Waking with a slight hangover, I hoped that goal had been a bad dream but no, even the Tenerife daily papers were rubbing it in. Oh well at least it was hot and sunny.
Serbia – 0, Ghana – 1
The Sebians were well fancied but a combination of missed chances early on and a stupid hand ball held them back. It was pretty even for most of the game, Ghana were the latest African nation to have a quality keeper, Richard Kingson made a couple of great tip overs.
Lukovic took an early bath after 74 minutes with a second yellow card and his departure inspired Ghana. Gyan went close and a few mintes later he converted a penalty after Kuzmanovic commited a blatant hand ball. Ghana savoured their win, they might be the suprise packet.
Algeria – 0, Slovenia – 1
England fans were looking for encouraging weaknesses in their other two opponents but they both looked useful. Long range efforts seemed the order of the day as they edged towards a scoreless draw. Ghezzal came and went pretty quickly for Algeria, getting two speedy yellow cards and was back in the dressing room before breaking sweat. Slovenia took their chance with a bending low shot from Koren late on that eluded the Algeria keeper-
Germany – 4, Australia – 0
The Australian defence didn’t have much idea what they were didgeridooing and the German machine rolled all over them. Podolski opened the scoring with a piledriver shot and as Swarzer rushed out to try to claim the ball Klose nutted it into the net. The last thing Australia needed was a joke sending off but they got one, Tim Cahill went in for a challenge and caught his opponent with his knee, it was a yellow at most but the ref gave him a straight red and he was waltzing like matilda straight to the dressing room.
Germany could have made double figures but missed some sitters, Mueller added a third and Cacau completed the rout, it was an ominous warning to the other hopefuls in the competition.
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