Not that anyone is going to mind or anything...

But I've fallen behind with the ol' World Cup blogging! Time for a Batch 3 round up, written as I watch Germany take a 4th minute lead against Sweden - Podolski has just scored and, as he did with his first goal in the tournament, run over to the German bench to celebrate with the subs.

So, Batch 3 - It featured, if not the best, than at least my favourite goal of the tournament so far. It featured the most disappointing game so far in Holland against Argentina. It featured the most heartwrenching moment as St Michael's knee crumpled under him. It featured the single most dull game so far in Tunisia vs Ukraine. It featured a Brazil team that finally showed up, and a French team who managed to suceed despite what appeared to be an overwhelming weight of desire and expectation and nervousness threatening to defeat them in a way Togo never looked likely to. It featured the first game of the tournament that I haven't seen all the goals from in Ivory Coast vs Serbia and Montenegro, notable also for being the only game of the tournament which will be the last ever for a whole actual country. (Podolski's just scored again). It also saw some awful refeering...There was something strangely satisfying about Graham Poll's disastrous triple yellow card action. English commentators and pundits and journalists are always so sniffy about "foreign" referees, and it's vaguely amusing to see them all with egg on their faces, although my heart goes out to Mr Poll himself...In a vaguely related note, SURELY yellow cards that keep you out of crucial games should be appealable?

Right, I'm off to belatedly change around my fantasty football team...We are in the knockout stages at last, and I think predictions at this stage risk serious fool-hardiness, so I'm not even going to try. Except to say that I predict that before this world cup is out we will have seen at least one properly convincing display by England. I hope I'm not wrong on that...