Twenty years ago yesterday...

...was the "Whack Heard 'Round the World."

I had moved to Oregon barely three years earlier, at a time when Tonyamania was nearly at its height.

The muscular little woman from southeast Portland was Oregon's best known resident at that time, I recall, so as it unfolded the whole appalling saga of Tonya, her porn-star-wannabe husband, the security guard with the bizarre fantasites, the strange little man with the club who did the actual whacking, and the toothy ice princess who was suddenly the Maiden in Distress for the popular press made for fascinating viewing.

It was like a bloody freeway collision; horrible but almost impossible to look away from.

Twenty years on Tonya is still an odd sort of demi-celebrity out here in her home state; many Oregonians feel a sort of schadenfreude about her.

Yes, she's awful, but awful in the same way as the uncle who turned out to be a flashy, high-rolling embezzler, or the aunt who turned out to be a shameless and brazen grand horizontal; awful, yes, but sort of...our awful, an awful so close that it becomes almost loveable in its awfulness.

She and her little gang of fellow idiots turned out to be the spokesmodels for "Keep Oregon Weird".

What I recall thinking then, and still think now when I bother to think about her, was how completely and utterly she reminded me of all the other people I knew who came from the same parts of Clackamas County she came from.

These were people who were just brutally...marginal; sad, hardscrabble fuckups who were often just one mishap away from being human trainwrecks, deadly combinations of barely-bright, poorly-educated, undisciplined-to-the-point-of-undisciplinable.

In the Army we called these sorts of people "shit magnets". “Bad stuff” just “happened” to them; car wrecks, arrests...lost time, lost jobs, lost husbands and wives, lost lives.

Tonya was a kind of patron saint for those people, and I think that's where a lot of the love came from.

She WAS them, just a little bigger, a little sparklier, a little more famous. Lots of people really wanted to love her because she seemed to be the little comet-that-could-escape the merciless gravitational pull of the trailer-park-stop-n-rob-highschool-doper-and-hootchie-mama Death Star. By her existence, by her celebrity, she gave those poor fuckers hope that they, too, could escape the nightmare that was their Fate.

Of course, she didn't.

The odd thing is that Nancy Kerrigan, the elegant and slender antithesis of the muscular little backstreet tough girl, got dragged into TonyaWorld and it had the nasty effect of showing her worst qualities, as well.

The little hints of self-pity we saw as she held her leg and moaned "Why me?" became a full-blown hissyfit after the gold medal loss to Baiul, herself something of a gawdawful wreck and I agree with Nancy Nall; you've gotta watch all the way through the banner at her site; it's perfect in the unspeakably perfect way it fits into this whole fucking perfect-head-on-collision of egomaniacs.

I think the final nail in Nancy's PR coffin was when she was caught pissing and moaning about the indignity of having to appear at some event at Disneyland. I have to agree I would have loathed having to caper around with a costumed mouse, but, hey, that's the price of fame.

The revelation some time later that she had been screwing around with her then-married-then-manager wasn't exactly a deal-breaker; she had been pretty well exposed as someone whose sense of entitlement was larger than her overbite.

The anniversary of this sordid little business yesterday was very strange. No one seemed to want to revisit the events of 1994 with any real zest, or re-examine the robust awfulness of the whole tacky little conspiracy and the unpleasant revelations it brought about a whole bunch of different people we had hoped to celebrate.

There was a certain amount of domestic pleasantry surrounding Kerrigan, who does seem to have matured into a nice woman with a nice family.

Poor Tonya, still the fallen star, was barely visible; she appears to be back down where she started, married to an itinerant carpenter and living with her husband and son somewhere in the hinterlands of the eastern part of the state. The World's Worst Newspaper quotes her third husband's description of her: "She's kind, she's loving, she's a little rough around the edges. She's a redneck, but she's my redneck."

The bulk of the local stories made no mention of Tonya's other classic Clackamas County shit magnet escapades: the arrests, or the bizarre shenanigans like the putative kidnappings and hubcap (or was is an ashtray) assaults, no mention of the sad little wedding-night-porn-video, of the freakish foxy boxing "career". I got the sense that the public, and the public press, was trying to quietly apologize for making this poor sad little woman into a public freak show for a decade or more.

So. Myself? I kind of hope that Tonya finds something like happiness. Wherever and however she can.

