Irony Coast: Fifa World Cup 2010

England & Japan:How the three lions lost the great war from the start while the blue samurais died valiantly."

This year's World Cup is not short of controversies or excitement. But what is lacking was, in the English and Japan's point of view, the end-result to go with the hype. England, with its frantic media who is asking way too much from such an underachieving side to win the World Cup, while Japan has it's coach who claimed Japan can make it to the finals.

Well, both of them lost in the same round. England got overpowered by the German's blitzkrieg, whilst the army of the rising sun lost out on Penalty shootout because of a misdirected kick to the post.

That's where the similarities end. Let's take a look at England. They virtually had a perfect qualifying campaign and a decent run of friendly result, including a 2-1 win over, well, Japan. In fact, many people believed that the current squad, dubbed the"Golden Generation" under Fabio Capello will finally give England something to cheer and win the World Cup again. The holy grail for national teams.

The Japanese however, did not had such a bright start. Although they did qualify comfortably for the Finals, their recent friendlies results before the World Cup was bad to say the least. Even before the Finals, the national newspapers criticized the Japanese squad to be too dull in their playing styles. And laughed at the prospect of them even surviving the group stage, let alone reach the semi-finals.

But the beautiful thing about football is that what's written on paper, it's usually just a piece of trash. England suffered miserable draws, ranging from the back(think Robert Green's howler), midfield(for God sake's,playing Lampard and Gerard is like asking Alex Ferguson to play twister with Rafael Benitez) and at front( Rooney's goals, or rather the lack of it). Japan on the other hand, scored an upset over Cameroon ( this was my top surprise) and the remarkable win over Denmark. Two spectacular free kicks from Keisuke Honda & Yasuhito Endō sealed the Blue Samurai's ticket to the last 16.

And let's not even talk about England's campaign against the young German warmachine. I watched the highlights, and it was like watching the last part of Saving Private Ryan. Where the US forces(this time England) got killed off one by one by the Germans(yours truly) and the part where England was saved was when the referee blew the final whistle.

You may argue that Lampard's goal would have change the course of the game. There's no denying that Germany was shackled for a while after Matthew Upson's goal, but the problem is the pkayers themselves.It's not like if Lampard's disallowed goal was the end of the world, heck they have 55 minutes to scored THAT goal. And at the very least, don't concede another. The 3 lions(oh wait, cubs) horribly failed in both task.

(England-1, Germany-2, Fifa-a big zero)

Japan faced a resillent Paraguay team. Although it was a dull game, not just because of the scoreline. Japan did play some pretty good passes which Capello would do anything for England to emulate. The thing is, if Japan had gone guns-blazing from the start, they would probably have won. Throughout the World Cup finals, Japan had been playing cautions football, it's a pain to see how they could have gone so close in making chances and finishing good ones if they just take the risk at the appropriate moment. If only Keisuke Honda had a decent striker to work with.

Too bad the coach played safe in this poker game and lost by just a number, or rather a penalty kick from the defender Yuichi Komano, who had worked very hard alongside the other Japanese players.

But what we all know is that Japan will go back to their motherland as national heroes. Fallen, but with "valiant" added to it. England......... it's safe to say that England can never win the World Cup, because they are England. Are they are about to see red over their woeful performances, and I'm not even talking about a battalion of fans wearing the away kit armed with tomatoes.