World Cup
Round of 16
Knockout Stage

After a grueling 15 days, and 48 games, 16 teams are going home and 16 continue to play for the biggest prize in sports. The full bracket can be viewed in my last post. The games start Saturday, with two games a day until we are down to the final eight and quarterfinal action.


First the updated official npocs World Cup Rankings. I will use these rankings throughout my preview and they will be updated after each day.

6.23.06
10:03 p.m.
Post First Round Rankings
1) Brazil 2.1
2) Argentina 2.9
3) Germany 5.6
4) England 6.8
5) Italy 7.2
6) Spain 9.0
7) Netherlands 12.4
8) France 17.5
9) Portugal 19.8
10) Sweden 44
11) Switzerland 59
12) Ukraine 65
13) Australia 72
14) Ghana 84
15) Mexico 89
16) Ecuador 115

France shot up the rankings after their revival earlier today with a 2 goal win over the Togo squad. Ecuador is your long shot with Mexico, Ghana and Australia receiving very little credit. The rankings make it look like that six teams have a solid shot with the Netherlands bordering on being in on this discussion. Even with an impressive performance over Japan, Brazil still has not seperated itself from Argentina. The dropoff to the next tier after the South American favorites was widened by Michael Owens injury pushing England further back.


Saturday
11 a.m.
No. 3 Germany
No. 10 Sweden

Germany (-170)
Sweden (+470)
Overtime (+240)

Under 2.5 (-145)

Amazingly the under is favored in this game, Sweden the scoring machine in this tournament plus the home time Germans who have already put up four goals in a game this tournament and own the cups leading goal scorer in Miroslav Klose. Sweden is getting a good dose of respect here and do not be surpised if this game requires extra time.

npoc says: "Germany 3-1"

Saturday
3 p.m.

No. 2 Argentina
No. 15 Mexico

Argentina (-275)
Mexico (+750)
Overtime (+300)

Under 2.5 (-140)

The most lopsided game of the first round. Argentina is really coming in their own and Mexico is headed the opposite direction. The Mexicans will have plenty of support on hand, their fans are among the best traveling in the world, but the Argentinians have the hand of God Diego Maradona in the stands along with world class talent, the Mexicans have not seen in years. Mexico was lucky to get this far, they should be able to stick around for 30-40 more minutes of soccer. After that it, will be all over.

npoc says "Argentina 2-0"

And there you have it, the first day of Round of 16 Second Round Knockout stage coverage. Check back for the updated rankings and all the cool flags of the countries still in it. You have a better chance of seeing a swastika flag than an american flag the rest of the way.

-n