“I can’t see past Brazil, actually,” Ferguson was quoted in the Daily Mail. “They are going to be the ones in South Africa.”

And the opinions are well founded in his belief that the Premiership is becoming less and less about developing English players, and more about contracting outsiders to become champions. Add on to that the continual pipeline of great Brazilian players being exported into foreign systems, and even this Argie would have a hard time denying his logic.

“Last season, there were 103 Brazilians in the Champions League and only 15 Englishmen. More Scots played in the Champions League last season than English players. I thought the 11/10 on Brazil to beat England was the bet of the century.”

Ouch. But Fergie has never been one to mince words.

What are your thoughts on Sir Alex’s early prediction?

The tournament takes place in Angola from January 10th to January 31st, 2010. We’ve got blogs and bloggers for 12 of the 16 teams involved in the tournament. If you’d like to blog for one of the bloggerless teams then see the bottom of this post for details.

The Angola 2010 groups and match schedule are after the jump.

Click the links to visit the team blogs:


Africa Cup of Nations 2010 Groups

Group A:
Angola
Mali
Malawi
Algeria

Group B:
Cote d’Ivoire
Burkina Faso
Ghana
Togo

Group C:
Egypt
Nigeria
Mozambique
Benin

Group D:
Cameroon
Gabon
Zambia
Tunisia

Africa Cup of Nations 2010 Schedule:

#01 – Jan 10th, Angola vs Mali (Group A) 17:00 kickoff

#02 – Jan 11th, Malawi vs Algeria (Group A) 14:45
#03 – Jan 11th, Cote d’Ivoire vs Burkina Faso (Group B) 17:00
#04 – Jan 11th, Ghana vs Togo (Group B) 19:30

#05 – Jan 12th, Egypt vs Nigeria (Group C) 17:00
#06 – Jan 12th, Mozambique vs Benin (Group C) 19:30

#07 – Jan 13th, Cameroon vs Gabon (Group D) 17:00
#08 – Jan 13th, Zambia vs Tunisia (Group D) 19:30

#09 – Jan 14th, Mali vs Algeria (Group A) 17:00
#10 – Jan 14th, Angola vs Malawi (Group A) 19:30

#11 – Jan 15th, Burkina Faso vs Togo (Group B) 17:00
#12 – Jan 15th, Cote d’Ivoire vs Ghana (Group B) 19:30

#13 – Jan 16th, Nigeria vs Benin (Group C) 17:00
#14 – Jan 16th, Gabon vs Tunisia (Group C) 19:30

#15 – Jan 17th, Gabon vs Tunisa (Group D) 17:00
#16 – Jan 17th, Cameroon vs Zambia (Group D) 19:30

#17 – Jan 18th, Angola vs Algeria (Group A) 17:00
#18 – Jan 18th, Mali vs Malawi (Group A) 17:00

#19 – Jan 19th, Burkina Faso vs Ghana (Group B) 17:00
#20 – Jan 19th, Cote d’Ivoire vs Togo (Group B) 17:00

#21 – Jan 20th, Egypt vs Benin (Group C) 17:00
#22 – Jan 20th, Nigeria vs Mozambique (Group C) 17:00

#23 – Jan 21st, Cameroon vs Tunisia (Group D) 17:00
#24 – Jan 21st, Gabon vs Zambia (Group D) 17:00

Quarter-Finals‘

#25 – Jan 24th, 1st A vs 2nd B, 17:00
#26 – Jan 24th, 1st B vs 2nd A, 20:30

#27 – Jan 25th, 1st C vs 2nd D, 17:00
#28 – Jan 25th, 2st D vs 2nd C, 20:30
(Official website says games #27, #28 are on Jan 24th, but that seems very unlikely)

Semi-Finals
#29 – Jan 28th, Winner #25 vs Winner #28, 17:00
#30 – Jan 28th, Winner #26 vs Winner #27, 20:30

Third place playoff
#31 – Jan 30th, Loser #29 vs Loser #30, 17:00

Final
#32 – Jan 31st, Winner #29 vs Winner #30, 17:00

Source: Official CAN 2010 website.

Time difference: Angola is GMT+1. So it’s one hour ahead of the UK and six hours ahead of US eastern. So… a 17:00 (5pm) kickoff in Angola is 4pm in the UK and 11am on the east coast of the US.

Details on how and where to watch the tournament as and when we get them.

