FOLLOWING a fascinating fortnight where the aesthetics of football has often been on display, it’s now crunch time in the FIFA World Cup Finals, with some interesting second-round match-ups in the offing over the next few days.

Indeed, an exposure to the 32 teams facilitated an objective analysis of the world game — the standard of play, team tactics and politics, and even the subtlest of suggestions as to how ‘The Greatest Show on Earth’ may yet unfold.

However, Brazilian coach Dunga’s recent assertion that there are no real super powers in the sport anymore — that the gap has narrowed considerably — is an excellent starting point for discussion this week.

Ahead of their showdown against Portugal on Friday last, the former ‘Samba Boys’ skipper declared that prominent countries like Brazil and Argentina are coming under increasing pressure from the ‘fringe countries’ — those who aspire to reach the dizzying heights of world champions — and therefore the need to maintain a high level to avoid being conquered by those other aspirants at the international level.

Closely aligned to this notion is that this year’s tournament has had its fair share of ‘strange’ results — enough to convince the sceptics that Dunga may be ‘spot-on’ in his analysis, with many a fan still reeling from the early exit of former champions France and Italy and left to wonder which of the seeded teams will be next.

A noteworthy similarity between Italy and France is that they both brought ageing squads to the competition, thus stimulating controversy in their build-up to the Finals in South Africa.

It might be cliché, but one is still tempted to say, ‘the more things change, the more they remain the same’. For Italy — like France in 2002 — entered as defending champions and obviously motivated by the lingering sentiments of the last campaign, kept faith with too many of the players who had bought them glory, which ultimately rendered unrealistic any attempt at another golden run.

The retention of Marcelo Lippi as coach bears further testimony to this, with the pervasive belief in soccer-mad Italy being that he sacrificed youth for experience and sadly, left the country’s best players at home.

Ironically, the stocks of the four-time World Cup winners would have dramatically soared following local club side Inter-Milan’s famous victory in the Champions League this year.

Simultaneously, however, we recall that in 1986 Brazil did likewise with admittedly an experienced cast that included stars like Socrates, Zico, Junior and company who four years earlier, had dazzled the world. Unfortunately, they didn’t have ‘the legs’ anymore and eventually lost to France in an epic quarter-final penalty-shootout.

So far, what we’ve seen in South Africa are only one African country, of six, advancing to the prestigious round of 16; all five nations from South America progressing; a few European countries making an early exit; eminent European nations struggling to stay alive; two teams from the Asian Confederation going through, and two of three tams from CONCACAF making the cut.

An important realisation in this context is that the success of the South American teams is not a ‘flash in the pan’ phenomenon, for apart from perennially boasting the most skilful players, they have always been the preferred choice in relation to the recruitment of players by the top European clubs.

In this regard, the Spanish, English, Italian, German, French and Portuguese clubs are brimful of players from South America. The situation also raises the question of whether or not the CONMEBOL confederation has a legitimate claim for five automatic spots in subsequent World Cup Finals — perhaps at the expense of that ‘half a spot’ which they now contest with CONCACAF’s fourth-laced team, and which they previously contested with the Oceania group.

In all fairness, the CONCACAF group has really done little to merit all of three-and-a-half spots, with the USA and Mexico the only consistent competitors at the highest level.

Indeed, it was obvious that Honduras — the third team from the CONCACAF region — was outclassed and out-of sorts, and clearly had no business in South Africa at this point in time.