World Cupdate

A Hamlet-style Danish tragedy played out in Group E as an own goal by Simon Poulsen off the backside of Daniel Agger was about as tragic as it gets as Poulsen made a terrible mistake clearing a back post shot.  The Big Orange made a game of it by scoring close to the end, but the game was over long before as Denmark never got it together, the Dutch won 2-0.

Japan pulled the upset of the day as Keisuke Honda took advantage of a bad defensive choice by Cameroon's Mbia to back off, and blew one past keeper Hamidou and the Samurai Blue held on to win as they bunkered up.  Cameroon missed several chances late however and that may haunt them.  Japan suddenly has an outstanding chance to advance out of Group E along with the Orange, and you have to like their odds after the 1-0 win.

Italy's muddy play in the rains of Cape Town against Paraguay was no shocker.  The defending World Cup champs are nowhere near the same team they were in 2006 and it showed in a swampy slog where Paraguay busted out to a 1-0 lead on Antonin Alcaraz's beautiful header.  The Azzurri manged to knot it up late as they switched to 4-4-2 and finally played like a Cup contender, but luck is on their side, this was their toughest match of the group and they will still advance.