If you’re interested in blogging for one of the bloggerless Angola 2010 teams, then have a read of our application guidelines here and then get in touch.

Latest development in the already long running Thierry Henry handball incident (or “la main de dieu” as it’s being called by some) is that Henry himself thinks a replay is a good idea:

“The fairest solution would be to replay the game but it is not in my control,” said the Barcelona striker.
“Naturally I feel embarrassed at the way that we won and feel extremely sorry for the Irish who definitely deserve to be in South Africa,” Henry added.
“I have said at the time and I will say again that ‘yes’ I handled the ball. I am not a cheat and never have been. It was an instinctive reaction to a ball that was coming extremely fast in a crowded penalty area.”

Very nice of Titi, although very convenient that he’s saying this after FIFA ruled out any possibility of a replay:

“The result of the match cannot be changed and the match cannot be replayed,” FIFA said in a statement. “As is clearly mentioned in the Laws of the Game, during matches, decisions are taken by the referee and these decisions are final.”

But a good public relations move from Henry anyway. Yes, calling for a replay he knows to be impossible is a little transparent, but at least he’s owned up to handballing (if not premeditatedly cheating) and shown some remorse.

Henry has also (sort of) apologized via a (poorly punctuated) Twitter message:

Not everyone will agree, but it’s probably time we started thinking about forgiving Titi. Maybe not straight away, but definitely before World Cup 2010. He handballed, he got away with it. That’s really all that happened. If William Gallas had headed wide or – as Roy Keane asserts in his own super intense bordeline-psychotic way – an Irish defender had cleared the ball, then this whole thing would barely be worth mentioning.

It’s also worth remembering that Henry is one of the good guys. He’s not Joey Barton, and doesn’t really deserve to be treated as such. Except maybe when he visits Ireland (which I don’t advise).

More importantly, there are more serious problems in football right now.

So how about it? Is anyone else ready to forgive and forget?

The following are those 32 teams who will take part in South Africa 2010. And perhaps what’s a bit special is the 32 include every single World Cup winner in history, precisely due to the Uruguayan stand.

Algeria
Argentina**
Australia
Brazil*****
Cameroon
Chile
Cote d’Ivoire
Denmark
England*
France*
Germany***
Ghana
Greece
Honduras
Italy****
Japan
Mexico
Netherlands
North Korea
New Zealand
Nigeria
Paraguay
Portugal
Serbia
Slovakia
Slovenia
South Africa
South Korea
Spain
Switzerland
United States
Uruguay**

Number of asterisks (*) indicates number of trophies won.

For the draw pots, check out the Malawi World Cup Blog.

The Irish FA, of course you’d hear from them, have come up with a simple solution: replay the game. But perhaps more important than any march on the Swiss headquarters, they have that all important word known as a precedent.

The letter from the Irish FA reads like this:

“Conclusive video evidence of a deliberate hand ball by Henry, which led to France’s additional-time goal, has been seen by millions of football fans worldwide. The blatantly incorrect decision by the referee to award the goal has damaged the integrity of the sport.

“We now call on Fifa, as the world governing body for our sport, to organise for this match to be replayed. The handball was recognised by the Fifa commissioner, the referee observer and the match officials, as well as by the player himself.”

“There is precedent for the invalidation of such results. In 2005, the Bureau of the Fifa World Cup organising committee reached a decision to invalidate the result of a World Cup qualification match between Uzbekistan and Bahrain on the basis of a ‘technical error by the referee of the match’.

“The Football Association of Ireland is hoping that Fifa and its disciplinary committee will, on behalf of football fans worldwide, act in a similar fashion so that the standards of fair play and integrity can be protected.”

And the official FIFA report reads like this:

According to Art. 12.4 (b) and 14.1 of the Regulations for the 2006 FIFA World Cup™, all protests, including those against technical errors committed by referees, are to be decided by the Organising Committee for the 2006 FIFA World Cup Germany™. A bureau of the Organising Committee may pass a decision in lieu of the plenary committee in urgent matters.

