12.55pm BST
Here's a statistic for you:
Arjen Robben ran 37 kilometres per hour to outrun Sergio Ramos (30.6) for the 1-5, the fastest sprint recorded by FIFA ever. (De Telegraaf)
12.47pm BST
I'm currently perusing Fifa's dedicated media website for the World Cup, in the absence of actual news. Among the handy information they've got there is a file of "story ideas" that members of the press covering the World Cup might want to report to their international readership. They include:
12.34pm BST
Among today's highlights to look forward to:
Iran, USA, Spain, Greece, Colombia, Ghana, Nigeria, Croatia, Russia, Portugal, Germany and Holland all have press conferences scheduled, some of them with open training sessions, so we should have some kind of update from each of them. Japan, South Korea, Cameroon and Brazil aren't holding press conferences, but they are each laying on a "media opportunity", whatever that is. Algeria are promising "media activity", which sounds to me dangerously like some journalists playing Twister. Mexico are having a closed training session with no media opportunities whatsoever, which is a little mean of them.
12.24pm BST
Switzerland v Ecuador: Ravshan Irmatov from Uzbekistan is in charge of this one. You may recognise him from 2010, when he took charge of five matches including the opening match between South Africa and Mexico, and the semi-final between Uruguay and Holland. Ravshan Irmatov doesn't say anything particularly interesting.
France v Honduras: Home favourite Sandro Ricci will wield the whistle. He was Brazil's referee of the year in 2010. I'm not sure what the more recent referee of the year title-winners are up to this summer. Sandro Ricci says:
Before each game I take off my ring and kiss it four times in honour of the four women in my life: my mother, my wife and my two daughters.
I am a cheery person and always in a good mood. I love to take care of my friends. I am an optimist and I like to have fun. Even if people think that referees are the strictest of people, off the pitch we are people who love life.
12.15pm BST
Hello world!
So it's now a little after 8am in Rio, which means that at some point soonish people in Brazil might wake up and start doing things which I can write about. So that's something to look forward to. In the meantime, here's my favourite Fifa press release of the weekend:
The first ever FIFA World Cup match ball to have a Twitter profile has reached a landmark of one million followers. As interest in the tournaments Official Match Ball reachesfever pitch, followers have grown by approximately 850,000 since the kick-off of the worlds biggestfootball tournament, and the official ball is growing its follower base at an unprecedented rate to be the first ever ball to reach over one million followers.
Flattered by its volume of followers, @brazuca said (in less than 140 characters), I can't believe I've
Im @brazuca, match ball of the 2014 FIFA #WorldCup. Yes Im a ball. Yes Im tweeting. Join me on my journey! #ballin pic.twitter.com/KerKWgFdez
12.03pm BST
Anyway, and with that, that's us - Simon Burnton will guide you through the tricky middle hours.
12.01pm BST
Jack Wilshere, the thinking man's tough
11.45am BST
Pirlo's face is a sentence all of its own, but Pirlo's face as he performs this dummy is an entire chapter.
11.36am BST
Phil curls one in from 25 yards
11.36am BST
Phil plays the Yes-No game
11.35am BST
Phil smashes Ronaldo
11.34am BST
Phil with a great save.
11.34am BST
"In defence of Phil Neville" - here's Marcus Christenson, defending Phil Neville.
Given that it was his first go, aside from the tonal issues, I don't think he was too bad. And actually, his brother, though excellent in a studio, isn't anywhere as good in co-commentary.
11.17am BST
Childish but nice. Someone changed the screensavers on all the Macs in some Mac store somewhere to Pirlo's face.
11.10am BST
Back to "Steven", here's Adrian Chiles challenging Brendan Brendan for the stevening world record.
10.56am BST
Another World Cup hero: Enzo Scifo, what a liege. Here he is, proving the same.
10.50am BST
Steven Gerrard, then. Apparently, England lost because of a "lack of quality in the final third". Nothing to do with his hapless anonymity, of course - what a coincidence!
And there's more:
10.42am BST
"You don't have to win to be loved", tweets Gary Naylor. -"England aren't loved yet, but might be soon." The new Denmark '86?
Of whose deeds you can read in the excellent book, Danish Dynamite - which began life on this site, here, and there's a further extract, here - co-authored by Rob Smyth (with Lars Eriksen and Mike Gibbons. Naylor's review is here.
10.38am BST
Bazza, of course, is the progenitor of the award for this gem:
"People always say its a shame someone as talented as Ryan Giggs or George Best before him never played in a World Cup or European Championship and I dont want my name to be added to that list."
10.31am BST
Daniel Sturridge is magnificent. Magnificent. And is hereby shortlisted for the Barry Ferguson award for self-knowledge.
