World Cup News: Germany beats Uruguay for 3rd place, 3-2

PORT ELIZABETH, South Africa — In pouring rain on a ragged field, Germany and Uruguay staged a match entertaining enough to be for the World Cup title.

Too bad it was only for third place.

Sami Khedira scored in the 82nd minute to give Germany a 3-2 victory and third place for the second straight World Cup. But the Germans had to survive a final-second free kick by Uruguay star striker Diego Forlan from just outside the penalty area. It ricocheted off the crossbar, and the whistle sounded.

Rain-soaked players shook hands and awaited a medals ceremony that was not nearly what they wanted. The Netherlands and Spain will play for the championship on Sunday in Johannesburg.

Germany coach Joachim Loew, his voice still hoarse from the flu, said his team was going home “with a very good feeling.”

“We achieved more than we perhaps expected,” Loew said.

Khedira’s header after the Uruguay defense failed to clear a corner kick by Mesut Oezil ended Uruguay’s hopes of beating Germany for the first time in 82 years.

“We had hoped for more, and we did everything for it,” Khedira said. “This was some kind of final and we did everything for it.

“We have a young team and set an exclamation mark here and can reach more.”

Uruguay came from behind to lead 2-1 when Forlan brilliantly volleyed in Egidio Arevalo’s 51st-minute cross for his fifth goal of the tournament.

Germany defender Marcell Jansen tied it five minutes later with a header after goalkeeper Fernando Muslera misjudged a cross.

In the dying moments, on a rain soaked pitch, Uruguay had one more opportunity. But Forlan, who has been especially dangerous on free kicks, hit the bar.

“Obviously it’s something spectacular to be among the top four,” said Forlan. “If someone would’ve asked us at the beginning, we would’ve liked it. It’s something positive.”

Uruguay has beaten Germany only once in 10 matches, in 1928. Germany beat Uruguay in the third-place match in 1970, the last time Uruguay reached the semifinals.

In its last three World Cup tournaments, Germany was runner-up in 2002 and third in 2006 at home.

“Luckily, we won, because the disappointment over the semifinal was still there,” Bastian Schweinsteiger said. “We were behind and we rallied, that shows the character if this team. I am very proud of this team although I have tears in one eye because we did not reach the final.”

Uruguay won the first World Cup in 1930 and also won it in 1950. Germany has won in 1954, 1974 and 1990.

Thomas Mueller opened the scoring for Germany in the 18th minute, also his fifth goal at the World Cup. Edinson Cavani equalized for Uruguay in the 28th when he slid a shot past goalkeeper Hans Joerg Butt.

Miroslav Klose’s aching back prevented him from playing for Germany and he finished the tournament with four goals and 14 for his career. He is one goal shy of Brazilian forward Ronaldo’s World Cup record and, at 32, doesn’t expect to play in 2014 in Brazil.

Loew was forced to make five changes to his team. Defender Philipp Lahm and forward Lukas Podolski were out with the flu. Backup striker Mario Gomez also has the flu.

In an action-packed match, Butt made two good saves on Luis Suarez and Forlan after his team’s second goal. The 36-year-old veteran, who was the third-string goalkeeper in 2002, got his World Cup debut replacing Manuel Neuer.

Suarez returned from a one-game suspension for a handball on the goal line against Ghana in the quarterfinals. He saved a goal, Ghana missed the ensuing penalty kick on the final play of extra time, then Uruguay won the shootout.

“I don’t think it’s too much vanity to think that if we improve a little we can aspire to certain prominence in future international tournaments,” Uruguay coach Oscar Tabarez said.

Racial harmony? Not yet, but SAfrica makes strides

VOSLOORUS, South Africa — World Cup fever, and the racial harmony it has inspired in her country, is something Caroline Motholo has experienced only from afar.

On the periphery of her more-than-full life — she runs a day-care center catering mostly to orphans whose parents have died of AIDS — she has seen the images: white and black South Africans side by side in the stadiums and fan parks, cheering together for their national team before its ouster, sharing pride that their once-shunned homeland is host for such a grand event.

