RAINBOW WORRIERS

THE LATEST FOOTBALL WORLD CUP competition has started off as lively as one could have imagined, played as it is in a nation in which there are more killings per day than in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and Israel put together. In my opinion some of the newspapers and journalists have exaggerated the importance of the robberies and assaults on members of their profession while in their hotels or when out covering the football matches; one reporter today was at pains to point out that “there are petty thefts at hotels all over the world”, which is indeed true, although I doubt that many of these in Britain are carried out by a band of six masked men carrying Uzis, as was the case recently in South Africa.

HOWEVER, THE WORLD CUP is all about football, of which there has been precious little up to now. The perennial favourites, Italy, Germany, Argentina and Brazil, have all played by now, and none have impressed overmuch, yet all seem to have that boring steel that will see one of them lift the trophy. It would be unfair to compare them, given that they have played somewhat different opponents in these first games, but if I were a betting man, which I am, I might be tempted to have a flutter on Uruguay, two time champions who have not won the trophy since the days of black and white television. So conspicuous is this fact that the BBC’s Gary Lineker recently called them the “champions of the black and white days”. A sure pointer for them to win in South Africa.

AND ONCE AGAIN WE ARE ALL SURPRISED by the Koreas. Whether it is the one that makes most of our cars and appliances or the one we will soon reduce to rubble, ruins and ashes along with Iran when we collectively test out our latest version of what used to be called the “Atom Bomb”, both of these countries are going toe-to-toe with the big boys in the footballing world. One wishes the North Korean spirit of joyous triumph could be shared by many so-called “free” countries, forever moaning about financial “crashes” and “belt tightening”.

ALTHOUGH JUNG-MOO HUH, manager of North Korea, refuses to talk to the press unless they refer to his country as the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (which no one does), Jong-Hun Kim, of South Korea, also known as Korea Republic, and his players attribute their stamina to the consumption of ginseng. There is no doubt that ginseng is a great help when one needs that extra little bit of energy, and I am never without a decent supply of the “man root” in my bathroom closet, but I find it somewhat difficult to believe that it would enable me to perform at a high level for 90 minutes.