We all deserve a little mercy before the end, don't we?

Down in southeast Portland her old skating rink in the Clackamas Town Center mall has gone, like Tonya, victim of hard times, bad choices, and bad luck.

So in their perfect, blandly awful mundaneity, perhaps the best last words on The Tonya and Nancy Story could be those of a nameless "Yahoo Contributor", who advised:

"So, don't come to skate but, the new 2 story Barnes & Noble and Macaroni Grill are worth the visit."

Yes, indeedy.

Let no man put asunder

Although you probably don't know this (and, I'm afraid, could probably care less; of all the posts here my soccer stuff draws fewer views than almost anything else outside of, well, anything. Hell, even my cat stories get more action) a lot has been happening to our Portland Thorns FC professional soccer club, current NWSL title-holders and defending first-season champions.

First, one of our defenders, Nikki Marshall, was waived back in September, right after the Girls in Red brought home the ugly-ass NWSL trophy (that's it over on the left and, yeah, it's pretty fuckin' ugly...except it looks a hell of a lot better sitting in our trophy case here in Portland. Heh).

Nikki is supposedly playing for our rival Seattle Reign but has more or less flat-out dismissed playing in the league next year.

Then Marian Dougherty, her backline partner, retired to take a real job.

The little-spoken fact of the National Women's Soccer League is that there are two types of players; those "allocated" from their national teams and those who can't make an honest living from their sport. Rumor - since the league is extraordinarily close-mouthed about its pay scale - says that the non-allocated players make as little as six or seven thousand a year from their playing gig. That's chump change for a good player but pretty typical of most sports, and in particular the NWSL has chosen to try and avoid paying out anything in order to avoid the solvency issues that crushed the three earlier attempts at forming a women's pro league here.

And today the first head coach - the manager, as they'd call her in Britain - of Thorns FC, Cindy Parlow Cone, has resigned.

And for the worst possible reason; her job was tearing her marriage apart. Her husband, John, resigned as the head of the Timbers' fitness staff today as well. Parlow Cone said: “Coaching the Thorns has been one of the highlights of my career. However, due to the scheduling conflicts created by the job, I realized that despite being a great move for my career, it was less than ideal for the health of my marriage - which is the most important thing in my life."

That's a damn hard road to find yourself on, to make you quit your job.

I've been there; not so much quitting my job to try and save my marriage but in the midst of a failing marriage finding myself in that cold iron place where it feels like the joy, the purpose, and the very reasons for living, have been leached out of your life.

You get up and go through the day but find no hope there. The world, and your place in it, seem very fallow, empty of the prospect of a gentler days to come.

This just reminds me of something I've said, and said here, before; that every day we live is a gift we're given.

Not that we will always want that gift. Sometimes that gift is a poisoned one.

Sometimes it is a horror so frightful that we cannot dare look upon it.

Sometimes it is pure joy. Sometimes it is a-tremble with happiness. Sometimes it is top-gallant delight, a delight so sweet and dear that it pierces our breast, a joy akin to weeping.

And...sometimes it is just...another day.

Another and another in the tripping string between our first breath and our last.

Some days are just a day, no better and no worse.

The part that catches in my throat, though, is how carelessly we assume that there will be another, and that that next day will be alike the last, and the last.

But it won't; there's nothing to say that today won't be the end of our marriage, or our love, or our hopes, or our life.

Well.

I could talk more about Coach Parlow Cone, and the Thorns, and what this may mean for the club, and Portland soccer, in 2014. But if you wanted to read about that you'd be following my work over at Slide Rule Pass, and this site isn't that site. I will have more to say about the soccer business side of this over there.

Today, here, I just wanted to remember again that every day we live we are a gift of love; that it's not such a bad thing to hold to that happy day and to work for the next as hard as we can.

Because oftimes it is only when the day draws to a close and the sky grows dark, and the cold wind closes around us, that we look back and remember that happy time and look forward with hesitation or fear, knowing that we cannot go back and that going forward gives us no assurance that we will emerge from the cold and the night.

Squeeee!

No real reason other than I came across a picture I loved and wanted to repost it.

Here's a couple of little future jammers getting all squeeee! over one of their heroines skating for our Rose City Rollers:

And here's another bunch of Portland kiddos, this time getting some love from Carli Lloyd of the USWNT:

Dunno why I love these little kids, especially the girls, all worked up about their sports heroines other than I think it's cool that they HAVE these strong women to get all squeeee! about and I'm kinda squeeee! about them, myself.