Yet virtually everyone she sees in Vosloorus, a dusty township of 150,000 people on the outskirts of Johannesburg, is black. The community has vast tracts of small homes, and a jobless rate above 40 percent. Few whites ever set foot in it.

“I wish that spirit would stay,” Motholo said, sounding hopeful but not confident that the World Cup euphoria will live on.

She’s lived in Vosloorus for 16 years, but said she knows no white people from Boksburg, the nearby city where — during apartheid — blacks performed the low-level jobs but only whites could live.

The images of racial good will conveyed via the World Cup to a global TV audience aren’t false. They embody the profound changes that have transformed race relations in South Africa in the two decades since apartheid began to dissolve.

But to declare South Africa a unified rainbow nation, as President Jacob Zuma did last month, is premature. For a reporter returning here for his first long visit since covering the anti-apartheid unrest of 1987-90, the progress is striking — but so too are the yawning divides that remain, the fears and resentments, the lingering scars of the bad old days.

The progress and the long road ahead both become apparent in a visit to the mostly white Boksburg district of Sunward Park, 20 minutes drive from Motholo’s hard-scrabble neighborhood.

There, Bernard Coetzee is the pastor at the local branch of the Dutch Reformed Church — the largest denomination among the Afrikaners who held political power during apartheid.

Many young Afrikaners feel comfortable under a black-led government, says the 48-year-old Coetzee. “But for my generation, the change is more difficult than for them,” he said. “We grew up in apartheid.”

One of the toughest adjustments for his community, he said, relates to affirmative action policies which give preference to blacks, people of mixed race, and even white women over white men.

“They’re the last in the row now,” he said. “That’s the most difficult thing.”

Back in 1988, Boksburg made international news when right-wing Afrikaners won control of the town council and voted to ban blacks from public facilities that recently had been integrated — including the town hall and a large lakeside park.

Now the park is a favorite leisure spot for blacks, and Boksburg — along with many other nearby towns — is governed by a black-run municipal council.

Mthuthuzeli Siboza, 49, serves on that council, representing Vosloorus. He bemoans the township’s rampant unemployment and HIV/AIDS epidemic, and gives mixed grades on race relations.

“Racism will remain with us forever,” he said. “But you can see people are forgetting about their negative tendencies and uniting around soccer.”

At Coetzee’s Sunward Park Community Church, the congregation now includes a few blacks, as does its day camp program, run by youth pastor Gerrit Visser.

The 27-year-old Visser epitomizes the post-apartheid outlook of many under-30 whites. Even though he once was carjacked by blacks who threatened to kill him, he is upbeat about race relations and South Africa’s future.

He told of a cousin who has moved to Britain and telephoned to say that Visser should do likewise. “I said to him, ‘You don’t understand. I love these challenges,”’ Visser said. “Stick here, make a plan... We have every reason to be pessimistic, but we’re optimistic.”

Two years ago, Visser said, he and two friends flew to Uganda and hitchhiked back home across southern Africa.

“Wherever we went, somehow the locals knew we were South African,” he said proudly. “They told us, ‘You walk like you’re from around here.”’

Thato Motsepe, 22, an aspiring actress and recent graduate of the University of Johannesburg, said the big divide in her generation has more to do with education and ambition than skin color. Describing herself as colorblind, she said interracial dating is increasingly common, and more young whites are learning African languages.

Like other blacks her age, Motsepe venerates Nelson Mandela, the longtime political prisoner elected in 1994 as the first post-apartheid president. But she feels no compunction to view her world through the prism of the anti-apartheid struggle.

“The older generation will always see color — it will remind them of some kind of pain,” she said. “It’s time we younger South Africans stop imitating what they went through. It’s time to move on.”

South Africans of Motsepe’s and Visser’s generation have only fleeting memories, if any, of the full-fledged apartheid system that prevailed from 1948 through the 1980s. Blacks had no vote in national elections; residential areas, schools, hospitals, even beaches were racially segregated.

