Stickers: World Cup Day 15

Via paninincheapskates but ed
ited

     The last round of group games before the knock out stages.  Today I get both halves of the Sao Paolo stadium where Belgium play South Korea and half of the Brasilia stadium which hosts Portugal v Ghana.  And the predictions for today are Germany 5 USA 3, Portugal 2 Ghana 2, South Korea 0 Belgium 0 and Russia 0 Algeria 3.
     The bookies seem convinced that Germany v USA will be a 0-0 stitch up as I cannot get a price on my predicted eight goal thriller.  Rain was close to being the big winner.  Germany scored the only goal of the game, but it failed to involve any of the eight stickers - well, I suppose it went past USA keeper Tim Howard.  Of the Germans, Mats Hummels and Toni Kroos start, Mario Gotze comes on as sub, Sami Khedira remained on the bench and Marcel Schmeltzer did not even make the squad.  The other Americans were Matt Besler and DaMarcus Beasley who both play, Mr Beasley causing some problems for the German defence by running at them.
      Ghana let me down by not getting a second, thus losing 2-1.  Portugal's Bruno Alves starts, Ghana's Jordan Ayew comes on as a sub, Daniel Opare doesn't, likewise Fabio Coentrao, made with oranges ripened in the sun, but who's injured.  The first goal is an own goal by John Boye and BBC's commentator makes the "G'night John Boye" joke. Copycat.
      There's not much likelihood of being able to write much when I don't get any stickers of either side.  However it does mean that for at least part of the game I will have the right score. In this case, for 77 minutes until Belgium's Jan Vertonghen scores the only goal of the game.
      Now that England have gone out, English fans have to take their pleasures where they find them and watching Fabio Capello's Russia draw 1-1 with Algeria and be eliminated by the North Africans is one of them.  Algeria's Essaid Belkalem is in their team, Saphir Taider fails to get on and once again I get the non-selected Adlene Guedioura.
      At the end of the group stages the betting running total is -£21.83 and I still need 166 stickers with 310 left to be revealed, hence I would need to get 53.5% new stickers to complete the set or 37.4% (over one in three) to be able to order them; both rather tall orders, I think. 
     Now it's time for the roll call of teams that have a worse record than England at this World Cup:
          Cameroon - no points, one goal scored
          Honduras - no points, one goal scored
          Australia - no points
          Japan - one point, conceded six goals
          South Korea - one point, conceded four goals
          Iran - one point, one goal