Thoughts on Fifa World Cup 2014: Part 4 (1st Round of 2nd Round)

During the world cup season, my social network news feeds get infested by the masterfully crafted speeches from the seasonal football critiques. One of them just wrote "I wonder why the Brazilian coach needs to play Fred and Hulk. They play like shit." I think Scolari read this status and did't like it; so for a practical demonstration, he substituted Fred and unleashed Jo and mentioned "Meet Jo Black". What happened subsequently is a totally forgettable show of missed shots, humorous penalty expecting stumbles and an overall clumsy presence. 

So, the point I just tried to make is that Scolari is forced to use these players, because there just aren't any better ones. Yesterday, for the first time during this tournament, I managed to gather my friends at home to enjoy the Brazil Vs Chile 2nd round game. During the game, we were lamenting the lack of a proper number 9 in Brazil. In fact, we unanimously agreed that Brazil hasn't seen a proper number 9 since Ronaldo retired. A lot of strikers came and went in between, but no one could do anything significant. 

In fact, we failed to recall any other player's name who donned the famous number 9 since Ronaldo's departure. After almost 12 hours, I can now vaguely remember a black skinned player who had a lot of promise, but got lost somehow. After googling, I stumbled across the name "Robinho", and I also remembered Pato. Probably they, along with Kaka or Ronaldinho could actually be better choices for the squad. 

Chile played a passionate game of footy. Throughout the game, they changed their strategy and managed to intimidate, if not tame, the young and brave Brazilian squad. The only dent in their stellar performance was the controversial ruling out of what seemed like a legitimate goal from Hulk. And that was not the only time when the referee (who, pointed out by another person) looks a lot like Pitbull. 

It seemed that the English referee prefers a lot of Chili in his food, and hates Brazilian dishes with a passion. So he tried to give some advantages to Chile (not Chili, by the way), but at the end of the day, the old Canadian warhorse (if you were wondering, I am talking about Julio Caesar) got the job done. The veteran keeper from Canadian football league's (yes, this is Soccer I am talking about) renowned(!) club FC Toronto saved the day for Brazil. 

They got the crossbar's blessing as well. 

Which brings me back to my last post. Old veterans and or senior citizens are often insulted and overlooked. However, they do inspire the young ones to do better. Who could forget the awesome dribbles from the Mexican Blanco? I think he played in three consecutive cups. By the team he got included in the last world cup's squad, he was not in the shape for playing a full game. But when he did come in, he scored a goal from a penalty and showed some of his old magic. 

Same happened with Didier Drogba, Anton Cassano, Giorgos Karagounis, Helder Postiga, Miroslav Klose and a number of other old veterans that were included in the squads by their respective coaches. Some of them delivered, while some failed, but they had their purpose in the team. 

Let's take a look at a wikipedia CV:

Karagounis represented Greece for the first time in 1999, and is currently the most capped player in the history of the national team. He scored the first goal of UEFA Euro 2004, a long range effort that helped his team to win the opening game of the tournament, in which the Greeks emerged as champions

Well, if that didn't impress you, you should see the last couple of games from Greece. 

So, Brazil brought in a team which does not have any senior player. No one to inspire, no one to look upon, no one to deliver the late night sparkle from the ustad. 

The game was mostly boring, and much heart beat altering for the Brazilian fans. Chile played well, but at the end of the day, broke down under pressure. Julio Caesar kept calm and stopped many penalty kicks, and Brazilian young ones converted theirs. 

At around 1:15 AM, the excruciatingly tedious game ended, and my friends left. I thought about skipping the second game. After all, I really don't bother much about a Colombia VS Uruguay game, especially when Uruguay has to play without their main striker. 

But surprisingly enough, I dragged myself to the living room at around 2:10, and I almost instantly got treated with an awesome goal from someone who writes his name as James (as in James Bond) but apparently we are supposed to call him Haa Mess (sound of opening the mouth in Bengali followed by Messi without the I). 