For foreign journalists based here at the time, the system produced jarring experiences — evading police barricades sealing off volatile black townships, covering illegal protests, perhaps even getting tear-gassed — then returning by evening to a placid, whites-only suburb.

Now, even affluent, mostly white neighborhoods are apt to include some black homeowners, but there are relatively few areas nationwide that are thoroughly mixed. Boksburg had one such suburb in the 1990s, Dawn Park, but white flight has left it virtually all black.

As for the black townships, like Vosloorus, “we don’t go there,” Coetzee said.

Indeed, many of the hundreds of down-on-their-luck whites who’ve set up squatter camps in recent years would have the option of buying inexpensive new homes in the townships — but haven’t done so.

“Members of the black middle class have moved into traditional white areas, but we don’t find a reciprocation,” said Eddie Makue, general secretary of the South African Council of Churches. “They’d rather eke out a living as squatters because of this misperception that the townships are unsafe.”

Like many South Africans, Makue was pleasantly astounded when thousands of Afrikaner rugby fans from Pretoria made their first-ever visit to Soweto — and enjoyed themselves — for a match in May that had been relocated to the huge black township because of World Cup logistics.

“When white people do come into a black area, they are well received,” Makue said. “Many of those fans were absolutely astonished they could go into a shebeen (pub) and not be robbed.”

Kallie Kriel, head of an Afrikaner-rights lobbying group called AfriForum, was among those at the rugby match.

He accuses the governing African National Congress of tolerating some anti-white racism among its young leaders, but he feels race relations at the grass-roots level are progressing well.

“It’s a relaxed atmosphere among normal people that’s being endangered by the political elite,” he said. “You don’t want that to trickle down to ground level.”

The Soweto rugby match, and the heartwarming World Cup displays of black-white unity, prompted John-Kane Berman, the head of the South African Institute of Race Relations, to issue a status report part way through the soccer tournament.

“Mixing across the color line in schools, universities, hospital wards, and elsewhere, once forbidden by law, is growing,” wrote Kane-Berman. “This day-in, day-out mixing as part of normal life has none of the symbolic significance of excited crowds in football stadiums, but it is more important.”

But he said racial friction could worsen unless two dangers are addressed.

“One is that continuing corruption, crime and state failure ... will cause more and more whites to see failure in racial terms,” he wrote. “The other risk is that widening material inequality will lead to growing racial tension for the obvious reason that so much of the country’s private wealth remains in white hands.”

Indeed, the economic gap remains wide, with the average white household’s income several times that of the average black household. Yet affluence doesn’t guarantee peace of mind — as reflected by the popularity of a book on emigration: “Should I Stay or Should I Go?”

For now, whites make up 9 percent of the population of 48 million, blacks about 80 percent.

In many white neighborhoods, the houses are sealed off by high walls, often topped with metal spikes and electrified wire and bearing the logos of armed-response security companies. In the wealthier suburbs, odds are good that behind the walls is a swimming pool and lush patio.

Some whites — and some blacks, as well — say one drawback of their country is constant stress, worrying about crime. They may get used to it, then notice it again with dismay when they return after travel abroad.

Other grievances vary by neighborhood. While blacks in the townships complain about inadequate housing and poor schools, whites in the suburbs gripe about deteriorating public services — trash collection, road maintenance.

One of the challenges — difficult in any nation — is for black and white, rich and poor to try to see across the divide and find some common bonds and understandings.

“At the human level, everybody wants to make it work — we’re all a part of this fantastic, beautiful country,” said Sibongile Mkhabela, who as a high school student was jailed for her role as a leader of the 1976 Soweto uprising and is now CEO of the Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund.

“Where the will falls off is when the self-interest comes in,” Mkhabela said. “What’s needed is for all of us to keep our eyes on the bigger picture, to understand we might be inconvenienced, we might feel discriminated against, but in the long term it’s in the best interest of the country.”

