Ghana who were 5 seconds from going out of the world cup? Ghana who lost to the USA? It's not how you start it's how you finish a world cup. Your predictions on an African team winning it are baseless where as the Brazilians and Argentinians have real pedigree there and the tournament is being played in their backyard with a lot of fans and conditions they are used to.

Getting offended that someone said the African teams haven't lit up the world cup in the past 20 years, when it's blatantly true is just denying reality. They haven't lit it up and their chances of winning this one stand at 119/1 at the bookies.

The only teams I have seen perform worse than or on par with England are Cameroon and Spain. Even if the other teams weren't as strong individually, they still gave it their all to win. I know a lot has been said about passion and pride, but England played quite indifferent, especially against Uruguay. I haven't seen that from any other country apart from the two I mentioned. Even Portugal and Russia who are terrible teams both showed some fight.

What are you even on about?

I never "predicted" an African team would win this world cup. I said it was highly unlikely this year, but Ghana could at least be considered dark horses if they got out of their group, which is a big ask (I believe Germany and USA are mostly likely to qualify now). You were the one who said you didn't think an African side would EVER win the world cup, which I argued against. EVER is a long time, isn't it. I assume an African team will win at some point. Whether it's 8 years from now or 20, or 30 I don't know....because unlike Pele, I'm not pretending to be Nostradamous. But African teams have quality, and sooner or later one of the countries will produce a generation that can dominate a world cup. I feel it's far more likely for an African team to win the World Cup in the next 30 years, than England. That's just based on observation at the teams at THIS world cup.

I'm offended that The Guardian tried to compare England's dismal failures to African teams in THIS WORLD CUP. Bar Cameroon, every single African team in Brazil 2014 has outperformed England, so the English media really need to keep their traps shut about African football and stop embarrassing themselves

Bookies are full of shit. England were made 25/1 to win the World Cup before the tournament started SIXTH favorites

That was a joke, and tells you how much the bookies really know. It was embarrassing to give England odds that good.

BIB - I agree with that. Cameroon and Spain are the only teams who performed as dismal as England.

The dark horses have just finished bottom of the group with one draw just like England. Ivory Coast are out as well.

I think you have to face facts that African teams have woefully under performed like the article suggested. From being touted to win a world cup by Pele to nowhere.

Ghana were 30 minutes away from finishing second today and qualifying, and it took the world's greatest player to deny them. They still performed, miles, miles better than England, in a far harder group. Arguably the hardest group in the tournament.

Ivory Coast went out to a questionable penalty in the 90th minute. Also very nearly into the knock-out phase.

These teams can hold their heads up high and were unfortunate not to qualiify (especially Ivory Coast) England were just flat-out shit, and were out after two games. I can't see what there is to gloat about. If England departed in similar circumstances to Ghana or Ivory Coast, they wouldn't been regarded as the joke they are at the moment.

And Nigeria are in the knock out phase, and I assume Algeria will be joining them. 2 out of 3 ain't bad. Were you disappointed to see Nigeria go through?

Again, every African team except for Cameroon performed better in this world cup than England.

Again, every African team except for Cameroon performed better in this world cup than England.[/quote]

As much as I'm tired of the "nearly, nearly" underperforming of obviously talented African teams, surely no-one can argue with the BIB?

Ivory Coast were robbed as well.

It doesn't look so hilarious now.

England are one of the poorest scoring sides in this World Cup. With only 2 goals scored.
Only Iran, Honduras, and Cameroon have scored fewer goals than England.

That's the company we keep nowadays.

Yes, the England defence hasn't been good, yes maybe Gerard had a part to play in a couple of goals against us, but even if the defence issue was addressed,...... the fact is that you still have to get them goals into the other team's net to win games.

Ghana needed a 2 goal win and USA to lose to go through so were never 30 mins from 2nd. Yes Ivory Coast went out to a dodgy pen, but then Nigeria only went through cause a perfectly good Bosnia goal was disallowed and as I type this Algeria are losing to Russia.

Can't disagree with England being shite though.

The very thing you are complaining about, you just did to a different set of nations.

This idea that some teams are just small time is silly, but being a competent and potentially problematic team and being a team that can win the world cup are worlds apart.

Most articles on DS world cup have been littered with people who clearly have a grudge against England. I have no idea why because England have looked pretty good about 5 times since the 60's. Good team, on a rare occasion a great team, but never a world beating team. If you are angry at the people who think England will win it all you are as bad as them for eating up the advertising bumpf that comes out during ANY international competition. Just as the sun or its ilk will bring up the war whenever Germany beat England, etc etc forever and ever for the mouth breathing mongoloids who like to be told what to think. Don't be angry at them, pity them. Or better yet, ignore them.

Doing a comparison to World Cup 2010:

> 4 years ago 6 UEFA countries qualified to the last 16. This year it is still 6 countries. Belgium, France, Greece and Switzerland have replaced England, Portugal, Slovakia and Spain.

> 4 years ago 5 CONMEBOL countries qualified to the last 16. This year, 5 countries still qualified with Colombia replacing Paraguay.

> 4 years ago Mexico and USA from CONCACAF qualified to the last 16. This year they have been joined by Costa Rica.

> 4 years ago Ghana was the sole CAF representative in the last 16. This year Algeria and Nigeria are representing Africa in the last 16.