So this Haames Rodriguez scored an Messilliant goal, and later on, scored another that dwarfed the opposition. It was a sad end to a not so memorable journey for Uruguay, who 'd still have to look back 80 years to recall their last triumph.

So Brazil will face Colombia next in the quarter finals. As both teams have yellow jerseys, my fun prediction is the one who'll wear yellow that day will win. 

Going back to seasonal football fans. I am also one of them. I don't follow football for a greater part of the year unless the world cup is there. No, I can't tell you how Chelsea fans are pretenders and Manchester United fans are true fans. I don't know for a fact that xyz player is actually because he scored 30 goals in PQR league whereas some other guy is scoring goals in the world cup but never makes any impact in league games. 

Sometimes I read some status updates from some of my friends during some games from (okay enough with the some-thing) English Premier League and Spanish league, and of course, the "Champions League", but in most cases, I manage to stay indifferent. But that doesn't make me "less entitled" to support an "international" team during the world cup. 

At the end of the day, most fans are fans because they are blind in some way. Every player, and every team has their flaws, but if we start being too critical, then no one can ever be the fans of any team or player, because the flaws would hold them back. 

By the way, during the first game, one of my spur of the moment jokes didn't go too well with my Brazil die hard fan buddies. Soon after Chile scored the equalizer, I said "Brazil is the only team that won't need a plane to go back home". In reply I got the look that can be most convincingly described as "Kotmot kore takay thaklo". 

Until the next.

To be continued...

Thoughts on Fifa World Cup: Part 3 (Spain In Pain)

I need to speed up my writing in order to stay current. Lot has happened since I started working on this part. 

Senior citizens are often treated unkindly. They are less energetic than their younger counterparts, and yet they believe they have some "experience" and that experience alone should compensate for skill, agility and overall hunger for success. This compels the coaches to ignore young prospects and select old buffoons instead.

Iker Casillas and Gienluigi Buffoon are undoubtedly two of our generation's best  goalkeepers, but it seems their days have come and went away, and they are only shadows of their former selves. 

As a rule of thumb, we are seeing that teams relying on older players are suffering dearly. To be more precise, European teams relying on older players are suffering dearly. Only 10 days of the world's greatest show has passed, and already titans like Spain and England have fallen. Two others are waiting to get the boot as well. 

Spain team reminds me of a Hurricane, and whenever I think about Hurricanes, the song "Rock You Like A Hurricane" by Scorpions starts playing in the back of my mind. They came, they saw and they conquered the world in 2010, and two years later, the seasoned soldiers of Vicente del Bosque managed to win the Euro cup, too--an unprecedented event. 

But time has not been kind to the Spaniards. Bulk of the Spanish golden generation came from FC Barcelona, and they came to prominence by adapting the now famous "Tiki-Taka". At first, I thought this was another useless innovation(!) by Prothom-Alo (e.g. Khude barta), but it seems it's a proper word and has its own wikipedia page as well. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiki-taka) 

So the world was swept away by tiki-taka. No one had any answer against both Barca and Spanish national team. But the coaches around the globe are not dumb. They took their time, analyzed the strategy, and did so much homework that within 2 years, the strategy has become a child's play and Spain has lost two out of two games in the Fifa World Cup 2014; letting in 7 goals and only scoring 1, and that too, from a penalty kick. 

Every war has casualties, and it seems that the Spanish inquisition's biggest casualty will be their defense and attack. Saint Iker; fondly named by the fans failed miserably. Things that counted against him:

• He is a great goalkeeper, but he is not the first choice keeper for his club side. 
• He is the captain of the squad. So despite of playing like bat-shit, he just didn't have the heart to step down in the 2nd game. 
• He is a living legend, but he is in his mid thirties

And as for the strikers, none of them had the killer instinct to get the goals rolling. All kinds of tiki-taka ended in vain when Diego Costa failed to deliver. Honestly, I didn't even hear that much about him before this tournament. But then again, I am not a very ardent follower of the league games, so he might have been "big" there. 