Hard at work with her orphans in Vosloorus, Caroline Motholo says she loves her job, yet describes it as a constant struggle — scrounging for supplies, lobbying for funds, preaching safe sex to a community not always eager for that message. Cartons of government-supplied condoms are piled floor to ceiling in one of the center’s rooms.

At 54, she’s old enough to have vivid memories of apartheid, and overall is grateful for the changes since then. She views white South Africans collectively as somewhat selfish, but says they have no reason to be frightened.

“Nobody is going to hurt anybody,” she said. “We can’t do anything without the whites. They can’t do anything without the blacks.”

-- David Carry

And the 2010 World Cup award winners are ...

JOHANNESBURG — The World Cup is winding down, and with the final days come the big awards. Let FIFA decide the best player and stingiest goalkeeper. After a month packed with 62 games and 32 teams, there are lots of other prizes to be handed out for this first World Cup on the African continent.

Here are some World Cup awards for the good, the bad, the ugly and, of course, one for the octopus:

The Golden Vuvuzela: South Africa may have been the first World Cup host to fail to get out of the group stage, but Bafana Bafana was a delight from Siphiwe Tshabalala’s blistering left-footed shot in the opening game to the team dancing its way into the stadium for its final match (a win over the French, more on them later). The home fans were even better, enthusiastically cheering for every team and giving this World Cup a most distinct soundtrack with the blare of their vuvuzelas.

The New Glasses: England got robbed of a goal and Argentina was gifted one as officials created a highlight — or lowlight — reel of errors at this World Cup. The bad calls raised howls anew that soccer use video replay or other technologies, and FIFA president Sepp Blatter grudgingly agreed to consider it. But this is the same guy who once said, “Let’s leave football with errors,” so don’t bet on changes.

The Hand of God: Diego Maradona was every bit as entertaining as a coach as he was a player. Whether he was stalking the sidelines, grimacing over fouls as if they were personal assaults, or celebrating Argentina’s wins as if each was the tournament final, you couldn’t take your eyes off of him. There were no outrageous outbursts, and while the verdict is still out on whether he really can coach, he didn’t do anything to hurt Argentina, either.

The Silver Earplugs: Love ‘em or hate ‘em, those vuvuzelas and their swarm-of-bees sound stamped this World Cup as South Africa’s own. But don’t expect them to sweep the sports world. Wimbledon, the rugby World Cup, the Ultimate Fighting Championship all banned them. Not to be outdone, the United Arab Emirates’ General Authority of Islamic Affairs and Endowments issued a fatwa against vuvuzelas if they exceed 100 decibels, which they usually do.

The Tarnished Ball: France behaved so abominably it might have locked this up for 2014, too. The defending runners-up staged a mutiny and refused to practice, pouting like a bunch of 3-year-olds in need of naps over coach Raymond Domenech’s decision to send Nicolas Anelka home following Anelka’s expletive-filled rant at halftime of the second group stage game. Oh, the French played abysmally, too, slinking home with one lousy point and one measly goal. Quelle catastrophe!

The Rusty Shoes: Wayne Rooney, Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi may be the biggest thing going in the game these days, but they were World Cup flops. Messi was the main reason Argentina reached the quarterfinals, creating plays for his teammates and occupying opposing defenses’ attention. But he left without scoring a single goal. Ditto for Rooney. C’mon, guys. Even offensively challenged Greece managed to knock in a pair of goals. Ronaldo at least scored one goal, but it was more accidental than intentional. And stop with the flopping and the whining. It’s beyond tiresome.

The Grounds Crew: Hundreds of fans are now on the hunt for “I came all the way to Durban for the World Cup and all I saw was the airport” T-shirt after congestion at the new King Shaka Airport forced them to miss the semifinal between Spain and Germany. Several flights had to be delayed or turned away after private jets — hey, let’s blame this on Mick Jagger, along with those games he cost the U.S. and England — clogged up the landing spaces.