You kick ass, gals.

Sugar and Spice...

...and sweat and effort. And sometimes some pouting and whining. She's six, after all.

But don't mistake her for a delicate little flower. Her money quote for today was overheard during a hard-fought game of HALO against her big brother. Little Miss elbowed him with both hands on her controller to warn him to get out of the way; "I want to kill!" she piped in her sweet-adorable-tiny-girl voice.

Here's a couple more of the snapshots I took today at Rose City Gym that I rather liked:

This group of little girls sort of adopted Missy, but here they are entranced by the older gymnasts practicing;

Here's the Girl, herself, practicing to be a little vampire:

And one last image of the subject giving her unabridged opinion of the photographer's vision;

She's sweet but spicy, the Girl. And she doesn't care who knows it.

Better off Solo

File this under "things I don't understand".

Here's Hope Solo, a young woman who - at least by appearances - is ambitious, competent, and relatively bright (given that goalkeepers, as a rule, need to have at least enough intelligence to maintain tactical control over their backline...).

While she seems to like to party and goof off as much as any young jock, she has a great gig with the USWNT and bright prospects for earnings from that gig, providing that she is and remains popular with the ponytailed legions of women's soccer fans.

Her new husband?

Not so much.

In fact, if I had to sum up Jerramy Stevens the term I'd use would be "dirtbag". And the other term I'd use is "trouble."

NOT because of any one particular thing - although he sounds like he's a real pain in the ass human being - but because of a long history of stupidity and bad decisions and flat-out fucktardry that goes back to high school.

And at least in this case breathing-while-black doesn't seem to enter into it. This isn't some kid from the hood; this is a guy who was making NFL cash, fuck-you money, who could have kept all this partying, fighting, and doping and general please-come-arrest-me-becuse-I'm-a-too-big-a-stupid-douchenozzle-to-keep-this-on-the-downlow out of the public eye in the same way that other wealthy African-Americans (and wealthy Americans of all hues) who like a bit of outlaw fun have done since the flying wedge era.

Black, white, or brown, he's just an unemployed dirtbag with a talent for fucking up.

Why in little green apples would a woman who appears to be this driven, this smart, and this put-together want a walking "kick-me" sign like this for more than an evening's diversion?

Seriously.

Sigh. I don't expect people to make smart decisions about their crotches. We all have - I suspect most of us have, at any rate - made some dumb choices about people whose groinical bits we rub our own wedding tackle against. For all that Solo seems to be a bright gal who can keep goal more than a bit there's no reason she should be any smarter than the rest of us about putting Tab A into Slot B.

But...for God's sake, Hope - this guy is nothing more than a life support system for a penis. Consider him the go-to guy when you need a bit of lovin'. Fine. He may be a bit of a laugh, he may be good as a sort of meat-based sex toy, but...to let him become anything more than that?

To become legally incorporated with him? Formally associated with him in governmentally-sanctioned domestic partnership?

Are you fucking nuts? C'mon, Hope; show me that there's some sapiens there...

I don't get it. Anyone have any insight into this? Anyone? Because for me this falls under the "things that make me wonder why we climbed down out of the trees" despair for hope of human intelligence.

Red Hot and Rollin'...

It's almost midnight and I just got back from work. Just. Having started work at four this morning.

Summer can get a bit hectic in this business.

But I didn't actually post this to talk about that.

What I wanted to talk about was two weekends ago and the Rose City Rollers' Season 7 Championships. Because it was my very first time as a volunteer for the gals from The Hangar.

I think I've mentioned before that I love our Rollers in particular and the flat-track rollergirls in general. I love that they play their sport for themselves, and for those who love it and not for money or glory. I love the "do-it-yourself" ethic that is steeped into the Derby, and the oddball combination of rockers, hipsters, working janes and their joes, jockettes, and wild women that make up the four teams that make up the Derby scene here in Portland.

(By the way - I want to apologize for how this post and the preceding ones look. For some reason the fucking photo uploader at Blogger is now left-justifying all the photos. I've repeatedly told it to put them in the center, or on the right margin, but no. Left, ever to the left, never to the right, forever to the left. Thanks, Blogger; you screwed that pooch. Again)

Sorry, had to get that off my chest.