10.25am BST
"Even though the song is being ironical this is how I feel this morning", emails Niall Mullen. The pitch for this included the words "with hilarious results". Fact.
And it might even be worse than old Nasir's contribution; any more for any more?
10.23am BST
A fathers' day thought: people with children really are something else. Nas! What on earth is going on?
10.17am BST
Good World Cup names: Daley Blind, which would be perfect for a newspaper.
10.15am BST
So, today's games. Might Honduras and Bosnia give France and Argentina a nit of aggravation? Also, Switzerland, under Ottmar Hitzfeld, will not be no pushover.
10.07am BST
A World Cup hero. Here's Wim van Hanegem.
10.05am BST
Lee Hendrie. Lee Hendrie and his twin earrings - why wouldn't he want to draw attention to such lovely lugs? - are marking the England team on Sky. Somewhere in heaven, John Logie Baird sighs with pleasure.
9.50am BST
"Not only am I stuck in Italy in a small town near Padova," whinges Alexi Lalas Johny B, "surrounded by literally (literally literally) thousands of Italians, but for some insane reason there is only one game available per day on terrestrial television here, with the rest only shown on Sky, which I don't have. I have the newspaper to read though - gloating on the back pages, billions of missing euros from the flood defences at Venice on the front pages. Would I swap Britain's relatively functioning political system for the corruption and scandal-ridden regimes of Italy or Brazil in return for a side capable of winning the World Cup? Probably."
And that's exactly why the suits can keep having us over.
9.42am BST
I CANNOT WAIT TO WATCH MORE FOOTBALL. I want the finest footballs available to humanity. I want a golden goose.
9.29am BST
Oh, go on then. Cameron versus Keys versus banter.
9.26am BST
Rooney versus Aspas. Oooh yeah,.
9.18am BST
"My fingers were crossed and it paid off" - Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain explains why the scan on his injured knee went well.
9.14am BST
Pirlo is a boss. But to placate the cosmos, here he is, crying over football.
9.07am BST
However - Roy Hodgson forgot Plan A. After ten minutes of Italy sitting in, it was clear England weren't going to play through them - who could? So, instead of bringing on Lallana to augment the clutter, Lambert and crosses into the box would've made more sense. In mine.
9.03am BST
Back to Italy, what a masterclass in closing out a game - magnificent, and the best I cam remember since Bayern Munich knocked Man United out of the European Cup in 2010, admittedly against ten men. Here's Arjen Robben's clinching goal.
9.01am BST
"Here's Sky Sports News, your home of sports news." Pithy, catchy and clever, all mixed.
8.59am BST
Sunday mornin', praise the dawnin'It's just a restless feelin', by my sideEarly dawnin', Sunday mornin'It's just the wasted years so close behind
Watch out, the world's behind youThere's always someone around you, who will callIt's nothin' at all
8.48am BST
"Completely agree about the TV coverage", emails David Wall. You what? Agreement, on a football blog, on the internet? This will not do; call yourself a human? "Ferdinand has been a pleasant surprise, and Juninho earlier of was insightful and fun too. In pretty much all respects the BBC are out-doing ITV so far (quality of pundits, opening sequence, etc). They just seem far more professional whereas ITV want to be the voice down the pub. But you can get that voice down the pub so why put it on TV? Gary Lineker as usual showing he's actually pretty good at presenting tournament coverage, it's just a shame he doesn't get the same freedom on MOTD. But why is it that the Beeb are always better than ITV at tournaments, is it merely the lack of adverts or something else (perhaps comprehensiveness of coverage with radio as well as TV, or ability to attract better pundits because they're more widely respected)?"
Keane's absence is a big thing for ITV - though I thought Clarke Carlisle was good as co-commentator in Mexico-Cameroon. But otherwise, BBC have just chosen more sensibly - two men who've played with and against a lot of the players involved, and are telling us stuff we don't know - how to play them, and how they'd handle particular situations. Roughly, that's what you want off pros - to give the benefit of their specific and individual expertise.
8.44am BST
How many fathers are being forced to have meals, outings, conversations and not watching sport all day bestowed upon them? Kids and wives are the best, just so thoughtful.
8.42am BST
West Brom fans, disappointed their club hasn't appointed Tim Sherwood. Have that, Alan.
8.37am BST
Telly talk. It was not remotely difficult to experience ground gears upon being informed that Rio Ferdinand is "having the time of my life" - that's his, not yours - at the licence payer's expense. But isn't he really good at actually supplying insight - and what a pleasure to see him and Thierry Henry talking across Shearer, the cogs of his brain visible through his pate and frantically churning in an attempt to contribute.
