Ghana vs Czech Republic

What a match. One of the most exciting matches so far in the World Cup along with the Australia vs Japan match. I was totally breathless from all the shouting and cheering throughout the match. Ghana had come into the match as the extreme underdogs, but within a minute of the match, they showed they were ready to play by scoring a goal.

Throughout the whole match, I kept expeciting the Czechs, one of the highly favoured teams to win the whole tournament, to click into gear and steam roll over the Ghanains. Instead the opposite was going to happen. Ghana had most of the attacking moves and if it wasn't for many many brilliant saves by the Czech keeper Cech, the Ghanains would have gone into half time with a much bigger lead than just 1-0.

The second half was to be more attacking by Ghana. They got a penalty shot but were unfortunately unable to capitalise. During the same penalty, too much protesting from a Czech player got him red carded and sent off. This meant the game became even more free flowing. The flair displayed by the Ghanains was even more apparent. They strung together many great passages of play and if they didn't go offside on many occasions, would have been even more ahead. They did manage to slot through a second goal late and put the match beyond doubt.

The atmosphere generated by the crowd and the skill and flair shown by the Ghanains made the match so exciting. The fact that the Czechs were a man down and had to push forward and back as well meant all the usual static, tight, co-ordinated play just went right out the window. This made for a very entertaining back and forth play which the commentator described as "playground football". Wherever the ball went, everyone would follow and it would just be one team attacking and then a counter attack from the other team.

Ghana's win along with Italy's draw with the USA means that any two teams can still mathematically make it through to the second stage out of group E depending on the results of the last round of matches. Group C containing Argentina, Netherlands, Cote d'Ivoire and Serbia and Montenegro was meant to be the group of death, but Argentina and Netherlands have already qualified after two matches. Instead, group E is turning out to be the interesting group in terms of who makes it through.