Anyway, so the way the Derby here works - and, I assume, it works the same way in most big cities - is that we have a local Derby "season" that involves the four teams in our Rose City league. The Guns n' Rollers, Breakneck Betties, Heartless Heathers, and High Rollers play each other through the winter and spring to determine the local bragging rights.

But...we also have am all-star/travel team composed of the best skaters in all four local teams (well, actually, we have TWO travel teams, a "B" team - the Axles of Annihilation - and the "A" team, the Wheels of Justice). The Wheels represent Portland in derby across the country and were good enough to go to nationals this past season. These gals kick ass like crazy monkeys.

But this wasn't about clobbering the soggy wenches from Rat City (boooo!) but local pride and the honor of the Rollers' seventh season title.

And to make it more fun, the bouts were at the old Memorial Coliseum down in Albina. The Mem is a real white elephant from the days before naming rights and luxury boxes. It's basically a ginormous concrete bowl inside a ginormouser glass box. It has all the charm of a 170-pound blocker elbowing you in the face, and all the elegance of a San Diego Emergency Room on a busy Saturday night when the Fleet is in town.

What can I say? I like the old barn.

So it was in mid-afternoon on Saturday when about thirty of us slipped, stumbled, stumped, or wandered into the windowless room down in the lower level of the Coliseum to meet with the volunteer organizers. As a group we were distinctive as individuals.

Some of the volunteers were very obviously skaters, retired skaters, or young women skating for the junior team (the Rosebuds). A handful were older guys ranging from some rakish pirates who had clearly spent years keeping Portland weird to whitebred me, a guy who clearly had a day job and wore deck shoes to the Derby. One youngish guy with a shaved head and less than half his left arm was introduced as a derby official whose derby name was "Bandit".

These two were the Cute Couple, but in derby fashion. They were both painfully skinny, quiet, and introverted. He looked about fifteen and was beyond quiet - he may have possibly said eight words I could actually hear, and she spent most of the evening doing everything but talking to him. They weren't "couply" most of the night in most of the conventional ways that people are. But during the pre-bout briefing when she thought nobody was watching she skootched up next to him and gently rested her bare feet on his legs.

The coordinators made it clear that we were NOT bouncers; any trouble was to be handled by the Coliseum guys. Most of us would just help people find their seats, run the front door, or help with the grunt work of moving and lifting. I drew the front, and so got a great view of the evening's progress.

Even though the doors didn't officially open until nearly six, fans, friends of the skaters, and various people involved in the various parts of the event started showing up well before then.

I loved these two; I have no idea who they were fans of, or what, but they were there ready to cheer something, by God.

One of the most interesting surprises for me was getting a really close look at the skaters "offstage", as it were. The elevator between the lower level, where the dressing rooms are, and the various team booths and merch stands on the main floor was located just to the right of our tables. So rollergirls from all the teams glided to and fro in front of us, often stopping to talk to friends or rivals or, as in this skater's case, have a pre-match feed.

I guess I always figured that the "tough girl/bad girl" personas were just that - a sort of homage to the old-school banked-track roller derby where the skaters would perform exaggerated pro-wrestling-style hits and mime theatrical ferocity to work up the crowd.

But watching the skaters that night I was strongly reminded of experienced troops at rest; a sort of businesslike toughness, a casual and undramatic physical power that had as much to do with their confidence in their skill as their muscle mass. Some of the costumes and part of the fierce derby names are for show, but these women are genuinely hard. Their cheerful brutality is not an act.

So the gates opened and the crowd streamed in; hipster couples looking for irony and PBR. Gresham yobs looking for PBR who wouldn't have known irony if it bit them on the ass. Derby moms and dads, boyfriends, and pals. A pretty fair number of people like me; regular Joe and Mary Lunchpails who love the game and enjoy the honest love of the sport that shines from the skaters themselves. But my favorites were the girls like the young lady in red here, who by her bright eyes is clearly impatient for the day when she, too, can wear purple; not to be old but to skate the flat track and dump some skivvy on her bony ass.

The Coliseum was rocking by the time the anthem was sung and the first skaters to the track, and as the door we were able to break away and look in on the bouts. I wasn't all that curious about the Guns v Heathers; they were playing for third place and pride alone. Although looking through my photos I realize that while taking crowd shots I seem to have caught a moment in film in the making;

Turns out that the woman in the picture above - she's in the black wifebeater in left center (look for the white number 419) is Diana Federoff, a.k.a. "Juvie Hall", who is (and, presumably that night, was) making a movie about derby around the world.