So I went to good old wikipedia again, and wow, the revelation is almost like opening the Pandora's box. Apparently, he played twice for the Brazilian national team before embracing Spanish citizenship. 

Some text directly copied from wiki:

On 29 October 2013, Costa declared that he wished to play international football for Spain, sending a letter to the Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF).Following the news, Scolari commented:"A Brazilian player who refuses to wear the shirt of the Brazilian national team and compete in a World Cup in your country is automatically withdrawn. He is turning his back on a dream of millions, to represent our national team, the five-time champions in a World Cup in Brazil

So basically, Spain came to the field with a Brazilian Mir Jafor, and still hoped to win the cup. No wonder things didn't work out too well for them. 

And about the other stars in the team; as an example "Fernando Torres". Oh wait! Isn't that the guy who has been featured in thousands of Memes for missing hundreds of the easiest goal scoring opportunities? 

Check out this list of funny Torres memes: 

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1159374-gems-from-the-internet-15-funniest-fernando-torres-memes

And then there's Xavi, Iniesta, Xab Alonso, Pedro, David Villa, Fabregas -- all great starts from across the globe who came from a grueling league with tiring legs, and most of these players are also either over or approaching their 30s. 

Surprisingly enough ,Spain approached their 3rd and last game with a totally different mantra. The starting eleven consisted of old veterans like Torres and David VIlla, and other overlooked stars like Mata and Cazorla got a chance to show their skills. Also, this was the first Ikarless game for Spain in a long while; Pepe Reina (not the Portuguese pepe!) took his place and ended the game with a clean sheet. 

After an inspiring show, they won the game 3-0 against Australia, and David Villa, Mata and Torres(!) scored one goal each. 

As one of my friend said, there is light at the end of the tunnel. As old veterans hang up their boots and gloves, new stars will shine from the burnt remains of the mighty Phoenix. Spain will not fade away. 

To be continued...

Previous Parts:

https://www.facebook.com/notes/ishtiaque-khan/thoughts-on-fifa-worldcup-part-2-brazilian-zeal/10152077645995728

https://www.facebook.com/notes/ishtiaque-khan/thoughts-on-fifa-worldcup-part-1/10152075297965728

Fifa World Cup Thoughts: Part 2

Brazil Vs Croatia match started off with an extraordinary "own goal". Before settling down comfortably, we watched the score line get active. This year, we are lucky enough to have a couple of cable TV channels broadcast the games. 

Even in 2010, we had to solely rely on BTV. Almost everything about BTV is disgustingly horrible and annoyingly intolerable. They used to take too many advertisement breaks, and the advertisements were horrible, too. 

The own goal from "Marcelo" of Brazil paved the way for a humorous Meme on Ananta Jalil, whereby he is asking "Brazil er first goal ta ke Marcelo?" and Neymar is replying "Marcelo". By the way, I didn't know that there was a word called "Meme" in 2010. But these days, our facebook posts, updates and even comments are filled with memes. Most people don't even know that they are using a meme, nor do they know how the word is pronounced. It has got nothing to do with the sound "baa baa black sheep" makes, nor is it "ami ami" (me me). It sounds something like "Meem" or "Meam". (Not maim, too). 

I was expecting a more attacking style from Brazil. But then again, as it was proven in 1994, they don't really need to go all out to dominate the game. They can limp along and still win the trophy. Argentina struggled and fumbled throughout the tournament in 1990, and yet managed to reach the finals. 

The way they won against Brazil was simply outrageous. 1-0 was the score; I still remember the clever pass from Maradona and the precise finish from Caniggia. Bebeto, Kareka and some other people couldn't repay the debt (obviously they were not Lannisters) and Argentina stole a win. 