The Bald Patch: Teams were told to keep off the grass at several stadiums on the day before games to keep the fields from being damaged. This is, after all, wintertime in South Africa, and the rain and cool temperatures can ruin grass faster than a Jabulani can make a goalkeeper look silly. Even with the precautions, though, big clouds of dirt got kicked up during the semifinal between Spain and Germany in Durban’s Moses Mabhida Stadium.

The Kinda Comeback Kids: Sales of antacid skyrocketed last month, thanks to the U.S. team and its penchant for late rallies. Much as the Americans swore they didn’t like doing it, playing catch-up seemed to suit them, and their doggedness and clutch play won them new fans. The thrill ride was too good to last, though, and the Americans bowed out in the second round to Ghana after falling behind one time too many.

The Bronze Continent: South America finishes third behind France and Italy for worst choke of the tournament. Sure, it gets huge props for all five teams advancing to the second round, all but one as winners of their groups. But by the time the semifinals rolled around, only Uruguay — yes, Uruguay — was left. All that love and flowery prose lavished on Brazil and Argentina turned out to be a waste, with both losing — decisively — in the quarters.

The Worst Guest (tie): The Dutch girls and Pavlos Joseph.

More than 30 women showed up at the Netherlands’ opening match wearing orange mini-dresses emblazoned with the name of Dutch brewery Bavaria NV, which has made a habit of ambush marketing at the World Cup. Two of the women were arrested, but they were sprung after Bavaria agreed to keep its clever marketing minds otherwise occupied until 2022 — unless, of course, Bavaria happens to shell out big bucks to be an official sponsor.

As for Joseph, he crashed the England locker room and chatted up David Beckham, and the tabloid Sunday Mirror might have been behind it all. Anything to sell papers.

Honorable mention, Paris Hilton. She came, she didn’t see much, she got busted for allegedly smoking pot. Turns out the offender was her pal, a former Playboy playmate.

The Tainted Ball: The Jabulani might be the only thing that got more bad pub than the French at the World Cup. Though Adidas said technological advances would make the ball sail true, it took some crazy dips and dives, making goalkeepers and field players alike look incompetent. Every four years somebody — lots of bodies, usually — have a gripe about the new ball. But this got downright vicious, with Brazil goalkeeper Julio Cesar likening the Jabulani to something you’d buy at a grocery store (not so far off, it is light). Say this for it, though, Jabulani sure is fun to say.

And last, but certainly not least, The Golden Boot(s): Paul the Octopus. Who knew the biggest star of the World Cup would be an eight-legged guy who can’t even kick a ball? Paul may have betrayed his native land (sorry, England), but his dead-on picks first charmed Germany and then an entire planet. If Brazil is looking for a mascot, it might want to consider him.

Better yet, put him in charge of officiating. He hasn’t missed a call yet.

-- Nancy Armour

FIFA: World Cup match officials a big success

DERDEPOORT, South Africa — Despite complaints about game-changing mistakes and FIFA’s agreement to revisit how technology can help officials, the head of refereeing for soccer’s governing body says that the World Cup has been a success.

Jose-Marcia Garcia-Aranda said Saturday that an analysis of the first 62 matches showed referees got more than 96 percent of their decisions right.

“It is a big success,” the Spanish official said at a news briefing. “We have to say it is not an opinion (but) facts.”

FIFA acknowledged that referees made errors, though in “only a few” matches.

“We are not hiding our mistakes or the mistakes of the referees on the field of play,” Garcia-Aranda said in a robust defense of FIFA’s officiating program.

World Cup final referee Howard Webb agreed that mistakes had been made but said they were largely isolated.

“There is no point us sitting here as match officials and saying everything is absolutely perfect,” said the 38-year-old Englishman, who is one of the few professional referees among the 29 FIFA selected for World Cup duty.

“But it’s also right to point out that the vast majority of decisions have been very sound and very correct.”

