Mumbai : True to the oracle of Paul, an Italian Octopus that came to Germany via England, 3 days ago, the Euro Soccer champions, Spain defeated Netherlands(Dutch) by one goal to nil at the fag end of a finals game outside Johannesburg in South Africa to write the name of Spain on the World Gold Cup as the winners of Finals. The third place went to Germany who overwhelmed Uruguay, as correctly predicted by the 2 and half year old Octopus which goes into retirement and death, after successfully predicting winners seven or eight times till July 10th. The Spanish supporters blew plastic bugles know as Vuvuzelas all over the ground to encourage Spanish players to fight and win the war of soccer. It is perhaps the only team that never entered finals before but won the cup in 2010.
The present world Tournament, while allowing as many as 32 countries and their teams to take their chance to move to the finals, gave pulsating treatment to the play in South Africa and woke up the African continent which had 7 teams in the last 32. seven came from Europe and another 7 from South Africa. Several other continents and islands provided the balance 11 teams, such as Japan, USA, Australia, 2 Koreas, New Zealand and soon. But on way to quarter finals, what would have been a South American final, turned out to be All European finals, with 3 European teams and a South American (Uruguay) team in the last 4. Top star players like Lionel Messi, Wayne Rooney and Christiano Ronaldo failed to impress, also ex-champions like Brazil, Argentina, France, Italy and England.
It was a common players’ world class game.