It IS a frigging small world after all...

I took a turn around the main floor of the Coliseum; it really is quite beautiful in a grim, industrial sort of way.

And then the featured bout of the evening began; High Rollers against the Breakneck Betties for all the marbles. I'm a Rollers fan because my kids' beloved aftercare teacher skates as a blocker for the Rollers under the derby name Kickassidy. So I made one last check on the door and put up everything but the very essentials, and went to watch the bout.

I won't give you the whole breakdown but let's just say that with nineteen seconds left the match was tied 110-110. You can read all about it at the first link, though. It was a great bout and...

And then it was over, and we had a 2012 champion.

The crowd stomped and cheered, the teams cheered, hell, everybody cheered. They cheered for the winners but, really, everyone who skated that night was a winner. They won the love of their friends and families, they won the awe and hopes of the little girls, they won the respect of their teammates and their rivals, they won the pride of the derby lovers of our great city for the Rose City Rollers.

And they won my heart all over again. They're terrific, our Rollers, and you can say I said so.

So the happy crowd decanted from the old glass box, and we turned in our yellow T-shirts and boxed up the remaining programs, and nodded goodbyes and headed out into the cool night. As I scuffed up the dark steps towards the lights of the Broadway Bridge I realized that I was smiling and humming a familiar tune under my breath.

There's a party in Portland...

No one's sleeping tonight.

An Die Memel 1: Die Grundstock

I know, I know...here it's nearly the end of the first week of the 2011 Women's World Cup and I haven't written a word about it!

Trust me, it's not because I'm not interested. This year, though, I haven't been watching the tune-ups and friendlies that lead up to the Big Dance, so I wanted to give the sixteen teams invited a chance to show what they brought. I wanted to look around a little rather than plunge ignorantly forward. But every team had played one game, and now I feel confident enough of my ignorance to talk a little about this year's finals.No changes in the set-up; sixteen teams; five from UEFA (Germany, the host, France, England, Norway, and Sweden), three from CONCACAF (The US, Canada, and Mexico), two from CONMEBOL (Brazil and Columbia), two from CAF (Nigeria and Equatorial Guinea), and, rather surprisingly, three from the AFC (North Korea, Japan, and - rather improbably - Australia). The Kiwis are the representative of the "OFC", a fairly ridiculous confederation representing the tiny nations of the western Pacific.

So; I have no illusion that any comments of mine about the teams, and the results so far, will carry any weight beyond my own opinion. But, hell, what's the good of having a blog if you can't talk shit on it? So let's go!

Group A: Germany, Canada, Nigeria, France

Germany: The weltmeistershaftin still looks the class of this tournament. Their opening match dissection of Canada was accomplished with their signature style; arrogantly confident and methodical. Today's 1-0 beating of Nigeria means that they will go through to the quarterfinals. Hard to see them as anything but the favorite to win everything again.

My predictions:
Quarterfinals: 100% (duh!)
Semifinals: 90%
Finals: 75%
Champions: 60%

Canada: A decade ago the Canadian women's national team had a great player, Charmaine Hooper, and managed to play just well enough to get beaten regularly by the USWNT. Hooper played for Canada for twenty years and earned the reputation as a rough player and a hard-to-like person. It's easy for me to understand why; her team, typically a collection of bobos, never managed to play up to her expectations. The current Canadian women's team has another wonderful player, Christine Sinclair. Her goal against Germany in the opening game was a strike of exceptional beauty. But I'm afraid that unless the CFA does something extreme in the next half-decade Chris is going to have a similar career. The Canadians are just good enough to make the top three in CONCACAF. And that's all. They have underperformed in every WWC they have played in except 2003. I'm sorry, Christine. You're a genuinely great player, and you deserve better.My predictions: Christine Sinclair has four years to assemble a team around her for 2015. If the CFA gets serious the next WWC may be Canada's only chance to have a go at Big Casino. Seeing Christine play the France game in obvious pain was difficult to watch. Her eyes, glaring out from inside that ludicrous facemask in hopeless rage, said all that needed to be said.France: The French women, unlike the French men, have never before been a factor in a World Cup. Their only previous appearance was an ignominious exit from the group stage in 2003. Their opening day win against Nigeria was unconvincing, but their destruction of a Sinclair-less Canada points to a very entertaining match with the Old Enemy, Germany.