The Bureau, composed of Chairman Lennart Johansson, Deputy Chairman Julio Grondona, Dr Chung Mong Joon and FIFA General Secretary Urs Linsi, took the decision based on the following facts:
1) At the score of 1-0 in favour of Uzbekistan, in the 39th minute of the match, the referee decided to award a penalty kick to Uzbekistan;
2) The penalty kick was taken and led to goal in favour of Uzbekistan;
3) Before the penalty kick was carried out, an Uzbek player entered the penalty area;
4) Consequently, the referee awarded an indirect free kick to the Bahrain team;
5) However, in such a situation, the Laws of the Game require the referee to order the penalty kick to be retaken;
6) The captain of Uzbekistan team protested to the referee immediately after the mistake had taken place and before the game had restarted. This protest was confirmed after the match;
7) This technical error was confirmed by the match commissioner and the referee inspector in their respective reports;
Uzbekistan protested the decision of the referee in a written request, asking for the match to be “cancelled” and be evaluated with a 3-0 forfeit result;

The bureau, taking into consideration that the referee in the match in question had indeed committed a technical error, established that, as a consequence, the match needed to be replayed. As a result, the protest put forward by the Uzbekistan team for the match to be considered a forfeit with a 3–0 result is rejected. In accordance with Art. 12.6 of the Regulations 2006 FIFA World Cup Germany™, this decision is final and binding.

* – Smiley face added for bonus apology.

Funnily enough, Uzbekistan protested their mere 1-0 win and earned the right to the replay…and then lost the playoff on the back of an away goal scored in that very same replay. Be careful what you wish for…

The problem is Uzbekistan and Bahrain are not France and Ireland. Either could’ve gone to Germany and the actual participant likely would’ve mattered little. The acronyms pander to the big countries, as they’re the ones which will generate the most money, and as such the integrity of FIFA is and always has been very much up for debate. If the debate is even necessary. Fact is, they want France in the World Cup for a multitude of reasons.

The other problem, of course, is that the incidents aren’t parallel. One is a missed call while the other is an error in applying the rules of the game. Not quite apples and oranges, but oranges and another member of the citrus family. Maybe a tangerine.

However, a precedent is a precedent, and I gather even most France fans would agree a replay, one where Titi’s arms are pinned to his side with epoxy, is only fair. Now the only question, having been officially petitioned, is whether FIFA will reach back into their own history and make the same call once again.

Don’t hold your breath, unfortunately.

(Not, of course, that one played in the Stade de France.)

And sometimes, that’s how you know the World Cup is on the fore. Staunch defense, gritty performances and the triumph of will over superiority. The World Cup Qualifying has definitively been left in the dust, but we did learn a thing or two…

i. Guus is destructible.

You know, I had a discussion with someone recently on the world’s greatest coach and I reckoned Guus Hiddink was the greatest of them all. His ability to mold an inferior material into something else entirely is, or was, unmatched, really. Fergie, Carletto and Pep are nice, but they can run out one big euro signing after another. The perfect synonym for a great coach is an alchemist. For me, Guus is – or was – that. Russia’s wondrous display at Euro 2008 was only undone by a vastly superior team and they looked, after two more years of nurturing, a blossoming giant ready to set the world alight in South Africa 2010.

Now they’ll be watching at home with the rest of us. Partly because Russia looked anything but the fluid, dynamic team we saw in Swissaustria. Partly because of the notion that superiority will always win out. Because Slovenia wanted it more, that much was clear. Slovenia played their socks off and, through confusion or motivation, Russia didn’t. Either way, that’s down to the coach. A great coach, yes, but one whose aura has taken a hit from which it may never recover.

ii. Wednesday’s most serious offender was not Titi Henry, but adidas.

The only explanation is that Raymond ordered Les Bleus dominatrix editions for his kinky extracurriculars and adidas mistakenly swapped them with the real deal.

Poor choice on both occasions.

iii. Roman Pavlyuchenko will shut up now.

God, it seemed every quarter open a new quote would pop up from Spurs benchlover Pavlyuchenko needs to get out of London – and I know much of this is journalists posing a question, but still – and back to some playing time in order to cement his World Cup place.

Not really a problem now, is it?

iv. Raymond Domenech is @#$%ing indestructible.

If there is anything which can unite the entire footballing world, it’s one thing: Raymond Domenech is an absolutely abysmal football coach. He has no business doing your niece’s Sunday game, much less Les Bleus. If France goes out, there is little to no chance Raymond Domenech makes it to Thursday morning employed. And this despite whatever scandalous blackmail material he holds over the leaders of the FFF (French Football Federation).

But somehow, some goddamn way, the referee and the linesmen all missed Thierry Henry’s handball. And then they missed the second one. And France won drew; and France went through.

