World Cup: Day 1

Greetings Soccer Fans –

Well the tournament gods were kind to the pool scoring gremlins on day one as both matches ended in draws. Though outplayed most of the day, South Africa nearly pulled out the upset over Mexico until an egregious defensive lapse gave up the equalizer (1-1). Uruguay and France followed with a pretty even scoreless draw that featured Thierry Henry complaining about an uncalled hand-ball in the box. Group A shows itself indeed to be a tough group to pick.

In the pool, we have a nice round 100 entries representing 24 countries. I’ve been doing this pool since ’94 and I believe this is the first time Brazil was not the most popular choice. Instead, it is Spain with 27 picks for champion (with 19 more as runner-up). Brazil (19), Argentina (16), Holland (9), England (8), Italy (5), Germany (4), USA (4), France (2), and Portugal (2) round out the most popular selections for the crown.

It appears many of us think the Euro championship erased Spain’s notorious habit of choking on the big stage and/or forgot about them getting knocked out by the US in last summer’s Confederates Cup and/or really like their colorful uniforms.

Prizes:
Here’s how the prizes will be distributed:

1st place: $375
2nd place: $220
3rd place: $150
4th place: $100
5th place: $80
6th place: $40
7th place: $25
100th place: $10

(there may be one or two entries still to arrive by post, which I will add to the grand prize)

Scoring Note:
At times when doing the scoring, a selection for a match is found omitted or both boxes are checked off. If the winner is implied by the selections in the 2nd stage, I go with that -- otherwise the selection is the team on the left.

Collections:
If you haven’t sent me your $10, please do so: 242 Yale Ave, Kensington, CA 94708.

Standings:
You’ll see below that we are all sharing first place right now with zero points. I can safely say that everyone is pretty much still in it. Let me know any corrections to your “Soccer Home Country”.

Enjoy the big games tomorrow. Go Yanks! Vamos Argentina!

Chris