My predictions:
Quarterfinals 100% (duh, again)
Semifinals: 80%
Finals: 50%
Champions: 10%

Nigeria: Women's football in Africa has been dire ever since 1991, and this year's African representatives appear to be little improvement, although Equatorial Guiana might even draw someone (we'll get to them later). Brutal hacking is the rule of the day in African football, and the women differ from the men only in degree. Nigeria's goalless exit from this year's WWC is just another argument against Sepp Blatter's insistence in expanding the finals from 16 teams. There's just not enough good soccer being played south of the equator to justify another team from CAF or CONMEBOL.

My predictions: The Nigerians are among the strongest of the men's sides in Africa, and the Super Falcons have been here before, going to the quarters in 1995. If the NFA ever gets serious about women's footy the Falcons might have a chance to make the step up to being a serious contender in world football. But at the moment, the Nigerian gals are just the latest scrimmage team provided by CAF for your amusement.

Group B: England, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand

England: The English have never gotten over the fact that they now pretty much suck at the game they invented. This year's England women's side, however, looks more promising than most. Their 2-1 defeat of the USWNT in a pre-finals friendly was a solid match, and they can both defend well and score. The draw against Mexico was a trifle surprising, but a one-goal match is never a good prediction of team play - one goal can be a fluke, or a moment's lapse, on the part of a good team. Their next match should be a one-sided walkover against the Kiwis, whose -20 goal differential is the worst in the finals outside the total unknowns like Colombia. If it isn't, there may be reason to worry that the Lionesses have reverted to the form that saw them failing to qualify for the finals in three of the six WWCs.My predictions:
Quarterfinals: 50%
Semifinals: 20%
Finals: 10%
Champions: 1%

Japan: I admit - I have a soft spot for the なでしこジャパン ever since their freakish 2-1 defeat of the mighty Brazilians back in 1995 between ugly 0-4 and 0-8 thrashings from the likes of Germany, Brazil, and the U.S. The hard-working little gals in dark blue have always seemed to me to represent the best of Japan; tireless, fierce teamwork and desire. Their skills are often lacking, and they will never be a genuine power in women's soccer.But they're in a chancy group, and they have the three points that needed to take (from the hapless Kiwis). If they can hold the English and Mexico to draws...well, I'd love to see the small women from Japan go to the quarters. (Update 7/1: Banzai! 4-0 and Japan is through! Great work, Japan, and good luck in the final eight!)

My predictions:
Quarterfinals: 100%
Semifinals: 10%
Finals: 1%
Champions: Not a hope. But - ganbare!

Mexico: The female Tri are something of a problem for me. They have typically been the "third-of-three" in CONCACAF behind the U.S. and Canada, and suffer from the usual macho-Latin handicap as most other Central and South American women's teams. Where they have succeeded it has been because they have poached Mexican-heritage players from U.S. college teams. But this year's edition looks to have some skills, and their finish above the U.S. in qualifying and group-stage draw against England suggests that they aren't intimidated by the traditional powers of the sport. I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that they are going to win the next two matches and go through top of group. (Update 7/1: Wow - I couldn't have been wronger. The Tri stumbled badly against Japan and will now have to completely demolish New Zealand for any hope of going through. Once again, form doesn't hold in the women's game...)

My predictions:
Quarterfinals: 10%
Semifinals: 5%
Finals: 1%
Champions: 0.1%New Zealand: Honestly. Why are you here, ladies? You're the "heavyweights" of the ridiculous OFC, and so long as there IS an OFC you'll be here again and again. At least when Australia was in your confederation we got to see you alternate with the Matildas, but now we'll have to watch you give up goals and flail hopelessly against moderately good sides you have no hope of beating consistently. If there are living indictments of FIFA's greed New Zealand is one of them. Argentina is the other, but they're home watching on TV like the rest of us. Thank God.

My predictions:
Quarterfinals: 1%, if some sort of immense divine intervention upsets the rules of time and space. Otherwise they may well be celebrating their goal against Japan as the highlight of their international campaign - they've only scored once before, a meaningless goal in a 4-1 demolition at the hand of China's Steel Roses.

