It was a close game but you all managed to scrap in a goal during extra time. Also the first time I witness the infamous vuvuzela firsthand, live.

Excellent work fellas!

Like any self respecting Singaporean football fan, with the insane World Cup rates bordering on day-light robbery, we’re all flocking to our neighbourhood kopitiams and McDonald’s.

So the other day, I was at a particular McDonald’s at 0230 watching the Spain, Paraguay match and the place’s packed like every other McDonald’s this World Cup season. I was rooting for the Spanish and was pretty sure the Paraguayans were pretty damn lucky to get this far.

So it goes.

Around the 60th minute, Gerard Pique pulled down Paraguay’s Oscar Cardozo in the penalty area on a corner kick, earning a yellow card and giving Cardozo a penalty kick. Amazing Spanish goalkeeper Iker Casillas dived left to block Cardozo’s low kick and the entire McDonald’s erupted in cheers and roars.

“Sure are a bunch of passionate Spain fans,” my buddy whispered to me.

Seconds later, on Villa’s attack in the penalty box, he was hauled down by Antolin Alcoraz, who drew a yellow card. Xabi Alonso took the penalty spot and sent a beautiful drive into the net. Again, the entire McDonald’s erupted in cheers but the referee Carlos ‘Kelong’ Batres quickly dampened the spirits and disallowed the goal, saying a Spain player entered the area too soon.

Given a second chance, Paraguay keeper Justo Villar guessed correctly, diving left to stop the penalty kick. He also knocked the rebound away from Cesc Fabregas before defender Paulo Da Silva made a leg save at the goal line on another shot by Sergio Ramos.

And this is the part that baffles me to no end.

The entire McDonald’s erupted into cheers yet again.

WTF is going on here? Who the hell are these people supporting?

Are they simply watching for the thrill of the goals? Do they care which team wins? Do they even know which team’s which?

Excellent.

Addendum: Wondering if screening the World Cup have been good for McDonald’s business or are they cannibalizing themselves with the horde of freeloaders?

Expect to see goal-line technology an absolute certainty at the next World Cup following the referee’s blunder.

Though you gonna give it to Germany’s goalie, Manuel Neuer for nonchalantly scooping up the ball and playing on.

Addendum: Fifa president Sepp Blatter apologizes (albeit not a very sincere one me thinks) to the Football Association over Frank Lampard’s disallowed goal in England’s World Cup defeat by Germany and promises to reopen the goal-line technology debate at the next Fifa board meeting in July.

Have you been following the World Cup matches? If you are, there’s a (very) high chance you’ve heard this delirious buzzing sound reminiscent of a swarm of bees.

No, it’s not your TV’s fuck up.

It’s this precious little instrument called the vuvuzela, a horn instrument touted by South African fans cheering on their favourite teams.

There’s a love hate relationship with this wretched device with Argentina’s Lionel Messi and Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo going on record to state that the vuvuzelas disturbed the players’ concentration during the game while several others defended the vuvuzela as being an integral and unique part of South African football culture and say it adds to the atmosphere of the game.

The BBC is said to be looking into how it can provide a vuvuzela-free coverage of the remaining matches.

Regardless the final outcome, the game has to go on.

Lifehacker has an useful article on how to silence the vuvuzela horns during broadcast and the if you’re a fan of the godforsaken tool, you might want to check out its own Twitter account, @livevuvuzela.

With all the hooha surrounding Starhub and SingTel’s World Cup exorbitant pricing, many people are looking for alternate ways to get their World Cup fix.

Besides buying antennas from Sim Lim Square to tap into our neighbouring countries’ free live broadcast of World Cup or heading to your nearby kopitiam (or McDonald’s?), here are a bunch of links which may or not may work to watch the World Cup 2010 online;

http://www.tvunetworks.com/
http://tvbunch.com/16/Live-Streams/worldcup2010
http://www.fromsport.com/c-1.html
http://www.firstrow.net/sports/football.html
http://livefooty.doctor-serv.com/
http://www.livesoccertv.com/world-cup-2010/#_videos
http://www.myp2p.eu/
http://www.free-football.tv/
http://iraqgoals.net/
http://www.asiaplatetv.com/football.php
http://livesport1.us/
http://streamick.com/
http://hostream.net/
http://www.ustream.tv/discovery/live/sports-soccer
http://atdhe.net/index.html
http://espn.go.com/espn3/index/_/sport/soccer-futbol
http://www.justin.tv/directory/sports/soccer

If you know of any other website with free live streaming of the World Cup 2010, please feel free to let me know in the comments. Enjoy!

Simple yet so blindingly clever. I NEED THIS!

3 days to kickoff! Have you guys placed your bets yet? Not that I’m encouraging you to gamble! Bet responsibly!

New Hui Fen, only 17, helped Singapore score our first gold medal in the girls’ singles event on the first day of the bowling competition. The event took place at the Orchid Country Club.

For her efforts, Hui Fen will receive a cash reward of $4,000, offered by the Singapore Bowling Federation and Orchid Bowl for every gold medal won by the country’s keglers.

Are we going to see a new bowling craze following the footsteps of our table tennis players along with 乒乓圆?

Name: New Hui Fen
Gender: Female
Date of Birth: 01/01/92
Years in bowling: 8
Why in the sport: Passion for the sport
Most Memorable Moment: Winning team event at Intercity
Most influential person: A.K. Yong
Bowling Idol: Remy Ong
Ambition: World Champion
High Game: 300
No. of Perfect Games: 1
High 3 Games: 743

Achievements:

Asian Intercity 2008 Women’s Masters Gold
Penang Pesta 2008 U-16 Masters 1st
National Schools Five Gold
Singapore Nationals ’08 Women’s Open 2nd