#14 South Africa 2010
An African World Cup had long been the dream of FIFA president Sepp Blatter and we finally got it in 2010 as the tournament headed to South Africa. It started off brightly as the hosts took a 1-0 lead over Mexico in their opening game via a thumping goal from Siphiwe Tshabalala, but Mexico equalised late on and in a nutshell that was the essence of the tournament. A lot of promise and flash, but not much substance – even the loud buzzing sound of the “vuvuzelas” in the crowd got on everyone’s nerves eventually.
In the end, a first-time winner was guaranteed as Spain faced the Netherlands in the final. It was a bad-tempered affair – arguably the worst final since 1990 or 1994 – but thankfully Spain won out in the end with an Andres Iniesta goal late in extra-time. I say thankfully because the Netherlands’ tactics in the final were filthy.
There were definitely some memorable moments – the bizarre nature of Diego Maradona as Argentina’s manager, the total meltdowns of England, France and Italy, and the pantomime villain antics of Luis Suarez to prevent Ghana from becoming Africa’s first World Cup semi-finalists, but the quality of the football just wasn’t that great although Spain and Germany, in particular, played some scintillating stuff at times.
#13 Brazil 1950
Of all the World Cup formats, 1950’s was the strangest as it didn’t technically have a “final” as such – there were four groups to begin with but the fourth only had two sides – Uruguay and Bolivia – while the others had four, meaning Uruguay essentially advanced via knockout format. And the group winners went into a round-robin second group stage rather than into a traditional knockout.
The four finalists turned out to be Uruguay, hosts Brazil, Sweden and Spain – after early favourites England were embarrassingly eliminated following a 1-0 loss to the USA of all teams.
The decisive match turned out to be the final one; Brazil vs. Uruguay. The hosts only needed to draw to win the tournament while Uruguay, one point behind in the group, needed to win. Brazil were expected to win at a canter – newspapers had already started to crown them as the world champions – but Uruguay had other ideas and after some interesting preparation (apparently urinating on the papers!) beat Brazil 1-2 to become two-time winners.
The match remains infamous to this day in Brazil – known as the Maracanazo – and caused them to change the colour of their strip from white with a blue trim to the famous yellow and blue that we see them wear today. A massively famous final match but the odd format means it’s not one of the best tournaments.
