What Caught My Eye Today

Fred's Note: In my humble opinion, today will go down as one of the most unforgettable sporting days of all time.

Soccer - It's win or go home time in group play. Half of the Round of 16 match ups are set, and...surprise, surprise...some of those match ups are not exactly what the experts were expecting. Here are the latest highlights from the past couple of days:

• You have to feel for host nation South Africa and Australia for winning their final matches but are out of the tournament based on goal differential.
• Regardless of what transpires the rest of the tournament, it will be hard to top France as the biggest disappointment of the 2010 World Cup. The 2006 World Cup runners up managed a single point in group play.
• England and the United States pulled out all the stops to come out of Group C in dramatic fashion. Surprisingly, the U.S. came out as group winners based on number of goals scored and will avoid having to face Germany in the next round.

My winning percentage continues to creep back into the realm of "just lousy." Through today's play I have a winning percentage of 40% (16 of 40).

My picks for advancing out of group play are faring a tad bit better. I'm 5 out of 8 so far:

• Group A: South Africa, Mexico, Uruguay, France
• Group B: Argentina, Nigeria, South Korea, Greece
• Group C: England, United States, Algeria, Slovenia
• Group D: Germany, Australia, Serbia, Ghana
• Group E: Netherlands, Denmark, Japan, Cameroon
• Group F: Italy, Paraguay, New Zealand, Slovakia
• Group G (aka Group of Death): Brazil, North Korea, Ivory Coast, Portugal
• Group H: Spain, Switzerland, Honduras, Chile

Tennis - What is it about Wimbledon that makes for such dramatic tennis?The longest match in tennis history was suspended for darkness at 59-59 in the fifth set at Wimbledon. The first-round match between 23rd-seeded John Isner of the United States, and qualifier Nicolas Mahut of France was halted due to darkness. It already had been suspended for the same reason yesterday after the fourth set. They have been playing for a total of exactly 10 hours; 7 hours, 6 minutes in the fifth set alone, enough to break the full-match record of 6:33, set at the 2004 French Open. Damn. What simply amazes me is that these guys played a total of 45 games in their first four sets and came pretty close to tripling that number in the fifth set alone. I say again...Damn. This actually fouls up the schedule for the men's draw a bit, but should be that big of a deal. I have a hard time envisioning either one of these guys having much left in the tank for a second round match.