World Cup: Semi-Finals & lots of videos

Soccer has continued to be all over American media this week. Landon Donovan was on the Late Show with David Letterman as well as the Daily Show with John Stewart.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Landon Donovan & Bob Bradley
www.thedailyshow.com
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The World Cup continues tomorrow with a match up worthy of a final: Brazil v. Netherlands. Brazil has won more World Cups than any other nation (5) while the Netherlands are considered the best country never to win the World Cup. Earlier this week, I predicted the following for the next rounds:

Uruguay over Ghana
Argentina over Germany
Spain over Japan (I got this wrong -- Japan lost to Paraguay on penalty kicks)
Netherlands over Brazil

I still think all of these predictions will be correct, but I'm feeling very uncertain about the Netherlands over Brazil. The Dutch have not lost a game, but neither have they looked like the best team in the tournament, which is how Brazil have been playing. This is a bit of a wish more than anything, but I'll stick with Clockwork Orange.

One of the greatest Dutch players ever was Dennis Bergkamp. Below is a wonderful goal he scored in the 1998 World Cup against Argentina. The goal itself is sublime -- watch his touch and perfect shot past the keeper. But listen to the Dutch announcer's orgasmic call of the play.



Speaking or orgasmic goal celebrations, if you haven't seen this it's a terrific video of reactions all over the world to Donovan's stoppage time goal against Algeria. (Some of these were shown in the Daily Show clip above as well.)



As for the US team, I still feel like it was a great WC, but that it could have been so much better. Winning the group was a big deal, but Ghana were beatable. And the tough part about the World Cup is that it's another 4 years until the next one. But the US has some good young players to build around and could be even better in 2014. Read here the take of the best American soccer blogger, Ives Galarcep, on US prospects for 2014.

ESPN's the Sports Guy had a good (but typically long) review of the US's run in South Africa. "When Donovan scored that Cup-saving goal against those spineless playing-for-a-tie-when-they-needed-to-win-by-two-goals Algerians, the moment resonated like no other goal in American soccer history. We didn't have anyone telling us how we should feel, what the implications were, what the moment meant. We knew what it meant. We wanted more games. We wanted our boys to keep playing. Someone scored. We celebrated. We jumped up and down. We ran around the room. We were alive for another game. For once in a fragmented sports world, we all happened to be rooting for the same thing."

And Grant Wahl nicely summarized the US team's World Cup for Sport Illustrated. "The U.S. would benefit from a little more skill and a little less emotion when the whistle blows for Brazil 2014. Teams that rely on emotion have a hard time maintaining it for an entire tournament, no matter how righteous it may be. Skill endures. In the end, this U.S. team did its fans proud in South Africa but has left them dreaming of what might have been."

Don't give up on the US team. And don't give up on the World Cup. There are some awesome match ups the next 2 days, starting with Brazil v. Netherlands tomorrow and continuing with Argentina v. Germany on Saturday.