Friday's Games (June 11th)

Here at COGH we intend to bring you match reports on the day, but we've been a little err... busy with beer at the weekend

Come on!!!

The World Cup of Good Hop - what it's all about...

Consequently, as we've been otherwise engaged, the first few reports will be a tad tardy. So - without further ado, let's meet the teams for Friday's games:-

Group A photo (l to r: Uruguay, S.Africa, Mexico, France)
Here they are again from a different camera angle...

South Africa

Durban Pale Ale, 5.7%
"It pours a hazy Caramac colour, with an immediate blast of marmalade orange on the nose, a toffee character and just a hint of spice. On the palate it is medium- to full-bodied, and an initial hit of sweetness is soon swept along by a tide of nicely chewy and tangy hops and a gentle fruitiness."
Beerpages.com

Mexico
Corona, 4.7%
(it was going to be Pacifico but James drank it on the train one night)
"Is there any better tasting beer than Corona? It means Crown in Spanish, and I have to think I agree with their assessment."
Walter Stevens, Reviewstream.com

France
La Choulette, 7.5%
"Russet-coloured French beer with a spicy and bitter orange aroma and a hint of chocolate. Bitter, peppery hops burst through on the tongue, balanced by rich grain and a Grand Marnier orange fruitiness." Beerpages.com

Uruguay

Harvey's Blue Label, 3.6%
"A full-bodied pale ale which should impart a delicate hop character behind the residual sweetness of the malt sugars."
Harvey's website

Match 1:
South Africa 1
Matthew Booze 32

Mexico 2
Bar-erra 68, Blanko 84

Dan is quick of the mark with a disparaging opinion of the host nation's effort - 'cloudy and bitter - possibly off', and a general consensus that it resembled stagnant piss. Conversely, Deaks thought Mexico was 'crisp and refreshing... need nachos... good hair of the dog material'. Stu was less enamoured, declaring Corona 'a girl's beer - pure and simple'. A lacklustre curtain opener - especially considering all the hype and excitement leading up to the tournament.

Cloudy or off? It's a tough call...

Match 2:
Uruguay 2
Loadeiro 7, Forlan-Over 78

France 4
Gallo 4, Squiffaci 45, 47, Ribaldry 90+3

A sparkling encounter which gave the lads something to cheer about. The French impressed from the start, with James being bowled over by the label if not the cap. Peter reckons he's be happy accompanying La Choulette dans la piscine - and admired the melony through taste and sweet notes flying over the palate. Uruguay put in a good account of themselves, with Dan imagining it would normally be poured by a barmaid with thin arms, but ultimately could not live with this Gallic talisman.

Arty shot: The Uruguayan attack(Front), with La Choulette resplendent in the background.

Well, that's about it from a memorable Day One of COGH. Stay tuned for the first Group B games very soon... It's ok, we won't broadcast any ads over the goals, unlike some channels we could mention.

Two great sporting events this weekend

It's now considerably less than 24 hours before the world’s greatest sporting festival kicks off in Johannesburg – a month-long celebration of triumph, adversity, determination and the sales of bottle openers that chant ‘ENG-ER-LAND’.

Africa is primed, as is the watching world – waiting with baited breath for the tournament to unfold. Some – like this Daily Mail (UK) reader would like things to be a little different from the 64 game soccerfest that awaits:-

These opinions are not only bigoted but wholly wrong-headed – I for one would watch 22 grandmothers play each other if by some quirk they qualified for the World Cup, and fully intend to watch every game – yes, even Slovakia v Paraguay.

What’s more I’ll be following #wc2010 on Twitter, scouring the net for the best journalism, eye-catching features and trying not to get annoyed by some of the pundits. I will also be posting up daily match reports from our own sporting titan – The Cup of Good Hop – which we are holding in Brighton this Sunday.

Our methodology will be quite simple – four of us (myself, James, Dan Last from European Football Weekends and Stuart Fuller from theballisround) will conduct 64 ‘tasting matches’ with the beers until a winner is found. In the absence of any Cameroonian beer, we have plumbed for ‘Celebration’ an old-skool French brew. After all – colonialism was a long-lived tradition for the French for centuries – though I’ve heard a rumour that Stuart is hot on the trail of authentic Cameroonian beer.

We will write reports for each match, capture as much of the event across various media as possible, and serve it up to you – and with any luck it will be a light-hearted, informative garnish to your World Cup main course.

Ok, so we’ve had to substitute the odd beer or two to complete our quest, but on the whole it’s a pretty impressive haul and we’re going to take great delight in demolishing the lot. You can get involved by voting for your favourite beers with the newly-installed right-hand column polls. If you’re tempted to do a COGH yourself but haven’t had the time to trawl around for all 32, you could do better than study Beer Genie’s guide to the World Cup – they’ve chosen many of the same brews as us, but have also supplied culinary tips and some ‘did you knows’ http://www.beergenie.co.uk/beer-and-the-world-cup.

Before the action starts I’d like to say a few thank yous – there’s all you out there who have taken an interest in COGH (more than 3,700 so far, from 38 countries across the globe) – and to the likes of Paul, Dave, Stevica and others who have tried to source some of the hard-to-get beers in the final hours. I’d also like to thank Dan and Stuart for agreeing to be our EBTs – Executive Beer Tasters on Sunday, and for the support they have given us over the last month. I'd like to unthank the BBC 5Live producer who cut me off in my prime after 30 seconds on the Tony Livesey show last night. Well, I think that’s enough of that…

I’ve just noticed that ‘Bongo Bongoland’ is now the number one trending topic on Twitter – oh dear. At least most of the posts don’t share the sentiments of Mike ‘Bongo Bonkers’ Phelps of Yeovil.

So, watch out for COGH match reports on Monday and then throughout the competition, laced with other content that we can be arsed to cobble together inbetween games – have a wonderful month – may your cup be of good hop.

I’ll leave you with some photographic flavour for the tournament to come and my betting tips – Torres (14/1) and Crouch (50-1) for top scorer – fingers crossed and ten quid down…

Know any Dexy’s Midnight Runners?

South Africa’s veteran skipper announces his retirement after lifting the trophy

Confusion reigns in the US team

Peter & James, 10 June 2010