Die Verdünnung der Herde

Day 6 of World Cup competition, and we've reached the point where true heartache resides. It's "Win or Go Home" time, and the first casualties have begun to be revealed. Kicking things off today, we had a battle between 2 Latin American nations (which was painful in-and-of itself, seeing how we wanted all the Latin American nations to do well this World Cup), as Ecuador took on Costa Rica in Hamburg, Germany. Ecuador struck the first blow early in the match, 8 minutes into the game. Costa Rica, who looked disheartened enough to begin with, did not look at all motivated to at least try and secure a spot in the next round of contention. The 2nd half saw two more goals by the Ecuadorians, the last being deep into stopage time which has come to be the norm for this World Cup. Final score, Ecuador wins 3-0. (Costa Rica goes home). Next, we head on over to Nuremberg, Germany where the Brits took on the team from Trinidad and Tobago. The game went scoreless for about 98% of the time, which made for a rather dull match. It was mostly one-sided, with the Brits making most of the attacks which, for some reason or other, would not pan out. In the end, they managed to connect with the net twice, ending things at 2-0. And the final match of the day saw another Latin American hopeful, Paraguay, take on Sweden in Berlin, Germany. Again, another dull match. Both teams seemed only 25% in the game. This one was practically called a tie, until, again, deep into the 2nd half (one minute left of play, I believe!) Sweden managed to penetrate the Paraguayan defense. Final score, 1-0, and Paraguay earns a ticket home. So, at the end of today's matches, Groups A and B look like this:

Group A:
1. Ecuador (6 pts.)
2. Germany (6 pts.)
3. Poland (0 pts.)
4. Costa Rica (0 pts.)

Group B:
1. England (6 pts.)
2. Sweden (4 pts.)
3. Trinidad and Tobago (3 pts.)
4. Paraguay (0 pts.)

Tomorrow: Argentina vs. Serbia and Montenegro, Holland vs. Ivory Coast, and "El Tri" Mexico vs. Angola