They stole many other wins, thanks to their inhuman goalkeeper Goycochea. Speaking of inhumans, Mr. Ochoya, the Mexican goalkeeper of 2014 stood like an adamantium wall against the new generation of Brazillian strikers. Basically every striker except Hulk, Fred, Jo and Bernard managed to take a few shots at the goalie, and he remarkably denied all these strikers of some fine goals. Among the ones who didn't take a shot at the Mexican goalpost were either sitting in the bench or sleeping in the field, or both. 

And this Hulk of Brazil clearly hasn't gone through any gamma radiation, nor is his skin green. He gets angry, but can't smash anything--let alone the opponent team's defense. A dear friend of mine got ridiculed by another dear friend of mine because the former picked Hulk for his fantasy team (fifa.com) and I took the fun (moja nisi). 

3-1 against Croatia, 0-0 against Mexico; things don't look too well for Brazil. Especially, all the senior strikers seem too old to score. Only Neymar Junior, who cries a lot, seems to be in scoring shape. 

I never liked Scolari that much. He reminds me of Walruses, which are not my favorite animal. He is called Big Phill for good reasons, but I couldn't imagine he'd make the Brazil team look like Varys without the whispering birds. 

The game against Mexico was so interesting that I fell asleep multiple times within the poorly invested 100 minutes or so I invested at the late hours of the night to see them play. The secret scroll called Jogo Bonito was stolen by the dragon warrior, and someone needs to retrieve it. Or else, we will see another European giant steal the show. Once again. 

And speaking of European giants; one of them fell too hard and proved once again that falling from the top is a lot more painful than falling halfway. 

To be continued.

Fifa World Cup Thoughts: Part 1

During every Fifa world cup, I try writing. Don't want to make an exception for 2014 as well. It's better late than never. 

This year's world cup kicked off with the somewhat non-memorable Brazil Vs Croatia clash. I have started watching the world cup since 1990, which makes 2014 my 7th consecutive cup viewing. As I've progressed through life,  interest level and circumstances dictated the number of matches I ended up seeing. The timing of the matches played a key role too.  

I very, very vaguely remember watching my mom and dad supporting two polar opposite teams in 1986. Mom was happy and jubilant after the "short guy" (not the imp!) lifted the cup, and dad had a long face after some bearded guy missed a penalty kick and the yellow jersey clad players got kicked out. 

Well, that's what I can recall, and I am surprised to remember such details. 

1990

I have a better memory of 1990 cup. At that time, my dad gave up his job in KSA and we were living in Dhaka permanently. I, like many others of our age, got addicted to collecting "View Cards" of the players of the Fifa world cup. I had a huge collection, and it was a very exciting time for us. That was also the time when I figured it out that I would be supporting the white blue ones for the next two decades; hoping every four years for a miracle only to be left heart broken. 

Roger Milla, Goycochea and Schilacci--the previously unheard names became the biggest household names. 

I remember buying an exercise book with the picture of a tear sullen Diego Maradona, with a funny anecdote written below -"The Black Hand of Codesal Mendez denied Diego from lifting the cup again". People alive around that time would be able to relate to this, I am sure. 

1994

All I remember about 1994 is Ephedrine and a superstar's stupidity. Enough said. By the way, Baggio had a cool pony tail and Brazil played a boring but effective game to lift the cup. Romario was on fire, though.  

1998

1998 became great because of Fifa 98. I spent more time playing the game than watching the games. I made Bangladesh win the cup and Alfaz become the top scorer for at least 20-25 times. Wasn't so easy, trust me. Zidane, Beckham, Ronaldo, Maldini, Batistuta, Bergkamp, Klinsmann, Rivaldo, Suker, Baggio --all of them played in this cup, and I really don't think people will see such fine stars in another world cup anytime soon. 

The final wasn't anything to write home about. France dominated the game, and Brazil seemed helpless, which was definitely something new to me. 

