Our Favorite World Cup Moments

For this post we all decided we would collaborate on a question and see what our answers were. The World Cup having just ended was the obvious topic to focus on. So our prompt was to think of our favorite World Cup moments. This is what we said:

Pablo:

Four agonizingly long years had passed since Fabio Grosso tucked his penalty kick away to hand Italy its fourth World Cup title in a shootout over France. South Africa 2010 was an eternity away.
I waited and waited. I went to college, met some awesome friends there, and we waited together. I remember playing Winning Eleven at 3 AM, talking about how bad we wanted the World Cup. This would have been about early 2007. To my disbelief, the time somehow passed.

After all the anticipation, I was suddenly watching the first kick of a World Cup on African soil- South Africa vs. Mexico as a billion vuvuzelas drowned out the referee's whistle. I feel confident in saying that the whole world, minus Mexico, was rooting for Bafana Bafana. I had wanted the hosts to do well in the time leading up to the tournament, but until the game kicked off I had no idea how badly I wanted them to win.

The yellow shirts had a nervy start, but seemed to grow into themselves as the first half progressed. They started to look dangerous and fast going forward, but still vulnerable at the back. My stomach was in knots (for South Africa!?). Shortly before half time, a brilliant counter attack sliced through the heart of the Mexican midfield and defense, and Tshabalala was in behind on the left side. The fans lucky enough to be at Soccer City Stadium in Johannesburg surely smelled gunpowder after they had regained control of their senses. A cannon of a left foot struck the Jabulani, and after a split-second's wondering where it was going, it exploded into the top right corner of the goal. I screamed GOAL! or YES!, I don't remember which, and jumped around as delight filled my body. Everybody in the room with me did the same, and I know people were joining us all over the world. It was a perfect combination of excitement for the Cup kicking off and wild hope for the hosts.

South Africa had chances to put the game away but failed to take them. Despite giving a good account of themselves, they became the first host nation knocked out in the group stage. The Cup went on to display many other moments of pure drama, heroics, heartbreak, and skill (particularly for USA fans), but for me, watching Tshabalala's shot flash into the net was the best moment of the 2010 World Cup.

Mike Bonetti:

When we few, we happy few, we band of bloggers, decided to make a post about our favorite World Cup moments I realized I had a difficult decision to make. I had to make a choice between USA vs. England and USA vs. Algeria. For me, both games were amazing moments in the 2010 World Cup and helped boost the credibility of US Soccer the world around. Ultimately, I decided that the game against Algeria was my favorite moment of the entire World Cup because we won, and I am American.

It was a win and you’re in, to the Round of 16, situation for the United States, who had high hopes of making it out of the Group stage. The entire match was a real ding-dong battle including an early chance by Algeria that beat Howard, but was turned aside by the crossbar and a disallowed goal by Clint Dempsey, due to a quite questionable offside call. After countless squandered opportunities, where the ball refused to go in the net for the US side, the score was all knotted up 0-0 after 90 minutes.

At this point I am as far on the edge of my seat as you can possibly get and still be considered sitting. As the 4 minutes of stoppage time began Tim Howard saved an Algerian header and the break was on, Donovan barreling down the pitch like a man possessed, gets the ball to Altidore who quickly sends it into Dempsey in front of the net, who is stoned cold by the Algerian keeper. At this point the ball is just sitting there in the box, time standing still; I am now hovering over the edge of my seat. Then the golden boy of US Soccer, Landon Donovan, puts the ball right in the back of the net. I then explode off my seat, pump both my fist and let out a boisterous yell as Landon and the boys pile up in the corner in celebration of a truly iconic moment in the history of US Soccer. And that is how the United States won the World Cup (as far as I’m concerned). USA! USA! USA!

Dan:

What better way to watch 90 minutes of 22 men running around chasing a ball they cannot touch with their hands than to have a monotonous bee-like drone to listen to? The vuvuzela buzzed its way into the international spot light in 2009 during the FIFA Confederations Cup in South Africa, and really became a subject of discussion during this World Cup. The cheap horn became a soccer (or “football” if you’re not American) fan’s best friend during games, allowing him to single handedly deal permanent hearing damage to others nearby with little effort.

Because of the annoying sounds the horn creates, and the speculation that the horns can spread disease by spraying small, virus-carrying spit droplets into the air, many arenas have began banning the horns. The vuvuzela was even blamed for a communication error at a Florida Marlins/ Tampa Bay Rays baseball game that resulted in a pinch hitter going up to bat out of order and being called out.

In June and July when the average American pretended to care about soccer, the vuvuzela was a constant talking point. Late night shows and news broadcasts would mention the vuvuzela before they would talk about the game itself. That brought much needed publicity to the game’s most important tournament.

The redeeming value of the annoying little horn is it brought attention to the game of soccer, albeit slightly dubious attention. If the sport is to ever take hold as a mainstream game in the States, people need to pay attention and watch when the games are on. The vuvuzela had Americans talking about a soccer related topic instead of baseball or basketball. Ratings for the world cup were their highest ever, and one could hope that soccer is poised to finally take hold here. Now Team USA just has to win.