Group A: South Africa 1 - Mexico 1

I completely forgot how big the home team advantage is at World Cups. With thousands of fans blowing in their vuvuzuelas, it sounds like the games were being played in a gigantic bee-hive instead of a soccer stadium.

South-Africa played well and deserved the point but they have trouble defensively especially at set pieces and Mexico's goal could have been avoided with a working offside trap. Mexico on the other hand often confused South Africa with the fact that their tactical line up is not very rigid. South Africa players were not always sure whom they had to defend against and it seems that a more strict zone defense would be most effective in shutting Mexico down. Because of their three men defense, Mexico are also weak against quick counterattacks over the wings, which is exactly how Tshabalala, who's goal superseded his name in awesomeness today, scored. The reason is that Marquez, the FC Barcelona player, who is arguably the best defender on Mexico's team, functions as a libero who advances during attacks and thus sometimes has trouble getting back in time. On the other hand that attacking role adds to Mexico's goal-scoring danger. Incidentally it was Marquez, who equalized, justifying the risk.

Both teams lack a more deadly striker upfront however and it seems they both made the least of their chances today. I'm a bit worried how they'll do against Uruguay and France, who have much more talent in the forward position and could easily punish defensive exploits.