So Algeria vs Germany and US vs Belgium.
the soccer hater who really is not following the WC chimes in......brilliant!
anyways, Germany automatic pass to quarters where they likely face France in a tough game....if they make it through that they face most probably Brazil in Brazil although watch out for Colombia......Germany-Brazil would be a killer of a game.... Germany certainly did not look like worldbeaters today....
on the other side of the draw, the easier one, the US has a decent chance against Belgium and then would play the winner of Argentina/Switzerland and while Argentina is probably favored over the Swiss they haven't exactly set the world on fire in the weakest group in the cup... on the top half of that side of the draw you have to like the dutch but they are always very hard to measure; they have a real tendency to self destruct and Mexico will play with knives in their mouths.....
unfortunately penalty shootouts will probably very much come into play as pressure intensifies and teams and their players tighten up and take less and less chances...so it all could become more random than people think although generally i've observed that the team that deserves to move forward tends to handle the shootouts better.....a classic example is Germany-Argentina 2006...when Germany came back to tie it it was clear Argentinna was so deflated they would lose the shootout and they did....