Sports Betting Blog

The Argentinean National Basketball team has been a bit criticized for failing to renew it’s aging players with new talent. Truth is that, despite the fact that these guys are certainly aging, and that the average age for the Argentinean team is somewhere up in the 33-year-old range, these veteran guys are still willing to prove that they’ve got what it takes to take the gold medal away from the championship favorite, the team USA and the 2012 dream team. Yet, for a moment, before the London 2012 Summer Olympics even kicked in, many considered this team to be too old to even be considered a serious contender for a medal. Sure enough their most recent performances in the friendly matchups they played in preparation for London were not great, and that made the aging Argentinean team look weak.

So it shouldn’t come as a big surprise to see that the South American squad took this first match against Lithuania as a message board to pinch on a bold statement. The old guys are here to stay! But let’s be fair and let the recently traded to the Phoenix Suns power forward, Luis Scola put it on his own words: “I think the message is that we are old but we can play, something like that,” said Scola in the postgame press conference. Sure enough, the Argentinean squad relied heavily on a solid performance Scola, who finished the night with 32 points, while the veteran Manu Ginobili proved to be the heart and soul of this squad, signing off a brilliant 21 points, 10 rebounds and 6 assist performance to lead Argentina to a 102-79 win over Lithuania on Sunday. Carlos Delfino rounded up the Argentinean game with 20 points. This was a big rematch of their 87-75 win over Lithuania in the bronze-medal game four years ago in Beijing back in 2008. Yet this time, they are going for gold. Or at least come home with a silver medal.

Now, Manu Ginobili knows that their next matchup is going to be of utter importance. They will face France tomorrow, a team that lost it’s opening game against the Dream Team. Now, the French need a win urgently, and Tony Parker, who plays next to Manu Ginobili with the San Antonio Spurs, is going to have to prove his worth in order to get around the Argentines. The Lithuanians were able to hold on in the game and were down 24-23 after the first quarter. But soon, things were going to change for good. Argentina got on fire before the halftime break and the 3-pointers just kept on coming. They scored 27 points in the second quarter, taking a 51-39 lead into the break and they never looked back.

“We didn’t want to show nothing to nobody –Said Scola in the same interview- We weren’t playing well in the preparation. We weren’t feeling well, we got this feeling that it’s not going well, we need to do something, we’ve got to play better, we’ve got to move faster, we’ve got to have a little bit more of a spark, so we needed to have this game.” Well, they’ll have a good chance to prove their worth as they play France and Team USA in the first stage.

The Argentinean people are very proud of their National Soccer Team. There is somewhat of a cult build around it. If the press fills in your T.V. with soccer news during every World Cup in each possible TV station, and you think its either overwhelming or just plain annoying, I got to tell you something. I don’t think any other country is got a single thing to match the way both players and fans, home or abroad cheer and sing and swear and live football like the argentines do. When the team plays the streets are empty, the bars are full, even at the bank the clerks are watching the game. Even at schools, students are cramped into TV equipped classrooms so that they can follow the games.

And then there is playing against Germany. I guess that only playing against Brazil or playing England can bring on such intensity, such a potent and deep-rooted rivalry among fans in the beautiful sport. And we are going to live a bit of that when both Argentina and Germany set foot on the Green Point Stadium soccer field in Cape Town this Saturday.

The expectations outside of Argentina were not particularly high for the team guided by Diego Maradona. They had had quite an irregular and somehow disappointing qualifying stage. Some of their losses were unprecedented (think Bolivia) and other were just painful (Brazil at home), but somehow it seems that despite the somewhat dubious experience of  Maradona as head coach, the Argentine team has managed to play wonderfully ever since they landed in South Africa.

The German squad is full of young talented players all of whom play in the German Bundesliga. It is not usual to see a World Cup team of only domestic players, yet Joachim Low’s team has proved to be one of the most competitive teams out there. With Brazil out of the picture, they are certainly going to take on a very promising change on the odds to win the World Cup.

But Argentina is still one heck of a team, and they have to beat the odds if they want to make it to the next round. Now, there are a couple of things you might want to keep an eye out for in this next game. For Argentina, many are wondering if Lionel Messi is finally going to be able to score. He has been close real close on many occasions, yet the best player in the world, according to FIFA, has yet to score on this tournament. He was a bit off on his last game, but heck, if he is as good as they say he is, he is going to want to prove it against the Germans. For better or worse, this is the first real threat to the Argentine hegemony in the tournament.

Now, since Tevez has been a bit overshadowed by Messi and Higuain in the group stage, he had to bring on his A-game against the Mexicans. His second goal was an instant classic, and might be the finest goal scored so far in the tournament.

On the German side, keep an eye out for Mezut Ozil. He has the talent and the ball handling skill to change the rhythm of the German offensive drive at will. And of course, keep an eye out for Thomas Muller. The youngster is on fire. He has scored 3 goals and 3 assists for the squad in this tournament. Truth be said, the young team has been playing so well we don’t even miss Michael Ballack that much. Neither do the German national soccer team.