I believe I had that.

In your face, Mystic Meg!

(Apologies to anyone now getting mental pictures they're trying to get rid of)

Yes, your family Doctor cleaned up in the semifinal round of the office tipping, courtesy large amounts of genius and not an insignificant amount of arse. The semis at a glance:

Germany 0 Italy 2 (AET) - fulltime 0-0
First half was very much Italy's, second half was Germanic enough to be stamped with BMW part numbers. Ze Chermans never really looked like scoring, apart from one or two shots which drew good saves out of the Buffoon. Ballack was mostly anonymous, largely due to tenacious D on behalf of the Italian midfield and back four (shout outs to Cannavaro who was, as ever, Chicken Man - He's everywhere, he's everywhere!) and the lack of A Few Of My Favourite Frings to back up the work of the Dog's Ballacks. Italy was transformed by the addition of fresh legs in extra time, with Milan's Gilardino creating good shit from the moment he got on the park (his first decent sortie had him beating Mad Jens if not the post), ditto del Piero when Lippi finally deigned to give him a run. And for once he didn't rule that del Piero and Totti are mutually exclusive, either. Cue two goals in two minutes, both curling shots from the perimeter of the area - the first to Gross Fabio, the little diving cunt from the Straya game who bears an unfortunate resemblance to Richard Fidler, head of ABC Comedy and many moons ago the guy in the Doug Anthony All Stars who played guitar and got shit hung on him by the others; the second del Piero's after an 'assist' (thanks ESPN) from Gilardino. Italy won because they played better football and, as in previous matches, buried the clear-cut chances they created - the fact that it took them 118 minutes to wear down the German machine sufficiently to create big enough gaps to engineer clear-cut chances tells you a bit about how well Germany played and a lot about how well Germany are organised at the back.

Portugal 0 France 1
A clash of footballing cultures perhaps, or maybe just a tale of contrasting approaches to the game: one team turned up to play football, the other were apparently out to score 10s on the floor apparatus. All Cristiano Ronaldo and co needed were their streamers and their leotards and they'd have been shoe-ins for the gold in the rhythmic gymnastics. Unfortunately for them the judges were scoring on the basis of disturbances to the back of the auld onion bag and Portugal managed to accrue fuck all. France went one better courtesy Thierry Henry, who showed the Guesers how it was done with a flop in the box that was eons more convincing than anything anyone in a red shirt could come up with. By comparison, the efforts of Cristianaldo, Postiga and those other arseclowns looked like... well, blatant, laughable, cynical, shit-quality dives.











The English take defeat well don't they? Must be all the practice.

Zizou also put on a masterclass. In his case it was demonstrating how to go out like a champ, after having played like a chump for the past five or six years. He's now being feted as lead contender for the Golden Ball, FIFA's dubiously named award (after Hitler, presumably) for the best player of the tournament. The Weak says: chill, people. Not so long ago, France were thankful he wasn't eligible to play the third group stage match against Togo, and there was a lot of doubt whether he was worth picking for the Spain round-of-16 game. Two or three good games does not make you player o' tha tournament. Cannavaro for the golden ball, Klose for the golden boot, and Italy for the golden turd - the Jules Rimet Trophy to its friends.


Apparently other stuff is happening as well
Portugal's colours were carried to victory in midweek, when the Queensland Origin team managed to win two games in a year for the first time since France were world and European champions. Which brings us to our latest Theory Of The Weak as to how NSW conspired to lose Origin: it's a scheduling conflict. NSW always fails to win Origin when it's a World Cup year, as the entire state's rather marginal interest in proceedings is inevitably diverted towards a real, internationally relevant, sporting Event (my caps) rather than a Kangaroos selection trial in three instalments.
2006: World Cup, Germany. NSW wins the first game comfortably, then as the World Cup gets interesting, the side gets pantsed in the second game and ousted narrowly in the third. Qld wins series 2-1.
2002: World Cup, Korea/Japan. NSW wins the first game comfortably (32-4 or thereabouts as I recall), then as the World Cup gets interesting, the side gets pantsed in the second game and draws in the third. Sides draw 1-1, Qld retains title.
1998: World Cup, France. Can't remember the details but I know we lost. I think Qld got the first game in a showcase of low-scoring tedium, we pinched game 2 and lost game 3.
1994, 1990 and 1986: World Cups, USA, Italy and Mexico. NSW won Origin each time, which buggers up my hypothesis completely so bollocks to that.

Which leaves our other Theory Of The Weak:
The fix is in, people.
Think about it. Four years without a Queensland Origin win. Media pundits forecasting the end of the concept altogether. Dickheads like Gus Gould proposing that Kiwis should be included so that all the best players are on show (to which the Kiwis responded (a) uh, cheers for that idiot but I really don't think so, and/or (b) the way our young lads are travelling, in ten years Origin will be about as relevant as Betamax and the international rivalry will have long since replaced it.) A stadium to fill in Melbourne for game 3, with a World Cup to compete with on top of AFL and the prospect of NSW having already sealed the series.

It's Origin II. You're the NRL. Your cash cow, your platinum brand, is two NSW wins away from oblivion. What do you do?

Well, you do two things. Firstly:

You get Steve Clark to referee Origin II.

And then the master-stroke:

You get NSW to pick Mark Gasnier at five-eighth for Origin III.

Come on, people. You seriously thought this was legit? A dopey fuckwit with no kicking game whatsoever, whose only first-grade start at five-eighth ended Knights 44 St George 6, gets picked at pivot for his state in the biggest game of the year?

When it comes to match-fixing, it's not just Juventus who know where the bodies are buried.


The Doctor is OUT.


PS Our pick for the kiss-yer-sister game (aka the bronze medal playoff) overnight between the striving Deutsches and the diving douches? Dr Yobbo's betting slip says locals by two - old mate Jurgen deserves nothing less as a reward for getting Germany to play like superstars instead of sour pricks.