2002

This was the most painful world cup for me. As it took place in Asia, most games happened during the day time when I had long classes in the university. I skipped a class to watch Argentina's crucial game against Sweden, but they failed to win the game and got kicked out of the tournament. 

I don't really remember much about the rest of the tournament (this is called selective forgetfulness) but I heard the other Latin American team won it!

2006

By now it is more than obvious that I am a big supporter of Argentina. But that doesn't mean I hate Brazil (nor should the usual trend be like this; but facts suggest otherwise). Every year (world cup year, that is) I see Brazillian fans smart talking about Argentina fans, and vice versa.  Previously, it was just verbal conversations and storm in the teacups, but with the emergence (read dominance) of social networks, these days we only see best buddies sniping, pinching and inadvertently hurting each other through snide remarks on their facebook profile.

But this wasn't the case even in 2006. Whenever there was a good match, I'd coordinate with my buddies to sit together and watch the games. On such a day, my friends came to my home to witness the Argentina Vs Serbia Montenegro match. That was a historic match because Lionel Messi scored his first world cup goal in that match. He came in as a late substitute and added to the 6-0 victory of Argentina.

But....we missed all that. The electricity went off 10 minutes before the match, returned briefly during the half time break, and went off again for another 60 minutes. We didn't get to see a single shot. My friends were courteous enough to hang around. We went to the roof and felt anguished as we heard people shouting after each goal was scored.

We could actually go somewhere else to see the game, but it was raining heavily in Dhaka that evening and we were basically stuck.

Wasn't such a bad experience, and I watched many games. The final was memorable for the Zidane fatality on Materazzi. Since Argentina and Brazil failed to convert, I supported Italy for the remainder of the tournament and gladly saw Cannavaro lift the coveted trophy.

To be continued..

Mass Effect Memories: Part 4

It took me a while to get all DLCs for Mass Effect 1 wanted to get the full experience, which I did with Dragon Age: Origins. 

I installed the game on my humble PC and started playing. 

As soon as I reached the character creation screen, glimpses of my past gameplay started haunting me. However, I quickly started enjoying the creation part because now I have a strong RPG completion resume. 

In no time, my male Shepard was ready to save the universe. I didn't do much with the default character model, but I spent more time in customizing the skills. Basically my Shepard turned out to be a heavy weapons specialist with high accuracy and damage. I don't exactly remember the traits, but I didn't pick anything "bionic". 

The next few hours went by smoothly. I rescued Ashley from the distressed planet, and also got the vision from the beacon. 

Soon enough, I reached the Citadel. 

I was a bit cautious, because I remember getting overwhelmed by side quests in my last play through.

To be continued..

Mass Effect Memories: Part 3

So i decided to change the title of this series. I started getting sick of the name. 

Over the years, my gaming preferences changed a lot. By 2008, I got completely sick and tired of first person shooters. I think the last shooter game I tried playing was Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, which was actually a very good game. 

But I quickly lost interest due to a disconnected, and confusing story line, and I also found my character to have a minimal role in the grand scale of events. 

At that point of time, I was an active member of a Gamespot Union. This might not ring a bell to many; http://gamespot.com, one of the most popular gaming websites had a unique feature called "Unions", which were basically user created discussion boards. The feature had a good following, and there were hundreds of small, but active boards that were self-governed; e.g. the owner and his appointed moderators would take care of proceedings. 

The union had about 10 active members, and we were very much geographically aloof. But we had a common liking for strategy games, and from this union, I garnered an interest in RPGs. Most of the members were RPG veterans, and I started getting all sorts of recommendations from them. 

They  walked me through the basics, and soon enough, I found myself playing Neverwinter Nights. Previously, I tried NWN2, but as you've already figured it out, I was trying to play that game as an action title, and I hated everything that involved role playing. 

But this time around, my mind was more receptive towards a slower approach to gaming, and I also managed to get involved with the story line. I struggled with certain quests at the beginning, but I managed to figure out ways and I eventually finished the game quite easily. 