Group C: USA, Sweden, Columbia, North KoreaUSWNT: Aside from Germany and Brazil the U.S. women are the only other perennial favorites to take home the World's Cup. And this year's edition looks solid, as usual. But there have been some small, irking flaws showing, like a crazed finish on a Dresden plate, that suggests some internal weaknesses. The WNT underperformed in the CONCACAF qualifying, losing shockingly to Mexico and only going through after a playoff win against the UEFA half-share side, Italy. And the first match began rather unimpressively, with a U.S. backline making some unforced errors and looking very vulnerable around the wings. I'll bet that the Germans and Brazilians were smirking as they watched the films of U.S. left wingback Amy LePeilbet get beat to her endline several times by a quicker North Korean attacker. Even Julie Foudy, not the most perceptive of analysts, noted that the U.S. midfield was leaving a LOT of space ahead of their backline and the Koreans put that to good use.But. Pia Sundhage is a damn good coach, and I suspect that she will have already made some adjustments to fix that problem - kicking Shannon Boxx in the ass to make her play harder wouldn't hurt; she was invisible against the Koreans - and there's no question that her choice of Heather O'Reilly was a good one. Abby Wambach now has a strike partner, and the two of them combine to make a truly frightening weapon. And given that their next two games are against the pathetic Colombians and the lethargic Swedes, the U.S should have no trouble going through. That's not the problem. At that point they'll run into the Brazilians, or the Germans. And that IS going to be a problem.

My predictions:
Quarterfinals: 99%
Semifinals: 80%
Finals: 70%
Champions: 50%

Sweden: The Scandinavian women were the monsters of the sport in the late Eighties and early Nineties, but since then something has happened to football up in the land of the ice and snow. The Swedes have never won this thing but came close, losing the final match to Germany in 2003. But since then they seem to have shared the decline that Norway experienced. The next generation of Swedish players has either not emerged, or has failed to succeed at the top level. Watching the Swedes flail away against a hapless Colombia was painful, and their eventual 1-0 victory practically defines "unconvincing". They will have their hands full with the U.S., and even North Korea has the capability to surprise them. If the Swedes pull together and have a good outing against the Koreans and then hold the U.S. to a draw they might yet go through - they seem like they should be the second-best in this lacklustre little group. But the Swedes have always held the power to disappoint in abeyance.

My predictions:
Quarterfinals: 60%
Semifinals: 40%
Finals: 5%
Champions: 1%North Korea: The gals from the Hermit Kingdom played their usual ugly, bunkered, counterattacking style against the U.S. and made the American women look pretty stymied for 50 minutes. But the bizarre and secretive Koreans - who, we are told, claim that their first-match loss to the U.S. this past week was due to several players having been struck by lightning early in June - just don't have the horses to compete with the big girls. They are frustrating and difficult to play because they pack behind the ball, and they showed some nice runs against the U.S. But their lack of consistent attack makes it hard for them to advance. They're luck that they have Colombia to make a feast on, and they have the capability to shock the Swedes if the latter show up in their slow mode...

Predictions: Sill go home again after the first round to face an angry Kim Jong Il and a future of starvation on the Korean soccer clone farm.

Colombia: Well, at least it's not poor fucking Argentina again.

My predictions:
The U.S. best hope for a 4-goal win in the group stage. Hopeless.

Group D: Brazil, Norway, Australia, Equatorial Guinea

Brazil: The third of the big three, but, like the men's side, prone to being either at your throat or at your feet. Struggled to get the three points against a far-inferior Australian side. Again, the next game will probably show us which Brazil showed up at this finals. Still, it's hard to predict that the most creative side in women's football won't make it onto the quarters. But the Brazilians have always seemed curiously frail to me. They have never consistently figured out Germany, and are no better than an even chance against the USWNT. So I think they will run into the German buzzsaw at some point and go home.

My predictions:
Quarterfinals: 100%
Semifinals: 90%
Finals: 60%
Champions: 40%

Norway: Same-same problem here as Sweden. For whatever the reason, the Norwegians have not aged well. They're still among the best in Europe, but their game has become a parody of the clockwork lutefisk it once was, and they had a terrible time scoring even the one goal against the Guineans. Still a solid team and likely to advance to the quarters, but they will have to find a spark they haven't shown thus far if they want to advance to the final match.