8.27am BST
"Botched rhinoplasty Messi" is an avant-garde way to open a sentence - well done, James Debens. "A terrifyingly expansive pair of nostrils".
Well, he is the natural successor to Maradona. Is this called a messifigy?
8.22am BST
However. Mr Elvis Afriyie-Ankrah, Ghana's sports minister, has tasked the Black Stars with winning the competition.
I require not the slightest persuasion nor excuse to post this video of the squad enjoying a sing-song. Here's the squad enjoying a sing-song.
8.19am BST
Meanwhile, Kwame Noglow, an Asante witch doctor, has advised us that Ghana will fail and Argentina will succeed. There is an old saying in Argentina which has seeped into the vocabulary of almost every citizen,|" he said, on, er, Classic FM. "'God is Argentine, they claim in reference to the countrys enviable geographical position and natural riches, a combination of factors which to the millions of impoverished immigrants who crossed the Atlantic Ocean fromSpain, Italy and elsewhere must have seemed like heaven on earth."
Done and done.
8.10am BST
Who's not spending hours trying to concoct a means by which they can justify lozzing everything and flying to Braseeeww?
8.07am BST
"Gary Lewin's World Cup has come to an abrupt end." Physiotherapist heal thyself. Poor blighter.
8.06am BST
A great World Cup goal. Negrete for Mexico against Bulgaria, 1996.
8.00am BST
El Diego. Scores the winning penalty for the Americas against Rest of the World, man in light blue comes to congratulate him.
7.51am BST
"It's perhaps too early to tell, returns David Wall, "but this is shaping up to be the best tournament since the early 80s/ 70s/ ever. It's as though everyone involved has decided to go retro with more commitment to attacking, some hapless defending, a couple of dodgy goalkeeping performances, inept refereeing and more lenience about physical challenges (almost all of that within the Spain - Netherlands game alone). The best things obviously never go out of style."
"I think it was me who said...". Here's a piece from December, after the play-offs, on why this would be the best World Cup in a generation. And yes, I forgot to bet a goal spread.
7.49am BST
"Admittedly the beer may have influenced my assessment, writes Martin Kuzmicki, "but this was fundamentally a usual England tournament performance - Rooney disappointing (that corner alone should stop all talk of 'world class'), defensive mistakes for goals, not beating a good team. The only difference is that they were not as abject as last time round against the Italians."
Rooney wasn't anything like England's worst player, I'd not say - better than Baines, Johnson, Gerrard and perhaps Henderson. But disagree that it was typical England - they played without fear, as though they actually wanted to be there, and that gave them a very different energy.
7.44am BST
And how good is Brazil; that's another statement. It's just such a country, and the effect on the competition just couldn't be clearer - everyone is just in a superb mood. Just look at how good the goal celebrations have been (England aside, of course).
7.39am BST
Anyway, how good is football; that's a statement. But really, how very, very good - in some ways, too good for its own good, so wonderfully good as to ensure its exploitation, and then to ensure its toleratation in name of more majestic goodness. It's so good.
7.35am BST
First email of the day, with David Wall."I expect there will be a lot of people complain, looking for a scapegoat, etc after the game last night, but I was pleasantly surprised. England had lots of attacking intent and retained possession pretty well in general. That is, they did exactly what everyone had been calling for them to do. Even if they end up losing all of their games I'd not be as disappointed as in past tournaments if they continue to play like that. It might be their best in-tournament performance for a decade, they just met a very good side in the first game rather than the quarter-final."
Johnson-Cahill-Jagielka-Baines;I don't think England had a choice but to attack. They played ok, I'd say - but how many of the players had good games? Two, three? I'd say Cahill, and then Sterling and Welbeck if we're being generous - both looked dangerous, neither threatened as much as you'd like, especially in that last 20 minutes. But yep, it wasn't bad.
7.31am BST
Talking of beauty, here's some more. A scenario: England lose to Uruguay, narrowly. Italy beat Costa Rica. Needing to be sure of winning the group, Italy then beat Uruguay, and England scrounge a 2-0 against Costa Rica, to finish second in the group, with three points! You'd have to admire that, both for its own sake and its poetic perfection.
7.24am BST
Insight with Andy Cole.This is just so exceptionally magnificent. Five questions, three don't knows, one Messi and one Brazil. Beautiful. Ex to tha clusive.
7.14am BST
Football. Football football football. Football, football, football, football-football, football. Football football football football football football, foot'ball. Football football football football football football football football football football football football football football football football football football football football football. Football, football, football, football, football. Football-football-football. Football3. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football. Football.
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