Flour Power

Sarah Hyland, from the TV show Modern Family, kind of looks like Victoria’s Secret model Miranda Kerr, don’t you think?

The graphic above was created using the Look-Alike Builder, courtesy of Totally Looks Like.

If you’re expecting some form of analysis that has anything to do with football, this is not the post you are looking for. There are already hundreds of those articles around the web, and a lot of them written by people that know much more about football than I do.

I’ll instead present some of the things that made this World Cup special despite not being specific to the sport itself: the buzzing vuvuzela, the most famous fan of the World Cup, two psychic animals and a pornstar’s marketing stunt.

The Vuvuzela

The most noticeable thing while watching the games was definitely the incessant noise of the vuvuzela. It was in fact so annoying that, as annoying things tend to do, it originated all kinds of jokes around the Internet: Youtube added the “Vuvuzela button”, Hitler complained about it, and the Vuvuzela Radio was born, just to name a few. Soon enough people started coming up with ways to remove the annoying sound, but those without the technical skills to implement them had to endure that buzzing sound through the whole competition, because attempts to ban it from the stadiums failed.

Larissa Riquelme

Don’t know who I’m talking about?

What about now?

Larissa Riquelme is a Paraguayan model and actress that rose to fame during this World Cup due to pictures such as the one above. She became the most famous fan of the World Cup, and was named “Girl of the World Cup” by Marca, the largest Spanish sports newspaper. Following her rise to fame, she promised to run naked (wearing only body paint) through the streets of Asunción if Paraguay won the World Cup, or even if they reached the semi-finals by beating Spain. Paraguay ended up losing its match against Spain, but Larissa announced that she will fulfill her promise anyway.

Paul the Octopus and Mani the Parakeet

Paul is an octopus living in a tank in Germany who is used as an oracle to predict football matches, usually international matches where Germany is playing:

During a divination, Paul is presented with two boxes containing food in the form of a mussel, each marked with the flag of a national football team in an upcoming match. He chose the box with the flag of the winning team in four of Germany’s six Euro 2008 matches, and in all seven of their matches in the 2010 World Cup.

He also predicted Spain’s win over the Netherlands in the final, which makes his predictions 100% (8/8) correct for the 2010 World Cup.

Paul is now retiring from soccer predictions.

Mani is another animal oracle that became famous during this World Cup. This parakeet from Singapore picked the correct winners for all of the quarter-final games, as well as the Spain-Germany semi-final. But he went against Paul in the final, ending his streak of correct predictions.

Bobbi Eden and #teambj

That promise that Larissa Riquelme did? That’s nothing compared to Bobbi Eden’s. The Dutch pornstar promised to provide oral sex to all her Twitter followers if Holland won the World Cup.

This made her Twitter follower count jump from around 5k to more than 100k in just a few days. Because Holland was defeated in the final, we won’t see it happening, but Bobbi promised some consolation prize. It’s a pity, I was looking forward to find out how would she be able to do it. Just think about the logistics involved!

Last night I had the pleasure to be one of the lucky few in The O2, Dublin, watching an amazing concert by Pearl Jam, starting off their 2010 Europe Tour.

If I had to describe the concert in one word, I would choose energetic. A lot of the loudest and quickest Pearl Jam songs were part of the setlist, and once or twice I wished for a quieter song to be able to get a little rest from being in the edge of the moshpit. But the band was just full of energy, and barring songs like Nothingman, Just Breathe and Elderly Woman Behing the Counter in a Small Town, it was almost constant jumping through the whole thing.

It’s hard to choose a favorite, but I’ll go for Better Man, for the awesome atmosphere caused by more than 10.000 people singing it in unison. I can’t help but feel a bit disappointed that none of Black, Jeremy, Last Kiss, Red Mosquito or Wishlist didn’t make it to the set, but on the other hand they played a completely new song. A song “so new, it might not even be a song yet” – Of The Earth.

In summary, two and a half hours of pure energy. Here’s the complete setlist of 26 songs:

Long Road
Once
The Fixer
Why Go
Corduroy
Severed Hand
Amongst The Waves
Even Flow
Unthought Known
Nothingman
Lukin
Not For You
Down
Got Some
Comatose
Arms Aloft (Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros cover)
Do The Evolution

Encore 1
Just Breathe
Given To Fly
Of The Earth
Porch

Encore 2
Elderly Woman Behind The Counter In A Small Town
Better Man
Kick Out The Jams (MC5 cover)
Alive
Yellow Ledbetter

The most read Spanish sports newspaper – MARCA – has made available in their website a very impressive calendar for the World Cup 2010.

It’s interactive, made in Flash, and allows for a quick view of all the games across 4 dimensions: teams, days, stadiums and groups.

The middle section displays the games, depending on which section the mouse is hovering on. For example, hovering over Portugal (left section, “National Teams”) displays the list of games where Portugal is playing (see screenshot above). This will also highlight items in the other sections – the group Portugal is in (bottom section “Groups and Stages”), the stadiums where the team will be playing (right section “Stadiums and Cities”) and on which days are the games (top section, “World Cup 2010 Schedule”).

It’s the best calendar for the World Cup I’ve seen so far.

(World Cup 2010 interactive calendar)

I knew the Irish were still not over that Thierry Henry (double) handball that helped put Ireland away from World Cup 2010, but I never thought some companies would go as far as using it for marketing purposes. As a supporter of fairness in sports I already wrote about my opinion on the subject, and I’ll be joining the “Anyone But France” team for this World Cup. It would be even better if Portugal was the one to beat them. But I digress.

The point of this post is to show that companies are creating campaigns based on France performing badly in the South Africa World Cup. It’s not only random people planning a drinking session when France is out, but well-known brands offering incentives to be anti-France. So far I’ve found 2 such examples.

The electrical retailer Currys has adopted the slogan “When the French lose… the Irish win!” and is offering vouchers of up to €100 to TV buyers, to be redeemed when France leaves the tournament. They even have a cheeky ad to go with it:

A long term investment in France’s demise, which might take longer than most people would like.

Pizza Hut is going the route of instant gratification. They’ll offer a free pizza for every goal scored against the French. The Facebook page will provide the ordering codes to get one of the 350 pizzas (yes, there’s a limit) each time France concedes a goal.

Do you know of any other anti-France World Cup offers? Please share them in the comments.