As if to defy the growing groans at how boring this World Cup has been so far, Switzerland pulled off an upset to end all upsets. On Wednesday, the team beat heavily-favored Spain. (Well, maybe North Korea over Brazil would have been bigger.) Now that sports nuts have something else to talk about besides the lack of goals and the obnoxiousness of the vuvuzela, here's what they're saying.
- Stunner, says Richard Dietsch at Sport Illustrated. "Switzerland's 1-0 win in Durbin throws Group H into a major muddle. In a sentence that seemed preposterous to write hours ago, the Swiss are now favored to go to the knockout round given they defeat Honduras on June 25.
- Typical, says Brooks Peck at Yahoo Sports' Dirty Tackle. "Of course, underachieving in the World Cup is nothing new for Spain and even though the Euro '08 champs were highly regarded coming in, their World Cup campaign is now in serious, serious trouble."
- Bias? Andrew Iddon at A Different League points out that Spain chose to leave two of its biggest stars, both players in England's Premiere League, on the bench in favor of players from Spain's La Liga. "Whilst it is true that there is unrivalled strength in depth in the Spanish squad, the question must be posed on if there is a bias towards players from La Liga."
- Another Win for Roger Federer, says Chris Chase at Yahoo Sports. "The greatest rivalry in tennis took to the soccer pitch today when Roger Federer's native Switzerland faced off against Rafael Nadal's beloved Spanish national team in a World Cup pool game. And for the first time in what seems like a while, Federer came out on top."
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