Referees were widely criticized after a series of mistakes in the first half of the tournament.

In the group stage, the United States was denied a likely winning goal late in its game against Slovenia, then a Brazil goal against Ivory Coast was allowed to stand despite two apparent handballs by Luis Fabiano leading up to it. Brazil’s Kaka was ejected later in the same match when it appeared he and an Ivory Coast player collided accidentally.

The pressure was stepped up after errors by assistant referees affected the outcome of two second-round games. FIFA will revisit proposals to introduce goal-line technology in response to England being denied a clear goal which would have tied its match against Germany 2-2 late in the first half. Germany went on to win 4-1.

Italian referee Roberto Rosetti has retired, three years before reaching the mandatory age to step down from duty, after he missed an offside call that allowed Argentina to score its first goal against Mexico. The Argentines went on to win, 3-1.

FIFA did not award control of another match to any of the four referees involved in the main controversies.

Garcia-Aranda said all the errors have been studied carefully, and the referees’ 96 percent accuracy rate favorably with the success of players taking penalty kicks.

Just nine of 15 penalties awarded during matches have been scored, a 60 percent accuracy rate. “I think the refereeing in this tournament has been more than good,” Garcia-Aranda said.

-- Graham Dunbar

British journalist Wright fined by SAfrican court

CAPE TOWN, South Africa — A British tabloid journalist who had been accused of trying to undermine World Cup security has paid a 750 rand ($100) fine to have his case dropped.

Simon Wright of the Sunday Mirror admitted Saturday to breaking South African immigration law in exchange for prosecutors’ agreement not to pursue the case further.

Authorities had accused Wright of being involved in an “orchestrated” attempt to undermine World Cup security after a man found his way into England’s locker room in Cape Town on June 18, following England’s 0-0 draw with Algeria.

Prosecutors said Wright harbored and interviewed the man, Pavlos Joseph, as the police were looking for him.

Joseph was arrested on June 28, and paid a $100 admission-of-guilt fine in exchange for a Cape Town magistrate dropping charges against him.

South African national police commissioner Bheki Cele said at the time that Wright had allegedly arranged for Joseph’s hotel accommodation using false details, adding that Wright also had a contract with Joseph for exclusive interviews for seven days “after he made news.”

Minister of Police Nathi Mthethwa issued a statement criticizing Wright’s actions.

Wright’s admission of guilt “is indicative that some journalists will do anything to get a story, even commit a criminal act,” Mthethwa said. “We are a sovereign country with laws that must be upheld by all citizens, as well as all visitors.”

Wright now has a criminal record in South Africa, police noted.

-- Thandisizke Mgudlwa

Klose on bench out for third-place match

PORT ELIZABETH, South Africa — Miroslav Klose’s aching back prevented him from playing in the third-place playoff against Uruguay on Saturday.

Germany won 3-2.

Klose is one goal shy of Brazilian forward Ronaldo’s World Cup record of 15.

Cacau replaced Klose, who has four goals in this tournament.

Germany coach Joachim Loew was forced to make five changes to his team. Defender Philipp Lahm and forward Lukas Podolski were out with the flu. Loew also has the flu but was on the bench. Backup striker Mario Gomez also has the flu.

Klose scored five goals in each of his previous two World Cups. He and Thomas Mueller led Germany with four goals each heading into the match, but Mueller scored early in the first half.

Webb to referee World Cup final

DERDEPOORT, South Africa — World Cup final referee Howard Webb is getting a much better ending to his second big tournament than to his first.

On Sunday, the shaven-headed former policeman will stride out in front of the Netherlands and Spain teams at Soccer City after being given his profession’s most prestigious assignment.

Two years ago, the English official was sent home early from the European Championship for a missed offside call in a group-stage match. That match between host Austria and Poland also is remembered for a stoppage-time penalty kick that earned him death threats from Polish fans.

Webb’s ordeal was captured by a film crew with authorized behind-the-scenes access to make the documentary “Kill The Referee.”