> 4 years ago Japan and South Korea qualified to the last 16 from the Asia region. The last Asia country to be eliminated this year was Iran which is closer to UEFA HQ than the Far East!

As Africa has doubled the number of countries qualifying to the last 16, how have Africa failed?

Algeria through to the knockout stages, taking out Russia in the process.

Not to be cynical, but I'm pretty sure some people reading this thread were praying for Algeria to fail, so we could have a bit more handwringing about the state of African football..

By the way, I believe this is the first time two African nations have reached the round of 16.

Congratulations Africa

because football works exactly like that, doesn't it? we were the better team against Bosnia, and they pretty much admitted they underestimated us. only someone with an agenda can make a ridiculous claim like the above.

Of course Africa haven't failed. First time with 2 African teams in the round of 16. It could very easily have been 4, and really should have been 3 (Ivory Coast were robbed).

I think it soothes the egos of some Europeans to have the Africans percieved as perrenial failures, so there's a tendency to fudge the facts.

Nigeria (and Iran to an extent) proved themselves better than that first dour 0-0. Algeria have been a very pleasant surprise. Shame about the ill discipline that cost the other sides in different ways, but it's only really Cameroon who came away without much credit.

Agreed. Good post

No debate who has been the worst continent at this World Cup, it's Asia.

4 Asian teams, all of them out and all of them came bottom of their groups.

Collectively their record was Lost 9, Drawn 3, Won 0. Scored 9, Conceded 25.

if they were robbed, that means Nigeria shouldn't go through as well since Bosnia was robbed too.

The only African team who really deserved it was Algeria

Disallowed goals happen in matches. The goal was disallowed early enough for Bosnia to do something about it. That's the difference. Nigeria were simply the better side throughout the match and deserved to go through.

If Greece were given a questionable penalty in the 40th minute, and Ivory Coast were not good enough to overturn it in the remaining time, then you could simply say they weren't good enough. But giving a highly questionable penalty in the final minute of the match is just cruel. If that was England, the whining from the English press about the 'injustice" of it all would have gone on forever.

So no, I don't equate the situations. Bosnia had plenty of time to get over the disallowed goal and prove the were the better side, but couldn't. Nigeria played the better football and went through. They fully deserved to go through.

I do appreciate how much it hurts some people to see two Africans sides get through to the knockout stages, somewhat curtailing their "Africa is failing" storyline

So far it's a success for Africa. If Nigeria or Algeria can get a result from their next opponents, even though they are underdogs, even better.

Why is it ignorant?

I'm comparing Algeria to Ireland in the 1990s.

The example of one player is Brahimi, who represented France at all its youth levels, then switched to Algeria because of his parents. But I don't think he can be considered properly Algerian, therefore African, because he hasn't chosen to make his home in Algeria has he? He will continue to live and work in France, where he has almost his entire life. He may be qualified to play for Algeria, but he is clearly as French as Zinedine Zidane - who is himself, a whacking great symbol of modern France, and not Algeria, who he could've played for also.

It's not a racist point. I'm not claiming Mo Farah isn't British because he wasn't born here - he came here at 6, he and his parents made it his home during his formative years, he speaks with a London accent, he is British... but by the same reckoning, these Algerian players are still effectively French, and their squad - clearly a very good side - has been put together by using the FIFA rules. Nothing wrong with it, good luck to them, but it's as truly representative of Africa as Andy Townsend, Mark Lawrenson and Ray Houghton are of Ireland. It's no guide to how good Africa is at producing footballers, because it's produced less than a third of that squad.

I think you may be taking offence where none was attended here, I'm sure a lot of people wish African teams well and it is a continent a lot of British football fans have affection for. The African Cup of Nations is probably the most watched continental championships, after the Euros of course. More so than the Coca America I would say.

The crux of the article was stating that African teams could do better. That's true of course and surely to suggest otherwise would be condescending? I don't think its a cover up of England's failings as the press have been severely critical of them and some are more than happy to stick the knife in. It is a legitimate criticism that organisationally a lot of African teams could be better. As well as the Cameroon debacle we now have Nigeria's players downing tools and squabbling over money when they should be celebrating reaching the last 16.

I think what the article was getting at is African football has not reached the heights we thought it may be heading for, not yet at any rate. This is evidenced by Pele's somewhat fanciful prediction but it was an opinion shared by many at one time. When people think of African football they think of entertaining, colourful teams. The Cameroon team at Italian 90 for example, they gave England a real scare as well as Roger Miller's dancing! There's also the exciting Nigeria team of the mid 90s with the likes of Okocha and Amokachi thst had success in the Olympics. I don't think there's an equivalent African team now. Ivory Coast have been disappointing considering the talent they have although they were unlucky against Greece of course.

Realistically the two that have got through will go out on Monday so this World Cup cannot be considered a resounding success for Africa imo but not a failure either. I think the article reflects that and hopefully there's better to come from Africa in the future.

All African teams are now out of the competition in the very first knockout game. Hardly a 'success' when Costa Rica a country with a population of under 5 million just went further than 5 countries with a combined population of 270 million. African teams yet again under perform on the world cup stage proving the article correct.

Yeah but Algeria did better than India and China who have a combined population of 11 billion so population something

Well we all know the rich heritage India and China bring to the football table. Who can forget those famous Chinese and Indian football superstars like, err?

Sunil Chhetri's not going to be happy reading that.