Orange Futures
By Mark Daniell
07/07/2010
The Dutchies Pass (on the left hand side)
Arjen In Nether Netherlands
Dutch Clog Uruguayan Dyke
Are just some of the headlines you won’t have read this morning. Poor old headlines, for every predictable Dutch of Class that gets through, there’s an Orange U-Turn that gets left on the cutting room floor. Well, not here. Not today.
Anyway, we’ve got football to consider, so putting aside questions about whether Van Persie was onside (he wasn’t), or interfering with play (he was); whether Uruguay should even be there (they shouldn’t, but only because Gyan should have scored that penalty) or how Sneijder is top scorer (he oughtn’t be) let’s cut to the chase: Who do we want to get to the final?
Spain pros
1. We have no grudge against the Spanish.
2. They’ve been consistently the top team in Europe and arguably the world for the last four years.
3. It’ll guarantee a new World Cup winner.
4. They’ll probably beat the Dutch, who, in spite of Dirky Kuyt, are a hard to love bunch. It’s not so much the diving that narks about Robben as his insitence that he’s genuinely wounded. Did they not have the little boy who cried wolf in Dutch nurseries? And that doesn’t take into account Van Persie (plainly an ass) or the ever more powerful ‘Van Bommel effect’.
5. The octopus has said the Germans will lose. If they then do it either means the Germans really do have a sports predicting octopus, or they believe they do so strongly they inadvertently act out its commands. Either way, the coincidence will be strong enough to give the thing its own daytime chat show, which the world needs.
Spain cons
1. It fails to give us a Germany Holland final, which would be a delightful grudge match.
2. Spain haven’t played any good football this World Cup, in spite of what Clive Tyldesley spouts.
Total: +3
Germany pros
1. It’ll give them the opportunity to lose a final to the Dutch, which would hurt more than any number of disallowed goals.
2. They’ve played the best football of the World Cup.
Germany cons
1. It’s Germany, they’ll probably beat Holland, and say what you like about the Dutch, can we really live with four years of the Germans as reigning champions?
Total: +1
So there you have it: Spain 3 Germany 1. Which by the way will also be the final score. Sorry, but that’s science for you, and it makes as least as much sense as newspapers trawling through population sizes, average GDP and results from half a century ago.
Spain 3 - 1 Germany. Science.
(Some of you may have noticed a few delays in these posts of late. I was going to let it lie, but frankly it shows such spectacular ineptitude on the part of BT that I’d be doing the world an disservice if I did. Knowing the complications involved in moving home and the necessity of landline and internet access during such a time, BT made a relatively basic mistake and cut me off a week early. It was okay though, as they made amends by reconnecting me at no extra charge, saying as a parting shot: “it will take seven to ten working days”. I’ve been trying to come up with a suitable simile to emphasise to them how spectacularly inept this is, but it’s impossible. BT just set the new benchmark in spectacular ineptitude. At least now, if anyone ever does anything spectacularly inept I can say, that’s like the time when BT cut me off a week before I moved home and then assumed a suitable apology would be to reconnect me seven to ten working days later. It’s always nice to witness a new benchmark, I should be grateful.)