Return to civilisation

I spent 5 days last week at the Glastonbury Festival in Somerset England. The beard continued to be cultivated ...

While I was there England sneaked into the Round of 16 before being humiliated by Germany at the World Cup. I also managed to see quite a few bands and caught a couple of halves of other games at various venues around the site.

As the quarter finals have kicked off today, there's been a couple of shocks. The first came as Brazil were knocked out by Holland. As things stand at the moment (one hour played), Ghana are taking the game to Uruguay with the score at 1-1 after Muntari put Ghana ahead on the stroke of half time with a wonder strike from 35 yards, before Diego Forlan equalised with a sublime free kick.

My new season is shaping up nicely with a spot booked for me to deliver some training at the 7-6 promotion seminar at County HQ on July 22 followed by the RA-FA Meeting on August 9 at the same venue. Some of my friends have completed their PGMO fitness tests today, so well done to Bob, Andy, Ricky and Ross.

Some of the other lads have had their Supply Leagues confirmed for them and I have to admit, I'm beginning to miss being out on the green bit again. I'm sure pre-season training (starting on July 12) will knock that out of me!

Work gets in the way

I've done my best to keep up with the coverage of the World Cup by listening to the commentaries on Radio Five Live.

It's not been easy as I have to work at the same time and falling asleep is disapproved of. The games have hardly set the world alight. Yesterday, Holland eased their way past a difficult opponent in the form of Denmark. The Danes had taken the game to the Dutch for much of the first half but when they came out for the second half they conceded twice with no reply. A calamitous own goal by Daniel Agger right at the start of the half was joined by a poacher's goal by Dirk Kuyt, following up a rebound off a goal post.

Cameroon, the African team expected to make the biggest impact in tournament, fell to a goal just before half time from Honda. It was his birthday on Sunday and this was probably a great, late present.

Normal service was resumed in the evening as another draw was played out between Paraguay and Italy. Paraguay scored a well crafted goal in the first half but then a disastrous attempt by their goalkeeper to collect a cross, saw the ball fly over his head and poked in by De Rossi with a little over 5 minutes left.

And so to today ... in the lunchtime kick off Slovakia's lead was cancelled out by a New Zealand goal in added time at the end of the second half. This meant that New Zealand earned their first ever World Cup Finals point.

This brought us to the much anticipated clash between Ivory Coast and Portugal. With the prospect of Ronaldo and Drogba on the same field, it seemed that goals might flow. As things turned out, Ronaldo could do no more than hit the post and Drogba, suffering from a broken wrist, did not join the fray until late in the second half. The game then stuttered through to another 0-0 draw.

Tonight's game sees the highest ranked team playing the lowest ranked, as Brazil meet North Korea. This game should see goals, so I'll be settling down for this one in 15 minutes.