My predictions:
Quarterfinals: 80%
Semifinals: 50%
Finals: 20%
Champions: 10%

Australia: So far, the inconsistent Matildas greatest contribution to women's international soccer was their nude calendar back in 2000and their tough 3-2 loss to Brazil in the quarterfinals of the 2007 WWC. I've never been able to figure the Aussie gals; they have played some fine games (like the Brazil quarterfinal) but then get hammered by sides like North Korea and Japan. They seem to draw almost exclusively from their domestic women's league, which suggests that, Lisa de Vanna aside, their players lack international skills. So far they have been beaten by Brazil, which is no disgrace, and showed some skill in doing so. A good result against Norway might see the Gals from Down Under through.My predictions:
Quarterfinals: 30%
Semifinals: 10%
Finals: 1%
Champions: Tie me kangaroo down, mate

Equatorial Guinea: Another poor punching bag from the CAF, albeit with some nice attacking skills. But the level of football just isn't there. Why, FIFA, why do you embarrass these not-ready-for-WWC teams from the global south? It's not like they're going to go on a tear at the finals.

My predictions: No hope, though it'd be nice to see them go all crazy on the Brazilians and get the upset win of all time.So. Here's my guesses for the rest of the tournament. I'll go on record now and we can revisit them to see how smart I am about soccer in general and the women's game in particular.

Quarterfinals:

Germany-England
USWNT-Norway
Japan-France
Brazil-Sweden

Semifinals:

Germany-USWNT
France-Brazil

Finals:

Germany-France

Champions:

GermanyMeanwhile, the great spectacle drives on, and we are the beneficiaries, getting to see the best women's football in the world. Play up, ladies, and get tore in.

Qualified

The U.S. Women's National Team qualified for the finals of the Women's World Cup today, winning 1-0 over Italy to go through 2-0 on aggregate.This would once have been a "dog bites woman" story, but this year has been very different from the qualifiers the USWNT has played from all the way back to 1991.

For one thing, the team did not go through at the top of the CONCACAF group; that would be Canada, led by Christine Sinclair. Mexico, as always staffed with U.S. collegiate players from Mexico, went second.So the USWNT had first to defeat Costa Rica for third place, and then beat the sixith place European team - Italy - for a spot in the finals.

And the other real difference is that the U.S. doesn't have either an individual player or a group of players significantly better than the best in Europe or Brazil.

Instead, this U.S. team has showed itself to be; often flawed at the back, where missed communication has led to several ugly goals or good chances for the opposition; lacking the controlling midfield that was key to American success in 1991 and 1999, and especially sterile up front, where the only real consistently successful weapon has been Abby Wambach.I've talked about this before; Wambach is a genuinely great player, but her ability makes her a perfect target and she tends to be badly over-used by a U.S. midfield that lacks passing dexterity and control and has no real wingers. The U.S. tends to go hey-diddle-diddle right through the middle, where it exposes the defensive ineptitude of most of the rest of CONCACAF as well as the clumsy soccer played by most of the women's teams from South America, Africa and Asia.But the Germans have proved in the sternest fashion, by beating the Americans to the Cup the past eight years, that they have solved Wambach. Four years ago the brilliance of Marta combined with the tight marking that neutralized Wambach to allow Brazil to put a hurting on a badly coached, demoralized, and overage U.S. team.

The change has been in part because the northern Europeans always had, and the Brazilians have gained, the skills they needed to play world-class football. But in part is has been because the U.S. team that burst on the world like an explosion in 1991 was a truly brilliant squad made of uniquely gifted players. We only partially realized at the time how good the Ninety-oners were; Mia, Tiff, Loudy, Brandi, Joy, Kristine, Michelle, Brianna...we can see now that they have to be considered one of the great teams of history, and the modern USWNT looks smaller only in the long shadow they cast now that they are gone.Two goals over the hapless Italians is just sad. And the lack of goalscoring isn't an aberration; the US has had difficulty scoring against decent teams all year. This year the U.S. begins its campaign for the Women's World Cup in an unusual position, as a challenger, and not a favored one at that.

I will be cheering and hoping for glory in Germany. But this year I suspect my support will, like many other WNT fans, be tinged with more than a little nervous anxiety. For the American women will be landing in Germany next spring not as the Team of Destiny, but the Team of Doubts.