Statistically, Spain is the best team in the World Cup. Even Lula Da Silva, the president of Brazil, peace be upon him, said that Spain has the best team in this year’s tournament.  Having said that,  we all know that when it comes down to it,  it is not always the statistically best teams that win.

Hmmm the world cup… oh the emotion!! OK need a beginner’s guide to this stuff?Look no further than the World Cup Blog. This site has so much good info, that you can come out after reading it a pseudo-expert (impress your friends as you hop on the bandwagon…I will).

Some excerpts (the beginner’s guide to World Cup):

When is the World Cup? Soon. June 11th to July 11th.

Where is the World Cup? South Africa. It’s the first World Cup to be hosted by an African country.

Is South Africa the Nelson Mandela country? Yes, it is.

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How many teams are in the World Cup? There will be 32 teams in the World Cup. Click that link to see who they are.

How many World Cup games per day? Three, to begin with.

Who’s favorite to win the World Cup? Spain and Brazil are the teams with the shortest odds.

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How does this World Cup work then? The 32 teams are divided into eight groups of four. Each group plays round robin with three points for a win, one point for a draw, zero for a loss. The top two teams from each group advance to the knockout round. From there it’s single elimination. Check out the World Cup 2010 schedule and our World Cup wall chart for more.

Wait… single elimination? Isn’t football full of draws? Not in the knockout rounds. From the Second Round of the World Cup onwards, the teams play 90 minutes. If the score is level, they play 30 minutes of “extra time”. If scores are still level, it’s penalty kicks to decide the winner. The victor moves forward, the loser goes home.

So thats a lot of info right there, I would check out their blog daily for more of the good stuff. Check the schedule:

Back to Brazil… Lula, in the same instance we spoke of above, where he said that Spain has the best team going into the tournament, went on to say that Brazil will still win anyways… He has a point, not that Brazil will necessarily win (although they most likely will ), but rather that, even though a team might be good, a certain magic at the time of play is what counts! And Brazil has that magic, that mojo, that je ne sais quoi, that mandinga, samba no pé, whatever you may want to call it…

Lula says that he is totally down with Brazilian National coach Dunga’s selections of players for this year’s world cup and goes on to say that the star of this year will be Robinho! Robinho was personally picked by Brazil legend Pelé as his heir apparent at only 15 years of age and went on to lead Santos to their first Campeonato Brasileiro title since Pelé himself played for the same legendary Brazilian club. Since then he has won another title with Santos and two more with Real Madrid as well. Robinho has won one Copa América title and two Confederations Cups with Brazil under the leadership of Dunga. Lula said: “As the 1962 World Cup was all of Garrincha, I think Robinho is ready and focused for the 2010 Cup to be his.” So Rio Mate’s prediction? Robinho will be the breakout player for Brazil.

Robinho... the inheritor of Péle...