Thursday, June 12, 2014

World Cup & BISERGS Kickoff



This is it!  The World Cup is about to kick off and the BISERGS is going into full swing.  Every BISERGSer is desperate to see their four new favorite teams succeed so they can be called the Biggest International Soccer Expert Related to Greg Samuelson for the next four years.

Brazil, the hosts and favorites to win the World Cup, take on Croatia to start the tournament.  The Seleção seem very relaxed in spite of the pressure of being expected to win it all, but the Croatians are looking forward to playing the role of underdogs and hope to start the tournament off with a shock.  

Ten BISERGSers will get their campaigns underway today.  The five Brazil supporters all used their first picks to take Brazil and need to pickup as many points as possible from this match or their BISERGS dreams could come crashing down on day one.  Max Snyder had an intuition about the Croatians and used his first round pick to get them.  A victory for his side would make him the early favorite to win the BISERGS.  The rest of the Croatia owners would see a positive result today as a huge bonus as they probably don't expect Croatia to give them any points until they play Mexico and Cameroon.  Allie and her father Dan will be together in their support of the underdogs, but two other families are divided.  Matt and Carol will be cheering against each other and Max has sided with mom on this one.  Ivan is looking forward to welcoming his dad to the BISERGS with a resounding Brazil victory.  Irma/Byron, Nate and Greg are all hoping to see Brazil start the tournament off with a lot of BISERGS points today.

7 comments:

  1. Can't believe it! I missed seeing the first two goals. I had typed out the schedule for all the games, but failed to notice that the times were given in Eastern time. If Arlan hadn't called us to see if I was watching, I would have missed the whole game, since I was taking a nap. Thanks, Arlan!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wretched arbitraje, Japanese árbitro favoring BRAZIL. Wasn't a penalty. And faltas that weren't faltas of CROATIA.

    ReplyDelete
  3. continuing above comment of unfair arbitraje: Mano que no fue mano

    ReplyDelete
  4. Referee just stole a goal from Croacia

    ReplyDelete
  5. Just looked up professional commentators on the game, and they confirmed my impressions: "Croatia wrongly denied. The ref. deemed Olic's perfectly legal knock down a foul on Cesar." "The ref. invented a penalty that led to a Brazilian goal." "Fred tumbled under minimal contact, but it was enough to fool the ref." (Was he fooled or paid off to make the protesting Brazilians happier about the games?) Finally, from Univision: "una victoria mentiroso" (a lying (fake) victory).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I didn't stay up for this one Carol. Kickoff was at 1 in the morning, local time, so I'm hoping to catch a replay here this morning. Friday is the weekend here in Abu Dhabi, so it will be a perfect way to start my 2014 World Cup. I'll have to see if I agree with your views of the referee as I watch through my green and yellow tinted glasses.

      Delete
    2. HaHa. It is hard to be objective. I don't really like the Croatia team (rough style like Germany had a decade ago), but figure that Brazil is my enemy this time around. (I chose Brazil and got Brazil the last two times around, I think, and cheered for them in 1994 against Sharleen's Italy.) Rodrigo said the Internet was full of jokes and ridicule against the Japanese ref.

      Delete