After that, I started playing RPGs like a possessed man. I breezed through Dungeon Siege 2, Witcher 1, Neverwinter Nights 2, Dragon Age: Origins, Drakensang, Risen, etc. within a very short period of time.

Among these, I loved Dragon Age: Origins the most, and by the end of 2010, I had already done with my 15th play through of DA:O. 

I didn't have any other game to play, and I suddenly remembered. Wasn't Mass Effect an RPG, too? 

ME 2 was out by then, and I thought I should start with the new one. But at the last moment, I decided to start with the first game, and the rest is history. 

To be continued.....

Mass Effect Memories: Part 2

Quake 3 Arena was one of my most favorite games, ever. I spent countless hours fragging humans and bots alike. To me, role playing games were an alien breed. I've only played a demo of Diablo once, and I didn't like the game at all. 

I tried playing Oblivion (Elder Scrolls IV) before, but I didn't understand the underlying concepts; e.g. I had no clue when I kept on getting a prompt on the screen that my character is being heavily encumbered; I only got pissed off at my character because he suddenly started moving very, very slowly. 

So when I started Mass Effect, I had little clue about weapon upgrades, suit upgrades and inventory management. I didn't even know that weapons can be bought and sold; I just ignored the vendors. 

When my team reached the Citadel, I totally lost direction. I didn't know what to do, or to be precise, who to beat up. I also didn't like it the way random strangers (especially Garrus) invited themselves in to my team. I also didn't like it inside the spaceship, and I wanted to slap the bearded pilot guy for his cheeky comments. 

So after dilly dallying for almost a week, I figured out a way of getting back to my ship Normandy, and I went in search of some alien lady. 

I landed on a planet, and was asked to roam around using a rover kind of vehicle. At first, it seemed fun to move around with the rover, but soon, it became boring, and I couldn't find where to go, what to look for and what to do. 

After trying to get out of the vehicle (in vain) and also to find out my objectives, I gave up playing Mass Effect. I didn't have a big hard drive back then, and I uninstalled and moved on to other games. 

I forgot about Mass Effect for a long, long time. Until some other events unfolded.

To be continued.....

Mass Effect Memories: Part 1

Me and a couple of my friends went to a games store back in 2008 to get a latest, graphically satisfying shooter. This visit was planned in order to check out the graphical capabilities of my newly acquired graphics card. I don't exactly remember the model I had back then, but it was either a new generation Radeon or an Nvidia Geforce. 

We mistook Mass Effect for a third person shooter, and I started playing the game with a trigger happy mentality. I quickly made a female character; mostly using default stats and customization options. I didn't understand any of the options/choices given to me, and I just kept on clicking buttons to get things done. 

After this distracting and impeding experience, I managed to start the game. When the game actually started, things still didn't improve much. I had to listen through a long brief, and none of the speech presented to me made any sense. 

Even after my character was dropped in a somewhat lonely planted to check out some suspicious alien activities, I was being barraged with conversations, interruptions and FMVs. I thought all of these were taking away immersion value from my experience. 

All I wanted was to kill some bad guys and to save the earth. Instead, I kept on getting updates on some Shepard dude and random people kept on saying random stuff to me. 

The setting was breathtaking, though. I could see a huge towering structure ahead of me, and two moons were visible in the sky. 

My friends were watching me play. They also got impatient. We agreed that this is the finest looking shooter that we've ever seen, but it is also the slowest and most irritating shooter we've encountered. 

They left soon, and I spent almost an hour trying to figure out how things work in the game. I got bored and overwhelmed with the different options; I was totally unaware how I could utilize the inventory system, and I was angered at the developers for not setting 0-9 as weapon swap hotkeys. 

I was coming from a Quake 3/Unreal Tournament background. I've never ever played an RPG before and I hated the very thought of those games. 

To be continued....