WHY SAY ANYTHING?

The first game of the day between Mexico and Brazil was a pretty mundane affair and resulted in a fairly routine win for the South Americans.

Mexico rarely threatened and goals from Neymar Jr. and Roberto Firmino did the trick.

What the game may be remembered for, for a short while at least, was the ever-improving acting ability of Neymar. He isn’t quite there yet as it is evident, to anybody who knows anything about thespianism, that he is playing a part because he overdoes it.

What is also obvious is that he has been told that a career in Hollywood awaits his retirement from football and he has already started auditioning for roles.

No doubt he will be cast as the bad guy who gets machine-gunned at the end of the film in Quentin Tarantino’s next masterpiece.

He can also perform a very adequate horizontal pirouette if any off-the-wall ballet producers or choreographers are interested.

This is actually a routine that the Brazilian has perfected so well that it appears as though he has been shot FROM a gun rather than BY one.

In the few years since he came to prominence, we at WSA are yet to see anything which suggests he is anywhere near the same level as Cristiano Ronaldo or Lionel Messi. He can be a world-class player, but not consistently. He scores world-class goals, but not consistently. He is a world-class diver and, as of yet, this is the only aspect of his game in which he is consistent.

Virtually every comment from ex-professional players about his performance when reacting to having his ankle trodden on, (not stamped on), by Mexico’s Miguel Layún, included the word “pathetic”.

He is now 26 years of age and is the most expensive footballer ever to be transferred between two clubs. If he wants to he remembered for his football, like some of his compatriots such as Pele, Jairzinho, Ronaldo, Tostao and Socrates, to name but a few, he needs to start playing the game and leaving out all the histrionics.

If he doesn’t he may find that the word “pathetic” becomes synonymous with him for the rest of his career.

Anyway, he was still on the winning side as the Seleção beat Mexico 2-0.

Japan v Belgium…..

The second game contained enough excitement and entertainment to more than make up for the first one’s lack of those two ingredients.

Belgium approached their game with Japan as though they, like almost everybody else, expected to win. Unfortunately, for a while anyway, the Japanese had the same thought about themselves and this belief firstly kept the score at 0-0 when the half-time whistle was blown and secondly, was what propelled them into a 2-0 lead only seven minutes into the second half.

Goals from Genki Haraguchi and Takashi Inui did the trick and Belgian memories were cast back two years to a certain game against Wales in the European Championships.

The difference this time around is that Belgium are made of sterner stuff, we just didn’t know it yet.

As if to strike fear into the hearts of the Japanese team, not to mention the Belgian supporters, Marouane Fellaini otherwise known as plan B, came on in an attempt to rescue his drowning team mates. He was joined by Nacer Chadli who was obviously plan C so Roberto Martinez had now played his two jokers and the world waited with baited breath to see which meaning of the word they would represent.

It didn’t take long for the comeback to begin as Jan Vertonghen scored a fluke header which had nothing to do with either of the two new arrivals but their very presence must have helped.

Then the miracles began. Firstly, Marouane Fellaini rose to head home an Eden Hazard cross. It would be incorrect to say he rose majestically, he actually rose like a hungry hippo who has learnt that there is some food on a nearby tree.

Then Nacer Chadli scored the winner four minutes into the added four minutes of injury time. His was a simple tap in from a cross by Thomas Meunier which Romelu Lukaku did well to get his frame out of the way of, otherwise known as a dummy.

The Japanese kicked off which was the signal for the referee to blow the whistle for the final time in this match. He was probably quite pleased with the result as, being from Senegal, he wouldn’t have been happy at the way his team were knocked out of the competition on the number-of-yellow cards rule by………….Japan.

What goes around comes around, as they say, whoever “they” are.