Round of 16 Summary

Confederation Status

Confed	Tm	2R	QF	P	W	D	L	Pts	G+	G-	GD	Win%	Pts%	Pwr
CSF	5	5	4	18	12	5	1	41	27	8	19	81%	76%	84%
UEFA	13	6	3	29	10	10	9	40	33	27	6	52%	46%	42%
CONF	3	2		11	2	4	5	10	9	13	-4	36%	30%	33%
AFC	4	2		14	4	3	7	15	14	28	-14	39%	36%	31%
CAF	6	1	1	19	4	5	10	17	16	23	-7	34%	30%	24%
OFC	1			3	0	3	0	3	2	2	0	50%	33%	21%

Intra-confederation games (e.g. Spain-Switzerland, are excluded)

I added a Power ranking (Pwr) which is the average of Winning%, Points%, Teams in second%, Teams in Quarter-Finals%. So UEFA gets (52%+46%+6/13+3/16)/4 = (52%+46%+46%+23%)/4 = 42%.

For the first time ever, 4 CSF teams have made it to the Quarter-Final round. This is even more surprising since the last time CSF had three teams in the "elite eight" was 1978 in Argentina when Peru joined Brazil and Argentina. In the 32 years since, only Brazil and Argentina managed to reach this level from CSF. On the other side of the coin, this is the first time that only three UEFA teams made it this far, the previous low was 4 in 2002 (CSF, AFC, CONF and CAF representatives made up the other four). In 1994, UEFA had 7 teams in the Quarter-Finals while in 1998 and 2006 they had 6, so this is a big drop.

The CSF performance is incredible, the only one team eliminated (Chile) and that was a result of a loss to another CSF team (Brazil). So far we had 9 intra-confederation games (8 UEFA and 1 CSF) none of them ended in a tie (22 total goals). Except for Ghana, CAF performance was abysmal (they would have been dead last). UEFA, who is having a bad WC, has played more than 50% more inter-confederation games and still has fewer losses.

Observations

For the third time in history a CAF team has made it to the Quarter-Finals, all three teams (Cameron 1990, Senegal 2002, Ghana 2010) needed extra time to advance. USA has won their group and finished in 12^th place overall in the world cup; during 390+ (probably over 410) minutes of playing time they had the lead for about 2 minutes (winning goal vs. Algeria was scored at 90'+2' and the game ended at 90'+4').

Xabi Alonso of Spain got a yellow card in 74' against Portugal , this was Spain's first yellow card of the world cup. On the other hand, Chile finished with 13 yellow and 1 red cards. Among the quarter finalists, Argentina and Paraguay have 5 yellows, Uruguay 3YC and 1RC, Netherlands and Ghana with 8YC, Brazil with 6YC and 1RC (Kaka) and last is Germany with 7YC and 1RC (Klose) . Interesting that both Brazil's and Germany's red cards (really second yellows) were given to stars who are playing attacking roles – these are the type of players who rarely get two yellows in a game.

Miscellaneous

All four of us went to the Paraguay – Japan game in Pretoria, as you know that game ended up going to Extra Time and a Penalty Shoot Out. Getting out of the lower stands Loftus field is very hard and time consuming when the stadium is near full, so by the time we got to our car (we parked right in-front of the Syrian Embassy) is was after 7pm. Our plan was to go to Pilanesberg Game Reserve for a "Safari". Our Hotel in Pilanesberg was about 160km (over 100mi) away from the Stadium and we had to face the fact that the Spain – Portugal match which we all wanted to see was starting at 8:30pm.

We headed west from Pretoria as fast as we could and after about 80km when started heading north is become clear that we are not going to make it to the hotel in time for the game. Adi called the Hotel to confirm direction and the night clerk told him that to get to the hotel we need to make a right at the four way stop sign. Informing him that we are still about 80km away and just started to head north on R556 from the N4 (a major road) didn't change the directions. We gave up on him and trust my memory that we need to make a right before Sun City at R5xx. I was driving fairly fast (100-120kph) on a dark two line highway (after all we have a big game to catch) and hoping that we will be able to identify the correct right hand turn.

At 8:30pm we are about 30km south east of Sun City (which is the precise location of the "middle of no-where") we see two huge TV screens starting to show the game. We pull left and turn, ask for direction for the entrance which was another left and enter the compound after a quick security check. We found some plastic lawn chairs and watched the game. It turned out that this was a setup for the people of the Bafokeng nation to watch the WC games. During half time and after the game the PA announcer welcomed their guests from Israel both in English and Setswana (the local language). This was an experience of a life time.

Since we still needed to verify direction both Adi and I used out Blackberry to ask for directions since "right at the four way stop sign" didn't inspire confidence in us. I also want to ask two men in uniform about directions while waiting for email responses. I got good directions from the two men, as well as an offer for me to wait 15 min after the game and they'll take the local fire truck and lead me to the hotel; I politely declined, but I think that they might have been disappointed.

When we got to the (less than half an hour after the game ended), we got our "chalet" key from the night clerk and driving instructions "Go back the why you come, before the gate turn right and hopefully you will find it" – we did find it.

The next day after a late breakfast, we bought a night safari tour for the four us. Around 11:00 having nothing better to do Lior, Gil and I decided to go for a tour of the game reserve on our own (Adi stayed in the chalet). We had little expectations since we know that the best time to see wild animals in just after sun rise. As soon as we started the tour we picked a dirt road and headed north. After one of the turns a driver of a tour van waves me over to come beside him and tell us to turn back and continue straight on the road from which we turned. As it turned out, about 2km down the road across a little river we saw an elephant carcass and two lionesses were munching on it.

During the night tour we returned to the same place and we also saw a young male lion along with the lionesses. While we were watching a hippo showed put and started bellowing at the lions to go away – she had some baby hippos and thought that the lions would go after them once they were done with the elephant (which died a week earlier). After about 5 min of a standoff, the lions backed away but only as far as hiding behind nearby bushes.

As it turned out we missed seeing a leopard by half an ½ on both our day tour and the night tour (once to early and once too late so on average we saw a leopard twice J). However we did get to see both black and white Rhinos and live Elephants as well to get 3 out of the big 5. The game reserve itself was teeming with wild animals from birds, to gnu (not the operating system), Antelopes, Impalas, Gazelles, Zebras, Giraffes as well as Jackals, Foxes, Warthogs and Baboons (probably several others that I can't remember right now). This was a nice diversion from the world cup and a highly recommended side trip.