World Cup 2018 Scripts and Blog

World Cup 2018 Scripts and Blog. Another World Cup done! Roll on 2022 at Qatar – it will certainly be different – dates being 21st November to 18th December. This will certainly force a number of festive viewing changes on the BBC!
So. Reflections on World Cup 2018
Overall picture – a great championship. Way more ‘open’ than many preceding world cups as giants, like Germany, crashed out in opening round, leaving ‘smaller’ competitors to surprise and delight.
Of course, Great Britain featured large among these ‘hopeful’ countries, trying to put behind us our terrible track record since 1966. So, we got to the semis – where Croatia ended ‘the dream’, themselves bowing out in the finals to the might of France – a well-deserved victory of 4 – 2.
I didn’t manage to watch every match but the two that stick in my mind were the very first – where Russia started everything off in the opening match with a game full of great goals. 5 – 0 to host country – miraculously doing the unthinkable, namely bringing a smile to face of Putin. …. Or was that just down to oil deal sealed with handshake between him and sheikh from Saudi Arabia?
This match was closely followed by Spain against Portugal 3 – 3 which literally had me rivetted to my seat from beginning to end – goal after goal and action all the way! Football at its very best.
And then those surprise results: Surprise results – Germans beaten in opening match to Mexico 1 – 0. And Brazil tying with Switzerland 1- 1; , Argentina beaten by Uruguay (so felt for Messi) and Portugal beaten by France.
Alas, neither superstars such as Cristiano Ronaldo for Portugal; or Messi for Argentina could keep their teams in the tournament. Ultimately it was down to team effort. And this shone through with the two finalists who understood the meaning of the word ‘team’ using it to magnificent effect.
Funny moments? These are usually provided by the commentary – flowery or banal but always entertaining! I have to say, I still think Gary Lineker is massively overpaid – would be interesting to compare his take home pay with Sue Barkers after a fortnight at Wimbledon!
Anyway, plenty of magical moments.
On ‘less magical’ and sadly human nature moments were those oscar-winning performances by players ‘going down’ – wish there was a way of eliminating this diva behaviour – it does the game no favours. Neymar – you should be ashamed of yourself but you’re not the only diva out there – just the best paid one.
Likewise with some other behavioural moments – certainly a number in the England v Columbia match would be worth revisiting though justice served in the end, Columbia going out. Not their finest hour in any sense of the word. And why didn’t video recording device spot these ‘antics’? I guess you have to ask those that watched them and made the decision … to carry on. Crazy or what? Just goes to show – even technology fails to deliver when humans are in charge!
But it would be a shame to end on a ‘grouch’. The competition as a whole was magnificent. Much more exciting I felt than a number of past world cups where the end result has been a bit predictable – dominated by Brazilians or Germans.
So, roll on 2022! And as stated at the beginning, be sure to get your xmas shopping done in plenty of time!