Sunday was a very interesting day at the World Cup of soccer in South Africa.
The Germany vs. England match was supposed to be a good one. Instead, Germany completely stomped England, 4-1. In the afternoon match, Argentina ran all over Mexico, 3-1.
Yet, both matches had a lot of drama and pathos to them.
I’m beginning to actually enjoy some of this. God help me.
My pal Andries Gouws of Johannesburg’s Beeld sent me today’s front page. He writes:
Pictures of some English fans after their team’s 4-1 defeat against Germany.
The headline [reversed out of black, at the very top]: Defeated and dismayed
The lead story is, sadly, about Australian tourists who were victims of an armed robbery at a lodge nearby Hazyview in Mpumalanga. According to the victims the robbers were “quite polite” — “Are you enjoying the World Cup?” they enquired before making off with cash, celphones, cameras and laptops.
In addition, Arlene Prinsloo sent along this page from the Sunday national paper Rapport:
She writes:
The story about which countries’ visitors spent the most money in South Africa during the first 10 days of the cup.
The graphic itself is by Anton Vermeulen.
The English took the loss in stride, I thought after finding this page — but pretty much only this page — this morning at the Newseum:
That’s the Times of London, with a gorgeous display of, unfortunately, an uncredited photo. And the headline says it all.
And that’s the only English front page I could find today. Until Simone Puterman tipped me off that a number of others were posted by the Guardian.
Oh, yeah. Now, we’re talkin’…
The Independent was so typically English — snarky but understated with its disappointment:
Brilliant.
Metro was even more straightforward:
The Daily Mail was downright brutal. And, perhaps, rightfully so:
The Daily Mirror went with a giant pun, for comedic effect:
But the most incredibly brutal of the batch was the Sun:
Ouch!
The tone by most German papers was one of understated elegance. Here’s Allegemeine Zeitung of Frankfurt, with lead art by Getty:
Neuest Nachrichten of Potsdam partially cut out an AFP photo for a little visual pop atop A1:
And Berlin’s Bild — you gotta love ‘em — were all over the place today with headlines, cutouts and, really, more than the human eye can take in:
It’s just now occurred to me, in fact, that Bild has replaced the “i” in its nameplate with the actual World Cup trophy. Very cute.
Many, many Mexican papers put the Cup out of A1 today — more than I could possibly post here.
Monterrey’s Milenio used a photo that most Mexican papers used, by Yuri Cortez of AFP:
Mérida’s Diario de Yucatán went with the poor officiating angle. The headline says:
Stained Day
Referee errors overshadow the World Cup
And one can hardly blame them. There were some hum-dingers Monday.
That photo is from EFE.
Correo of Guanajuato led with the huge banner headline:
Thus, no
I loved this nice, tight crop of a photo by Ángel Guevera on the front of today’s Reforma of Mexico City:
And El Universal of Mexico City also summed it all up with a great headline:
The same old story
Wonderful, wonderful presentation by El Universal. The photo of the dejected — but still proud — fan is by Matt Dunham of the Associated Press.
In Argentina, of course, papers were delirious with excitement. Here is el Territorio of Posadas, using an AP photo on the front:
The headline translates into:
The illusion grows
But I wonder if a better translation might be “The legend grows.” Perhaps one of my Spanish-speaking friends might advise.
I like the page, all except for the bug superimposed at the upper left of the picture. That seems obtrusive. I’d crop out a few picas at the top and bottom and but the scores down below the headline, with the chatter copy.
Clarín of Buenos Aires celebrated with a nice shot by freelance photographer Carlos Sarraf and what Google Translate tells me is the same headline Territorio used:
And Misiones of Posadas ran the obligatory photo of former soccer superstar — and now a coaching superstar — Diego Maradona:
Nice structured design and a lot of action — and emotion — in the photo. Nicely done.
And a number of Brazilian papers — where they’re just nuts about their team and the World Cup — created huge A1 presentations in advance for today’s match with Chile.
Here is Jornal da Tarde, of São Paulo, with the Mexico-Argentina game up top and the advance in the lower left:
The photos are all from EFE and AE.
I’m not quite sure what’s going on with this poster front by Lance of both São Paulo and Rio:
Is that sawdust? Perhaps this is some sort of soccer tradition in Brazil.
The headline translates into:
Magic
Green and amarela
…in which the last word obviously didn’t translate, dammit. So that’s no help.
The picture is by Ari Ferreira.
Estado de Minas of Belo Horizonte made a nice poster front out this illustrative shot — unfortunately, I can’t make out the credit — of a fan carrying a Brazilian flag and a vuvuzela.
“Vencer” translates into “beat,” but none of the other words translated for me. I’m having awful luck today with Google.
And our finalé today is this wonderful A1 illustration by a Notícia of Joinville:
That’s wonderful stuff by artists Marcelo Oliveira, using photos by Charles Guerra.
Most of the pages here today are from the Newseum. Read more about those London-based pages in the Guardian.
