Fútbolita

No, your eyes are not playing tricks on you. Shrek and Donkey are on the front cover of the Argentinean newspaper Olé.

The newspaper has compared  Ariel Ortega and Cristian Fabbiani – players who have been closely linked to River Plate in recent days – to the animated characters. In other words, they think Ortega and Fabbiani bear an uncanny resemblance to Shrek and Donkey.

Don’t we all love the Argentinean press?

River had one of the worst seasons in the Argentinean Apertura last year, finishing at the bottom of the table and losing the title twice to Boca Juniors. So perhaps ‘Shrek’ and ‘Donkey’ can help to salvage what’s left..

OK, so everyone is pointing the accusing finger at Dunga, which was unavoidable from the start. Absolutely no one wants to be in his position right now. TBH, there were already cracks showing on the eve of the Argentina match. WHO publicly criticizes their own player before such a crucial game?! A bad Pato is still better than a ‘lucky’ Rafael Sobis. Waiting 105 minutes for him to score an extra time goal against Cameroon should have knocked some sense into Dunga’s head, but apparently NOT and Sobis had to start against Argentina and eventually missed all his chances.

Well done. Do you know who we really needed? Robinho. CBF, PLEASE get a coach who actually encourages free flowing football instead of relying on defensive counter-attacks. And one who doesn’t blatantly tell the press that his OWN player is undeveloped. Way to go, Dunga! You said “it’s gold for Brazil or nothing.” Well, so much for that! As expected, Ronaldinho took a leisure stroll in mid-field and was sadly outclassed by Lionel Messi. Fielding Alex Silva in place of Thiago was probably the final straw. Thiago Silva’s the best defender I’ve seen in this Olympic squad but he didn’t get to play. And Ronaldinho’s intentions in this tournament from the start had been rather dodgy. It was almost as if he chose to ‘run away’ from his problems by coming to Beijing to compete. He was just another weak link.

Anyway whatevs, we still beat Argentina last year at the Copa America finals (and previously in the Confederations Cup) – by the same humiliating scoreline. So if they weren’t able to pull off a come back even against our U-23 football squad, it would’ve been really tragic. They are deserving winners, I must say but can someone please tell Maradona and his beloved son-in-law Aguero to shut the hell up with their irrelevant comments. Aguero, you impregnated a 17-year old who happens to be Maradona’s daughter. So that deserves a Lifetime Achievement Award already. Do you really need to harp on about your thumb-sucking display of affection for a foetus growing inside your teen bride’s womb? Also, no one gives a rat ass about Maradona’s comments either. Yes, you were ONCE great, Maradona, but you are pretty useless to Brazil at this point of time.

Globo went (unsurprisingly) insanely overboard with their post-match coverage. Apparently, the front cover of the newspaper had an image of a tombstone and outrageous headlines that read “Brazilian football, five-time world champions, informs of the death of Dunga’s team yesterday in Beijing, China.” Oh yes, they added this too : “Don’t bother to bring flowers”. LMAO. Here are all the other newspapers in the country and their epic headlines….

Moving on, let’s just concentrate on the WC Qualifiers next month. I’m sorry that Marta and Co’ didn’t win the gold for Brazil either because they really wanted it and that was the difference. It was really heart wrenching to see Cristiane cry because she had worked so hard throughout the tournament and in the end ‘luck’ decided blew it for the women’s team.

Yeah, I’m laying off my writing again for football. There’s a shoot for one of the shows I’m writing for this Saturday and a RF photoshoot on Sunday… which has ‘FUN’ written all over it.