Two More Matches Set In Round of 16, African Nations Fumble Historic Wins

 

England vs. Mexico at the Azteca on Sunday July 5.

This World Cup is about the superstars shining, with the quality of the football taking a backseat. We saw that again on Wednesday with Kane's two goal performance to lift England into the next round. 

It's also been one of the most dramatic World Cups, with multiple late winners and lead changes towards the end of regulation. The two extra breaks that have been introduced at this tournament are like cheat codes for managers. 

There still hasn't been any great games to really speak of. We've witnessed amazing individual performances, mostly by the attackers. They've entertained in spurts. But none of these games are classics. They're all forgettable. I don't think we'll see a truly great game until the final. 

Due to the 48 team format being what it is, the quality of competition is highly uneven, so we're just watching big teams that are afraid to lose and small teams that are afraid to win. That makes for nervy, tight, and boring football. 

For tomorrow, hopefully Portugal and Croatia deliver a game to remember. But I anticipate a low scoring affair with both sides passing it around the field and playing for penalties. I think the Switzerland-Algeria game will be more entertaining and have more goals in it.

Mexico Advances To Round of 16, Awaits Next Challenger

 

France, Norway, and Mexico all advanced as expected.

Maybe tomorrow's games will give us a surprising result or two. 

Senegal against Belgium may unfold in a similar fashion to the Norway-Ivory Coast game yesterday, but with both teams lacking a lethal striker, I could see it going into extra time and another penalty shootout. That's a tough game to call. 

As for England vs Congo, that game has a Kane penalty in the 75th minute written all over it. Congo tied Portugal and only suffered a 1-0 defeat to Colombia so they'll keep it close. They might even score. But England should be able to get it done. 

The U.S.-Bosnia game is another tricky one. Bosnia is a knockout-tested team, having defeated Wales and Italy in European qualification. They live for penalties. They're similar to Paraguay in that way. But whereas the Germans were toothless in attack against the South Americans, the U.S. won't be. 

This U.S. team, much like Mexico and Canada, will try to score early and often. Bosnia won't be able to hang on. They don't belong here. And they know it. You score a couple of early goals against them and they'll fold. They have one goal in them and no more.

European teams are just not to be feared like they once were. The reputation of European football has taken a big hit in these past couple of years. When a team like Bosnia qualifies over Italy you know something is wrong with European football. Something is rotten in the state of Denmark. There's a crisis, no doubt about it. The killer instinct in many of these national teams is gone. A team like Mexico, Senegal, or the U.S. can make a run to the Semi Finals.

The World Cup Has Officially Begun: Paraguay Provides First Shock of The Tournament

 

Take a bow, Paraguay. 

I had Germany as a finalist. How wrong I was.

Germany can no longer be considered a giant of football. So this was not David vs. Goliath. Still, what Paraguay achieved was impressive and they fully deserve to face France in the next round. Good luck to them.

The GDA In Light of The USrael-Iran War And The Ukraine Catastrophe

 

"For South Asian countries, which is the home of 50% of the world population, Ukraine is the main supplier of food grains. China, with the largest population in the world, depends on Ukraine for 32% of its corn. With the world’s second-largest population, India imports 31% of its sunflower from Ukraine. Egypt, Iran and Türkiye also depend on Ukraine’s corn exports. In a similar way, Moldova, Lebanon, Qatar, Tunisia, Libya, Indonesia, Pakistan, Malaysia, Egypt, and Bangladesh depend on Ukraine for wheat.

The least developed countries and low-income food-deficit countries are already struggling with high population, low productivity of agriculture land, climate change, inflation, and the COVID-19 situation. Challenges of food supply are growing because of the closure of seaports for cargo shipment, oil processing units, movement of energy, and other resources from point of utilization to a place of negative development. Point of utilization means countries and/or sectors that need help to sustain losses of food, fertilizer, energy etc. incurred from war; while place of negative development can be considered as countries that are fuelling war rather than focusing on peace. When there is a war, it is not just between two countries, it impacts what we eat today and tomorrow." - Keval Shah, "Ukraine: The Breadbasket of Europe, Impact of Crisis on Everyone’s plate" Canadian Science Policy Centre, August 2022.

"Historically, Ukraine has been considered a breadbasket for neighboring and more distant regions. Ukraine has one-third of the world's most fertile black soils and a relatively flat landscape that allows for higher yields and larger fields that contributed to the development of Ukraine's crop-based agriculture. Approximately 80% of arable land in the country is used to produce cereals, oilseeds, vegetables, and other annual crops (State Statistics of Ukraine, 2020; World Bank, 2021). Since 1992, crop production has dominated Ukrainian agriculture, and we show changes in production and exports of crop and livestock commodities in Figures A3 and A4. In 2021, primary agriculture contributed almost 10% of Ukraine's Gross Domestic Product (GDP), 18% of employment, and 44% of total export value. When up- and downstream sectors are accounted for, the share of agriculture increases to approximately 20% of Ukraine's GDP (von Cramon-Taubadel & Nivievskyi, 2023). Ukraine has signed 12 bilateral and multilateral trade agreements since 1995, became a member of the World Trade Organization in 2005, and established a Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area (DCFTA) with the EU in 2016 (EU Commission, 2024). Concurrently, import tariffs and many specific tariffs on nonsensitive agricultural and food products were reduced to Most-Favored Nation (MFN) levels. Ukraine's continued efforts to expand trade relationships through trade policy liberalization led to expanded exports of agricultural products since the mid-1990s.