“We see the knife-edge that we live on in terms of officiating at major tournaments,” Webb said about the film on Saturday. “One big decision and the ambitions that we have can be cut short.”

The experience certainly didn’t kill Webb’s career, and appears to have made him stronger.

Alongside the same team of assistants, Darren Cann and Mike Mullarkey, who shared his Euro 2008 disappointment, he will be busy Sunday.

“We have certainly kept trying and refocused and we’re delighted with the way this has gone,” the 38-year-old Webb said. “This is a massive honor for us. This is massively important for the world. It only comes around every four years.”

The English trio had a strong World Cup even as high-profile errors by some of their colleagues have become headline material. Webb has been particularly praised for his player-management skills to keep firm control of three matches without showing a red card.

Notably, his handling of a highly charged, win-or-go-home group match between defending champion Italy and Slovakia won acclaim.

“We need to try to be a calming influence on the game,” Webb explained. “The perfect game for me would be one where nobody is speaking about the officials, and they are speaking about the excellent game of football and the skill of the players.

“That is what the 80,000 people at Soccer City will come to see.”

TV RATINGS: After 62 of the 64 games of the World Cup, ESPN/ABC networks have averaged a 1.9 U.S. rating, up 36 percent from 1.4 through the same point in 2006. The average household audience is up 41 percent from 1.575 million to 2.227 million and the viewer audience is up 45 percent to nearly 3 million.

The 2010 event is also ahead of 1994, when the World Cup was held in the United States and was the most-watched World Cup in U.S. television history. Through the quarterfinals, this year’s competition averaged 2.198 million homes, up 32 percent from 16 years ago.

MORE LIKE ME: Dutch soccer great Johan Cruyff says that of the two teams in the World Cup final he “sees the most of me” in Spain and not the Netherlands.

The former midfield star and architect of Dutch “total football” of the 1970s made the comment in an interview with De Telgraaf. His country of birth is whipping itself into a soccer frenzy for the final in Johannesburg.

An orange tram rode around Amsterdam on Saturday, and the Defense Ministry announced that two F-16 fighter jets, including one painted orange, will escort the team’s plane home once it reaches Dutch air space Monday. The same orange F-16 roared low over Amsterdam’s Arena moments before the Netherlands routed Hungary 6-1 in its final World Cup warmup.

Cruyff also praised Spain coach Vicente Del Bosque for forging a cohesive team out of stars drawn from archrival clubs Real Madrid and Barcelona.

Cruyff, who now divides his time between Spain and the Netherlands, did not predict who would win.

“I have links with both the Netherlands and Spain,” he said. “Whatever the result, I win.”

DOOOOEEEELLLL!: There are 11 ways in which South Africans can shout “Goal!” and the government has a book to prove it.

As the World Cup fever was getting into its swing, the South African government’s department of arts and culture asked teams of linguists, sports experts, journalists and broadcasters to compile, then translate, a list of 348 key soccer terms.

They wanted to “to ensure that each and every South African gets the opportunity to be acquainted with the relevant information pertaining to the World Cup in their own language.”

And the experts obliged.

After years of work, they produced a 240-page book that translates key soccer terms in South Africa’s 11 official languages. A Goal in English, is “Doel” in Afrikaans, “Igoli” in Zulu or “Inqaku” in Xhosa. Words like “penalty” and even “underdog” were translated.

FORMULA ONE OPINION: Spanish Formula One driver Fernando Alonso reckons there’s more chance of his country winning the World Cup on Sunday than him winning the British Grand Prix.

Alonso qualified in third place for Sunday’s race at Silverstone, England, which takes place before Spain plays the Netherlands in the World Cup final.

Alonso finished eighth at the European Grand Prix two weeks ago. He believes “it’s easier that the football team wins tomorrow.”

The reigning European champions have never reached a World Cup final before and the Ferrari driver is urging them “to capitalize on this opportunity, just in case we have to wait another 40 or 50 years to get here again. Try to make people happy.”