Regular readers of this blog (if you do exist, please make yourself known and follow us!) will be aware of my bizarre sense of humour and the fact that my mind works in a strange way. For this, I make no apologies. It does, after all, come in handy when it comes to this sort of thing - forget about the Golden Boot or Goal of the Tournament - here are some slightly different ideas on who caught my attention over the tournament. With a few classics thrown in:
Biggest disappointment - that Germany didn't put 5 past England, thus wiping out both 1966 and 2001 in one go. The English would then only have two world wars to fall back on.
Award for showing Zinedine Zidane how to assault a man subtly in a World Cup final - Nigel de Jong for going all Cantona on Xabi Alonso and only getting booked
Best confusing name - Jonathan Mensah of Ghana, referred to simply as "Jonathan" because of his similarity to John Mensah of the same team.
Too little, too late award - Fabio Quagliarella of Italy. A really fantastic long range chip against Slovakia to pull it back to 3-2. But it still wasn't enough to keep them in the tournament and the reigning champions were deposed.
The "Hey, weren't you shit once?" award - Diego Forlan of Uruguay proved all his doubters at Man United wrong with some superb displays, consistently scoring great goals and providing for his team mates. Honourable mentions to Richard Kingson, Ghana's keeper who is Wigan's backup and Vladimir Weiss of Slovakia and Man City.
The Samson award - Fernando Torres of Spain. Cut off the girly locks and play shit. His one contribution to the final was to pull a hamstring and waste a bit of time.
Miss of the tournament - Ayegbini Yakubu for Nigeria against South Korea. Just awful and ultimately cost the team a place in the knockout stages.
Imposter of the tournament - in an Argentina side brimming with talent, there stood Newcastle's left midfielder Jonas Guttierez at right-back. He actually didn't disgrace himself, although things looked a lot more settled once Nicolas Burdisso took his place.
Most biased pundit - Marcel Desailly. Mate, you can't support two teams. Having turned his back on his homeland of Ghana to win trophies with France, Marcel took a rapid U-turn when the French started their hissy fits. Celebrating their penalty against Serbia with a cry of "All the chickens and goats will be celebrating", Desailly betrayed the fact that he probably hasn't been to Ghana in a very long time. He made Ian Wright look pretty neutral.
Much maligned commentator who I actually quite liked - Mick McCarthy. He may have a thick accent, but McCarthy is intelligent, insightful and witty when summarising for the BBC. He also has a column for the Guardian and is therefore a lad.
Most pointless cameo - in general, the opening ceremony was very enjoyable. I was particularly impressed by the children spelling out the names of all the competing nations with black and white balls. But why was R Kelly necessary? His outfit was so ostentatious that even I found it a bit tasteless.
Best impression - the pitch of the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium in Port Elizabeth did a startlingly accurate impression of the surface of the moon.
Funniest moment - Unquestionably the Rob Green howler against the US. It is for moments like this that the rewind function on Sky+ was invented.
Best dance - Although Archbishop Desmond Tutu tried, he failed. This award goes to Siphiwe Tshabalala and co after the opening goal of the tournament. When Ghana and Slovenia tried to repeat the trick, it didn't feel quite so special.
The Halley's Comet Award - Miroslav Klose. He performs so rarely at club level but when he does show up it's pretty spectacular and a big occasion. It's now three World Cups in a row.
That'll do
RM
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