goal that really showed off the composure of Clint Dempsey. Basically Zusi stuck a low cross into the 6 yard box. Although this picked out Dempsey who was in space it was a little too high to kick but a little too low to head. So Dempsey rather calmly took it on the belly and scored anyway.

As we entered the 95th minute (90+ 5 minutes stoppage time) we were all starting to entertain the almost unbelievable idea that the USA could win and go top of the group with 6 points while Portugal could be knocked out with 0 points. Then Ronaldo made a long run down the right-wing before crossing into the box to Varela who stuck his head on it and equalised with what was the last meaningful kick of the game.

Having come so close to victory the USA fans in the stadium looked despondent but they'll do well to remember that with 4 points they are joint top of the group with Germany. This means that in order to qualify for the last 16 both Ghana and Portugal will have to win their final game against each other and hope that the USA will lose to Germany. Although they may want to punish them for their impudence the USA could even beat a Germany that's already resting up for the last 16 and win the group.

Before I go though it is the law that I have to say; "Gee America - I bet you wish you'd better controlled the threat from CR7!"

(Originally Posted on 22/6/14)