There is no explanation for this man’s employment. There is no explanation as to the ‘luck’ this man receives (if Abidal doesn’t earn a red and Ribery doesn’t get injured yet France still go out, does he still stay employed?). It’s all so infuriatingly inexplicable.

So inexplicable I may give this astrology he holds so dear a try.

v. And even if France perform poorly, the French will have two teams to root for.

I will not pretend to know anything about French-Algerian relations. What I do know is that of the 25 players called up to play in the one-off playoff with Egypt, 15 on the Algerian national football team were born in France. Yes, fifteen.

Will every last one of these players go to South Africa? Doubtful. But it’s equally as doubtful the squad won’t be riddled with French-born players. So the French can allez les bleus! And then, if that doesn’t work out, allez Algeria!

vi. Keylor Navas is coming to a European city near you.

His Wikipedia page may say that only the Spanish Segunda is calling, but they may want to close the deal quickly, as a few others will be checking in with his Costa Rican club. The 22yo Costa Rican keeper put on a performance that would’ve had Gigi Buffon blushing today. Uruguay tested him early and often from distance, and he made one sprawling save after another. The stats only say five, but it felt like fifty, and isn’t mental intimidation half the battle?

vii. Egypt are the pre-2008 Spain.

Egypt have not made it to a World Cup since 1990, making next summer the 20th anniversary of their last trip to the finals. In fact they’ve only made it twice in total, going way back to 1934 for their only other trip. Neither time did they make it past the first round.

And yet they’re the most successful team in the history of the African Cup of Nations. They’ve won it thrice since their last trek to the World Cup, and the last two back-to-back. They should be going to the World Cup, as they’re clearly one of Africa’s most superior teams, if not the most superior. In fact winning two AFCON titles in a row nearly mandates you as the best team on the continent.

How do you explain it? They’re not quite parallel with a pre-2008 Spain – they do have a trophy cabinet – but one must think that, relative to expectations, Egypt are now football’s biggest chokers. Other theories certainly welcome, but the mysteries surrounding it are befitting their ancestors.

viii. The Uruguayan national anthem needs to be cut down to a verse and a chorus. And no face paint.

Uruguay, making sure they got their full patriotism in for the day, put on a five minute – well, 4m56s – national anthem, full with a guy is creepily feline blue, white and gold face paint. It was so unnecessarily long the Costa Rican squad had to leave mid-song in order to warm up; the Uruguayan players even wondered just what the hell was going on by the forty-fifth verse.

ix. Eastern Europe still has a bit to go.

At the beginning of the day, one assured participant and three potential. At the end of the day, it was but that lone assured participant – and not even the team the world had been predicting.

Eastern Europe, particularly the leagues of Russia & Ukraine, are rising in the eyes of footballing legitimacy. They have money, homegrown talent and know to scout the Americas and Africa for talent that will choose a nice paycheck and playing time over a seat on a European bench. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, they could not capitalize on it. Not Bosnia-Herzegovina, not Russia, not Ukraine – not even perhaps the best of the bunch, Croatia.

A disappointing showing from what you’d expect to be a new footballing hotbed.

And yes, I still blame Kristen Pazik.

x. Don’t expect open floodgates in South Africa.

Scorelines from all 13 World Cup “playoff” games (including New Zealand – Bahrain, and remembering the first Egypt – Algeria fixture wasn’t technically a playoff):

0-0
2-1
0-1
1-0
0-0
1-0
0-1
1-1
1-0
0-1
1-0
1-0
1-1

And the only team which managed more than a solitary goal was knocked out.

Welcome to World Cup football: caution is the name of the game.

xi. Video replay is necessary.

The impossible has happened once again: a crucial game was decided by the wrong call which so easily could have been corrected.

Not really worth the debate anymore, is it?

“We suffered for two years, we have been having some problems with our press, our fans, with other people It would have been better to do it in another way, but as I said, I’m not the ref.”

“If they had got through it wouldn’t have been robbery (lucky). We have a lot of respect for this team,” Henry said. “We knew they play long and like a physical battle. You saw tonight that they are a very good team. I played eight years in England and I can tell you they are.”

Sebastien Squillaci (French defender): “It’s part of the game, it played in our favour tonight, maybe some other time it will play against us. Of course Ireland will not he happy but we are happy the referee awarded the goal. We’re competitors and we’re there to win. The goal may not be valid but we’ll take it.”

Giovanni Trapattoni (Ireland coach): “I told the referee that it is possible to make great mistakes. I am sad because the referee had time to ask the linesman and I am sure he should have asked Henry as well.”

