{"id":73275,"date":"2014-06-27T14:45:42","date_gmt":"2014-06-27T18:45:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=73275"},"modified":"2014-06-30T10:49:31","modified_gmt":"2014-06-30T14:49:31","slug":"w-t-ph","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/06\/27\/w-t-ph\/","title":{"rendered":"W.T.Ph"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Brasil_2014_Football_Flag_and_Trophy\"<\/a>

VectorOpenStock, via Wikimedia Commons.<\/p><\/div>\n

And so the first round of the World Cup comes to an end with a bang from Thomas M\u00fcller, and\u2014pace <\/em>Ronaldo, who put on a fine late show\u2014various degrees of whimper from the departing nations Portugal, Russia, South Korea, and Ghana.<\/p>\n

At last, those of us who have followed Rihanna on Twitter for the last two weeks have found certain of her exigent questions answered: for example, to June 19\u2019s \u201cENGLAND whatchu gon do?!!<\/a>\u201d we can now confidently say, \u201cNothing.\u201d Other tweets of hers have been by turn prophetic, emphatic, and envy-inducing: \u201cUruguay defense is almost disrespectful<\/a>,\u201d also from June 19, uncannily anticipated Luis Su\u00e1rez achieving full disrespectful status five days later. \u201cW.T.Ph<\/a>,\u201d more exclamation than question, has been and will continue to be applied usefully throughout this free-ranging, attacking, and mesmerizing tournament. \u201cGoal keepers getting phucking sleepy<\/a>\u201d has its own kind of lullaby poetry; and who wouldn\u2019t want to be Germany\u2019s Miroslav Klose, the coholder of the record for most goals scored in World Cup tournaments, who\u2019s now, more urgently, an object of Rihanna\u2019s undistilled affection? \u201cMy nigga Klose<\/a>,\u201d she tweeted on June 21. Lionel Messi, eat your heart out.<\/p>\n

Coming up, eight games in four days. Brazil vs. Chile looks like a good one, while Uruguay, hobbled by a dementia of denial to which both team and country appear to have succumbed, probably won\u2019t do much against Colombia. Mexico has played well, but we can expect the Dutch, with Van Persie and Robben, to outclass them. France should beat Nigeria, and most people who are not Greek will be rooting for Costa Rica to triumph over Greece. Germany vs. Algeria is a grudge match: at 1982\u2019s World Cup, in Spain, Germany and Austria contrived a result that would see both teams go through at Algeria\u2019s expense, a shameful performance that has not been forgotten in North Africa. Lionel Messi, whom Nigeria\u2019s coach Stephen Keshi claims is from Jupiter (confirmation awaited from Tom Cruise) will beat Switzerland. And last of all, there\u2019s what might be, in competitive terms, the cream of the crop: Belgium vs. USA. How far can this mercurial USA team go? Or rather: USA, whatchu gon do?<\/p>\n

Jonathan Wilson\u2019s work has appeared in <\/em>The New Yorker, <\/em>Esquire, <\/em>The New York Times Magazine, and <\/em>Best American Short Stories, among other publications. He is the author of eight books, including <\/em>Kick and Run: Memoir with Soccer Ball. He lives in Massachusetts.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

And so the first round of the World Cup comes to an end with a bang from Thomas M\u00fcller, and\u2014pace Ronaldo, who put on a fine late show\u2014various degrees of whimper from the departing nations Portugal, Russia, South Korea, and Ghana. At last, those of us who have followed Rihanna on Twitter for the last […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":518,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13859],"tags":[192,14440,14441,14442,86,126,145,89],"class_list":["post-73275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-world-cup-2014","tag-brazil","tag-group-stage","tag-knockout-stage","tag-rihanna","tag-soccer","tag-twitter","tag-usa","tag-world-cup"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nW.T.Ph by Jonathan Wilson<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"June 27, 2014 \u2013 And so the first round of the World Cup comes to an end with a bang from Thomas M\u00fcller, and\u2014pace Ronaldo, who put on a fine late show\u2014various degrees of\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link 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