Sunday Sports Recap

Despite two of my favored teams embarrassing themselves yesterday (Czech Republic and the Chicago Fire), it was a great sports day that saw both the US Men and Women win. While the 100 degree temps took all the life out of the Fire's 1-0 losing Brimstone Cup match in Texas, the heavy downpours seemed to add life to Turkey's thrilling late three goal comeback to advance to the quarterfinals over my ethnic cousins (my paternal grandparents were from Prague). My maternal grandparents came from Italy (Calabria), so i'll be rooting for the Azzurri on Wednesday. Italy will likely advance with a win if Holland beats or ties Romania. If Italy and France tie and Romania loses, there would be a three way tie that would likely see Italy advancing according to this analysis of the various tie breakers. i think the final decider is rock, paper, scissors.

Holland's Group C finale tomorrow vs, Romania gives me the opportunity to bring back this hilarious gag from the 2004 Euro semi-finals. God forbid the Cubs are playing in late October this year, but if they are, this White Sox fan may just pull some inspiration from this video.

On the plus side yesterday, Tiger continued to overcome his painful knee injury and made another great comeback to force today's playoff against Rocco Mediate. Can't go wrong today. Gotta love both story lines. Rocco is a 45 year old everyman and Tiger is Tiger.

The USWNT used goals by Natasha Kai and Abby Wambach to beat Australia by one goal for the third time in recent months in their first game of the Peace Queen Cup in Korea. Though the game was over at 2 am Central Time, the US Soccer report didn't arrive until ten hours later. When games are televised or readily available online, the reports seem to come quickly. i know overseas events present unique challenges, but when there is no other way to find out the result, the report coming half a day later is frustrating.

It was great to read that Aly Wagner is back and made her first USWNT appearance since last year's double hernia surgery. The description of Abby's goal assisted by Aly is also remarkable. And it was nice to read that my neighbor (we both have homes in Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin) Kate Markgraf was selected as the Sierra Mist Woman of the Match.

2007 Women's World Cup Runner Up Brazil is next for the US Women tomorrow (tonight). Brazil also edged its first opponent (Italy) 2-1 in its Peace Queen Cup opener.

The US Men bombed Barbados with a record 8-0 opening win in the long journey to South Africa in 2010. Was great to see Michael Bradley get his first WCQ start and his second international goal on Father's Day while his dad led the U.S. team from the bench. That had to be pretty special for both of them.