“All the European people saw the game and what happened. France played a good game in Dublin but this time we played better and over the two games we deserved to go to South Africa.”

Raymond Domenech (French coach): “I didn’t see the replay. From where I was, I couldn’t see anything. All I know is the referee awarded the goal.”

Richard Dunne (Irish defender on Henry): “He told us we deserved to win. How is that supposed to make me feel? It makes me feel worse. He’s admitted he cheated. We should have won. He just said, ‘That’s it’. He just said he handled it, he didn’t mean it. Looking at it, it’s quite obvious he did mean it. It’s there for everyone to see and they’re not going to change it now. So what can we do? They’re going to the World Cup and we’re not. That’s it.”

“At the stage of the game and the way it was going, it’s the biggest decision I’ve ever suffered. We deserved to win the game, we could have scored a couple of more goals. It’s one of those things. It gives them a lift and knocks the stuffing out of us. To give big decisions on that in big games is wrong. Platini wants France there.”

Liam Brady (Ireland ass’t manager): “When it comes to the crunch, the big teams always seem to go through. With the draw, they were wanting Portugal and France to go through and they did. That’s all that has to be said.”

Robbie Keane (Irish striker): “It was an easy decision to do the seedings, wasn’t it? They’re all probably on the phone to Sepp Blatter now, texting each other over the result. France and Germany are massive countries. There’s no way in a million years there was going to be a fair draw. And it wasn’t!”

“There’s no question or doubt in my mind, we won that game. The handball was so obvious. We’ve seen the replays, but we knew anyway from the reaction of the players.”

Florent Malouda (French free-kick taker): “I didn’t see it – I was really far. I took the free-kick – but I could see from the reactions that there was a problem. He tried to score and maybe the ball touched his hand – the referee didn’t see it, we have to see on the replay if there was a hand.”

William Gallas (French goal scorer): “It went so fast. I saw Thierry’s pass. The Irish were surprised, and I put my head, my chest,” he said as his voice trailed off.

[guardian; The Independent; Canadian Press; AP]

This is a picture of what’s currently going down in the center of Paris. No, that is not a Frenchman celebrating the lack of video replay in football. No, that is not an Irishman infuriated by the lack of integrity by one Thierry Henry. Hell, it’s not even the CEO of Caran d’Ache. (Well, it could be.)

It’s actually an Algerian fan, celebrating their impending trek to South Africa on the famous Parisian street the Avenue des Champs-Élysées. The same avenue which Algerian fans ran riot over, quite literally, last evening.

The carnage – not literally, the injured were removed – after the jump.

[101GG]

• Hooligans force a player’s premature retirement. (Dirty Tackle)
• The Diego Ban and How It Affects You (Futfanatico)
• Beginning the search for Scotland’s next manager. (Inside Left)
• The vignettes of Finland. (Nordic Football News)
• But Nordic not always so good for Serie A. (SoccerLens)
• Gabriel Obertan gets a side job. (Unprofessional Foul)
• The World Cup 2010 draw pots. (Malawi WCB)

Algeria, Greece, Portugal and Slovenia all won their playoffs and qualified for the World Cup today. Uruguay vs Costa Rica is happening as I type. But there’s one story that will be dominating the World Cup playoff headlines, and I think you already know what it is: Thierry Henry’s handball for France vs Ireland.

With the aggregate score at 1-1 and the game halfway through extra time, penalties were just around the corner. But in the 103rd minute Thierry Henry controlled the ball and crossed for William Gallas to head home the goal that sent France to World Cup 2010 and Ireland home. Only problem is that Henry controlled the ball with his hand. Twice.

To be more accurate, Henry controlled the ball on his forearm and then directed it with his hand. It was the upper body equivelant of taking the ball on your knee and then passing with your foot. There is very very little doubt in my mind that Henry handballed intentionally.

So yes, Henry has cheated France into World Cup 2010. Which is absolutely disgraceful. Not just from Henry but from the refereeing team too.

But before we all condemn Henry, let me ask you this. And please answer honestly: Would you have done the same?

If you were fighting to get your team to World Cup 2010, wouldn’t you do everything in your power to make it happen? Even if it meant bending or breaking the rules? I’m not excusing what Henry did, and he’s definitely (to quote Kevin Keegan) gone down in my estimation tonight. But I can definitely understand why he did it.