There is something luxurious about the group stage of a World Cup. Gone is the waiting. Gone the fill-inch columns about arcane details of squad selection. Gone the faux-humanitarian pearl-clutching about global sport events being a massive waste of time and money. Gone the moaning about the scheduling. Just stay up late; it’s actually quite fun.
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Tim Shipman
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For now, here we are, with the glorious, technicolour feast. Goals left, right and centre. None of the quotidian misery of a goalless draw on a rainy Tuesday night in Stoke. Now it is the sun-soaked rush of national anthems, heroes, villains and – most of all – a goal fest aided by defences that barely know each other from Adam. Matches that you’d never before think twice about – Uzbekistan vs Colombia at 3.00 a.m. on a Thursday for example – take on the immense significance that trampolining and archery suddenly do at the Olympics. You’d never touch it normally but now, if it’s on, I’m all in.
