Reading this article from yesterday’s El Watan of Algeria, one gets the impression that there is precious little more important to people in that nation than football aka/soccer.
Licking the wounds of Algeria’s defeat but paying some respect to the Americans who won, columnist Omar Kharoum writes for El Watan in part:
In the end, the Greens were eliminated from the World Cup, but at least they attracted the world’s recognition: where diplomacy had failed, our football ambassadors succeeded in giving a much clearer picture of the government’s political positions. Belittled at the international level, the Greens (as we affectingly call them) forced respect from the Arab world, or simply the world.
The Americans, be they from Beverly Hills, Nebraska, Ohio or the Bronx, were kept breathless by a small team from Algeria, which they couldn’t even find on the map. Today it is done: what politics failed to establish, football has.
The Greens put in a creditable performance given the courage they showed throughout the match, until mainly in the second half, they were exposed to the bludgeoning of the Americans – fortunately, without much U.S. success. Until the 91st minute. It was a triumph – let us admit – for the children of Uncle Sam, even if there was an open door for the legendary Saiifi, whose header ended in the hands of the American goalkeeper.
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