The Football kNuts Best 11

Public Service Announcement: I've been having some internal debate about whether or not to continue this blog now that the World Cup is over. It has helped me define how much work would be required to produce solid material daily about football over an extended period. The answer to that question is: a lot. Since I already know the audience is likely to diminish dramatically from a number that is already not enormous, there is some merit in just canning things altogether. However, assuming I don't sign on with some sports website to publish regularly (a pleasant dream, but one that seems vaguely unlikely), that would leave me both without a vehicle and a readership for football writing, which is unacceptable.

To make a long story short, I'm going to continue writing about football into the coming season - mostly about the Premiership and La Liga, with a smattering of Serie A thrown in. The publishing schedule will be 3 times a week, likely on Sunday/Monday, then on Tuesday and Thursday. That will give readers regular times to come visit the site, and give me regular breaks. Since it's easier to build readership there, I'm going to move it over to Livejournal, which will make it easier for the bulk of people already reading to follow.

The non World Cup stuff can be found at http://football-knuts.livejournal.com/ starting next Monday.

You see some spectacular things in NYC.

Alright, since it's Wednesday, I assume you've read all you want to read about Sunday's festivities. I was in NYC for the weekend and watched the penalties across from the Hotel Gansevoort down near the Meatpacking District (which sounds like the best name for a gay neighborhood in history, but really is just the old meatpacking district). Anyway, after the game finally ended, I saw both Ronaldo and Maria Sharapova come out of the hotel and hop into cabs. I also saw some of the hottest Italian women ever celebrating with skeezy Italian men over the Azzurri victory. Fun, interesting times.

The first half of the final was fun to watch and reasonably well played. The final 75 minutes were much less so, and I doubt you need me to tell you just how sick of penalty kicks I am. In fact, I'm so oversaturated with info about this Final that I'm just going to wrap any game specific recap here. Zidane headbutted Matza, Matza fell real hard, nobody will ever know exactly what he said, and Zidane capped his career of brilliance with one moment of insanity. At least we're never going to forget it, right? See the bottom of this article for 5 reasons why I myself might take a hit out on Matza if I played against him.

I got my immediate prediction on this one wrong (I picked France on Friday in what looked like a push), but I got my prediction from 6 weeks ago (before the World Cup) correct in picking Italy to win, and I got 6 of the 8 quarterfinalists right, so I didn't do too badly.

My Best 11
This is going to be a 4-5-1, since that's all any of the good teams except Germany seemed to play. This isn't really a good thing for the game, since it means the majority of the World Cup was played like every team was the 2000 New York Knicks, trying to win every game by an 81-80 score, but it's what we've got to work with

Obv.

Goalie: Buffon, Italy
If we were chatting via instant messenger, this is the part where I type "Obv" and expect the conversation to be over. Lehman and Ricardo were the only two even close in my mind, and they were also the two that showed that saving penalty kicks is a skill and not sheer randomness. Buffon's only drawback is that he makes it all look so easy, which disguises the fact that he's really, really good.

Defense
Right Back: Miguel, Portugal
Center Back: Fabio Cannavarro, Italy
Center Back: Lilian Thuram, France
Left Back: Philip Lahm, Germany

Two central rocks, and two attacking wing backs who played very good defense. Canna and Thuram both show that you don't need giants to play in the middle in order to win, an opinion that seems to be at odds with current trends. Of course, they are also two of the best defenders of the modern era, so the rule may be "You either need world class players OR big backs to compete." Something to keep an eye on in the coming years...

The two guys I really wanted to add to this list were Gabriel Heinze from Argentina and Zambrotta from Italy, but even Chelski has to pick a starting 11 every Saturday.

Midfield
Midfielder: Maniche, Portugal
Midfielder: Michael Essien, Ghana
Midfielder: Maxi Rodriguez, Argentina
Midfielder: Zinedine Zidane, France
Midfielder: Andrea Pirlo, Italy

Yes I know this leaves us without a true left-sided midfielder, but these guys were more deserving. Besides, Rodriguez would technically be running down the left side of your television for half the game, right? Zizou and Pirlo were always going to be on here since they were the creative engines behind the two teams in the finals, but the other three were extremely tough choices that could have gone to any number of superstars.

Essien was nothing short of masterful in guiding Ghana out of the group of little death, and deserves credit for that, which is why he is here. Maniche was dynamic as a box-to-box midfielder for Portugal and gets the nod just ahead of Deco for a strong (yet hateable) Portuguese team, and Maxi Rodriguez just gets the nod over Riquelme and Mascherano for a seemingly reformed Argentina. I hope Argentina manager Jose Pekerman gets a chance to coach more at this level - one mistake should not destroy what was otherwise a very good World Cup.

Players that would likely have made it if this column were the Best 16 instead of the Best 11 include Viera, Ribery, Gattuso, Deco, and Torsten Frings.

Forward: Miroslav Klose
It feels a little shady to just give this to the golden boot winner, but Klose had an amazing World Cup until he got injured, at which point Germany's attack suffered. Klose was gangbusters during the group stage (again), but you could definitely tell he was bothered by injury as the tournament wore on. He was completely out of their Argentina game minus his fantastic headed goal, and didn't make a dent against Italy. Then again, who did? Regardless, before the injury, Klose was a monster, giving fans everything they could have wanted included bulges in the old onion bag.

As for other forwards, Henry played well both in scoring goals and in passing well to his teammates, but his dive against Spain tainted his Cup a bit for me. Fernando Torres of Spain was the only other striker in the list deserving a positive mention. Yes, it was that kind of Cup.

Tomorrow: 5 reasons why this was a terrible World Cup for casual fans.