Before the full-scale Russian invasion, Ukraine supplied approximately 50% of global sunflower oil, nearly two-thirds of sunflower meal exports. While sunflower oil is processed for human consumption, sunflower meal as a by-product is used as feed for livestock production. The main destination markets for sunflower oil were China (48%), the EU (25%), and Turkey (7%). Currently, sunflower oil is consumed in 48 countries around the world, with the biggest consumption in the EU, India, and China5 (IndexMundi, 2023). Ukraine was the third largest exporter of rapeseed, and seventh largest exporter of soybeans before the war. The country ranked fourth in corn exports, with top destinations including China, EU, Egypt, Iran, and Turkey.

Ukraine was the seventh largest wheat exporter before the war and was expected to be the fifth largest wheat exporter in the 2021/2022 marketing year (USDA, 2022a). Middle East and North African countries highly depend on Ukrainian wheat with Egypt, Indonesia, Turkey, Pakistan, and Bangladesh as the main export destinations (FAO, 2024a; Smith, 2023). For example, in 2021 Ukraine supplied 35% of total wheat imports in Egypt where wheat and wheat products comprised 31.5% of daily consumption6 (FAO, 2024a; International Trade Centre, 2024). Lebanon imported 61.5% of its wheat from Ukraine in 2020, wheat and wheat products account for 31.8% of daily caloric consumption, and the price of bread increased by an astonishing 70% after the blockade of Ukrainian exports (IPES-FOOD, 2022; OEC, 2021).

Other African countries are also import dependent and exposed to high price volatility, including Sudan, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Somalia as the most vulnerable (Abay, Breisinger, et al., 2023b; Breisinger, Kirui, et al., 2023a; Breisinger, Diao, et al., 2023b). Other countries, like Burundi and Rwanda, indirectly depend on Ukraine's sunflower oil through re-exports from Egypt (EU Commission, 2022b). The prices of vegetable cooking oil, bread, and wheat flour have increased dramatically along with fuel prices and the cost of living overall. West Africa and the Sahel region are also negatively affected by high commodity prices and scarcity with up to 10 million people at risk to become food insecure due to the war in Ukraine. Several Asian countries including Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Indonesia have experienced similar challenges given import dependency on wheat supplies from Ukraine and Russia to meet domestic demand (Mamun & Imrul Kabir, 2023; USDA, 2022b)." - "Global economic effects of war-induced agricultural export declines from Ukraine" Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy published by Wiley Periodicals LLC, September 1, 2024.

If you wanted to engineer a global famine then attacking a key global breadbasket and shutting down choke points in critical waterways would be opening salvos. 

Ukraine has always been important real estate for its food production and as a bridge to Asia and the Middle East. As long as the war continues its grain and wheat exports will continue to decline, causing many countries dependent on Ukraine to look elsewhere.

What must be remembered is this artificial scarcity is by design. The global depopulation agenda spans national borders, regimes, election cycles, religious divides, and ideological conflicts. 

During the global Covid theatrics Mr. Putin, the Chinese, and the Ayatollah all played along and wore masks like all the other duplicitous leaders around the globe. 

So throw out from your mind any idea or thought that Russia and Iran are opposed to the West in earnest and that the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East are between one bloc of nations against another, or between one ideology against another. The game that's being played by the elites transcends the fate of civilizations and nations and encompasses the whole planet. 

The war aims in Ukraine, similar to Palestine, Syria, and Lebanon, are to reduce the population, clear the land, and drive refugees into Europe. Russia, Israel, and the West share the same aims in Ukraine, as they do in the Middle East. Death. Destruction. Famine. And disease.

Thoughts On Canada Advancing To The Round of 16 + A Reform Of The World Cup

 

Stephen Eustáquio World Cup Knockout goals: 1. Cristiano Ronaldo World Cup Knockout goals: 0.

The game that was played this afternoon between South Africa and Canada may have been the most boring sporting event in recent memory. 

In a traditional 32 team World Cup, where the group stage features stiffer competition, both of these teams would have been grouped. 

I'm sorry to say this, I love Canada, and Canadian football has come a long way in my brief lifetime, but Canada and South Africa had no business gracing the World Cup Knockout stage this Sunday. 

This sacred arena was reserved for the elite of the elite of international football. This was not the best of the best on display. It was poor advertising for a great sport. Guys from the local YMCA would have given us a better game. 

If I'm not mistaken, South Africa had 1 shot and 1 corner all game. It was the most shameful and cowardly performance by a national side in a big tournament that I can remember. These guys were passing it back to their goalkeeper all game. I don't know how South Korea lost to these bums.  

And Canada wasn't much better. They played awful football. Poor execution. The striker was a ghost again. The manager looked lost. They got extremely lucky South Africa made it out of their group. If I'm Morocco or the Netherlands tomorrow night's game counts for two. Whoever wins that game will be automatically through to the Quarter Finals. They should lay it all on the line tomorrow night. Other than Argentina no other team would have an easier path to the Quarters and potentially the Semi Finals.

Hopefully the games this week will deliver the goods and make us forget this game was ever played.

Going forward I hope FIFA revises this 48 team nonsense. The World Cup should only feature the best of the best. I think they should only accept 24 teams. 12 European teams. 3 South American teams. 3 African teams. 2 Asian teams. 2 teams from North America. And 2 playoff winners to fill out the rest of the spots.