It’s only nine days until the start of the World Cup, so it would probably be a good idea to make sure NOW that you have everything you will need to be able to enjoy the matches undisturbed. Here’s a guide to some of the essential stuff you need. Click directly on the links or you can find them in the side panel on the right, under “It’s how you know.”
If you are among the fortunate ones to be going to Germany, even without tickets for any matches, check out this guide to all the CITIES. You will have information on places to stay, where to eat, to party, and best of all, where to watch matches free, all courtesy of the New York Times.
The NYT’s estimate of where the best party of all will be is COLOGNE, so check this site out also.
But for the stay-at-homes (like me), the complete TV SCHEDULE of games is mandatory, and this site has information on the commentators (including that humorous Gaelic football fan (and his onion bag) Tommy Smyth of ESPN), pre- and post-game shows, wrap-ups and all the other attachments to the games themselves.
To keep track of your chosen team, download an ELECTRONIC WALL CHART that will do all the figuring in the group-stages for you. Just fill in the scores, and your computer will do the rest.
And then while you’re waiting, enjoy yourself with some HISTORICAL SNIPPETS from previous World Cups. As The Guardian calls it: “The Greatest Show on Turf”.
All that’s left is the peace and quiet you need to focus on the screen undisturbed. I found no URL that could arrange that for you, so it’s every (man/woman/beast) for (himself/herself/itself).
Enjoy!

Insidebayarea.com

The FIFA rankings, published in May, of all the world’s national teams puts the U.S. fifth—behind Brazil, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands and Mexico. OK, even the most chauvinistic American followers of the sport would concede that the U.S. is not as good as those first three, but might argue the toss about Mexico, which we have regularly defeated in the last few years. But is the U.S. better than traditional powers France (8), Argentina (9), England (10), Italy (13) and Germany (19)? How did the exalted rating come about?
Burrow around in the FIFA site, or FIFA World Cup site for a while and you will find the method by which the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Rankings are calculated—by computer, of course. I found it at http://www.fifa.com/en/mens/statistics/index/0,2548,117943,00.html?articleid=117943, but be warned that after the World Cup, on July 12, FIFA will publish new rankings, based upon a slightly different method of computation.
At the moment, the calculation, developed by Dr. Markus Lamprecht and Dr. Hanspeter Stamm, takes into account results of “A” class matches over a period of eight years: World Cup finals and eliminations, Confederations Cup matches, and international friendlies. Goals count, playing at home or away is factored in, importance of the match, and regional strength of the teams. The most recent matches are rated higher than games from the past, and the weighting of regional strength is:
UEFA (Europe) x 1.00
CONMEBOL (South America) x 0.99
CAF (Africa) x 0.96
CONCACAF (North America, Caribbean) x 0.94
AFC (Asia)x 0.93
OFC (Australia, New Zealand, the Pacific) x 0.93
That means that Europe generally is stronger than South America and Africa; Africa generally better than Asia, and so on.
But here’s the problem: Nowhere in the computer scheme does the calculation include any account of the players—in my opinion, the most important factors in the game. So Brazil playing a game without Ronaldinho, Ronaldo and Silva and losing, would be scored the same as if they had played with their strongest team. England the other day lost 2-1 to Belarus, yet without many of their first team. No matter, to the computer, England is England, Brazil, Brazil, no matter who plays.
This may explain why the U.S. is rated so high. In late January, The U.S. beat Norway 5-0, and on paper that win looks impressive, even though Norway is not going to the World Cup. But the Norwegians did not bring their top players. Jamie Trecker of FOX described it as “..an understrength, fringe Norwegian team.” So why should that victory count as much as the defeat of Norway’s best? In the computer rankings, it does, and several victories like that could put the U.S. higher than our instinct tells us it deserves.
One more thing: The program computes results over a period of eight years, but teams turn over in shorter periods than that. In the new version that FIFA will unveil after the World Cup, the calculations will involve results over only the last four years.

Just 16 days from now, on June 9, the greatest sporting event on the planet will start with the first ball kicked in the match between Germany and Costa Rica in Munich. One hundred ninety-seven of the 205 countries in FIFA entered the World Cup competition and started playing elimination matches two years ago.

Forget about the Olympics, the Super Bowl, the “World Series” (in name only), this is the real World Championship!

It comes down to 32 teams: 14 from Europe, four from South America, four from North America, Central America and the Caribbean, five from Africa, two from the Middle East, two from the Far East and one from Oceania, that scattering of islands that stretches from Australia and New Zealand out into the Pacific.

The World Cup is not only about the matches; it’s about the fans from all over the world; it’s about the intrigue among the teams, the rumors about this player or that player. First the press in Europe was abuzz with the admission from Wayne Rooney, the 20-year-old star striker for England, one of the favorites, that he had gambled away $1.26 million of his $2.25 million earnings during a period of several months.

Then while playing for Manchester United at Chelsea a few weeks ago, he broke the fourth metatarsal bone in his right foot, and will probably be out for six weeks, missing all the qualifying matches for England. So the gossip is now about whether the England coach was wise to take him to Germany anyway, hoping he will be fit for a semifinal or the final, if England gets through.

And what about Brazil? Widely expected to repeat as World Champions, most of the players are playing in Italy and are sadly off-form after a long season in Europe. Will they be as ready as Ronaldhino, whom you can see in this amazing clip?

How will the U.S fare? Ranked fourth or fifth in the world, will the U.S. live up to that lofty rating? Are they really better than Argentina, France, Germany, the Netherlands? Did coach Bruce Arena do the right thing by leaving out Taylor Twellman, a proven goal-scorer, but not yet in a competition that gives up goals as reluctantly as a Rottweiler gives up bones?

Over the next 40 days, we are going to find out, and then on July 9, in a stadium filled to capacity, with billions of people watching on TV, one referee and two assistants will lead two teams out onto a patch of grass in Berlin for a ninety-minute match to decide the real World Champion in the most popular sport in the world.

Editor’s note: Robert Evans will be writing a weekly soccer column for ANG Newspapers during the World Cup and he’ll also be maintaining this blog.
Evans is a retired FIFA soccer referee, originally from Wales who has officiated both World Cup and Olympic qualifying games. He has also authored three books on soccer refereeing. Evans was a referee in the North American Soccer League from 1972-1985, and in 1992 he became the first American to be appointed a FIFA Referee Instructor.