NoTime Off for Public Servants During World Cup
“The Presidency wants to place it on record that Deputy President Motlanthe has never made such an undertaking, nor was such an issue ever discussed with him,” it said in a statement.
The Presidency said it was taken aback by the report adding that such matters are not within the purview of The Presidency, as they are covered by the Department of Public Service and Administration (DPSA) which regulates labour relations within the public service.
The DPSA, which deals with, amongst other things, policies on employee absenteeism and leave, has issued a circular titled ‘2010 World Cup Soccer Guidelines on the Management of Working time, Leave of Absence and Remunerative work outside Public Service Employment’.
World Cup Fan Guide 101
It’s got something about everything that fans, especially tourists, will need to know, including the meaning of words like “jol” (South African lingo for “party”) – in one place.
It aims to help tourists get around the country with ease and provides advice on what to do when you are not watching football.
Tourists can keep the guide with them, even when travelling or going to the stadiums to watch matches, and refer to it for contact details or information.
Here’s what you can expect to find in the guide at a quick glance:
Weather:
Those who are already packing their bags should know that South Africa has a moderate climate, with warm summers. The football spectacle will be held in full winter. Along the coast, the winters can be cold and wet but, in the interior, it’s dry.
It can get very cold at night, especially in the interior, so visitors should remember to wrap up warmly if they are planning to attend any night matches.
Language:
Tourists need to be familiar with English. Although South Africa has 11 official languages, they can expect to find people who speak and understand it everywhere they go. It is the language of the cities, of commerce and banking, of government, of road signs and official documents.
Banking:
South Africa boasts a world-class, sophisticated financial sector and is abreast of all the latest technological trends. From the moment fans step off the plane they will see banks, bureau de change and automatic teller machines (ATMs).
Foreign banks are well represented, and visitors can bank by ATM or Internet. Visa is the preferred card of the World Cup and the only card they can use in match venues. All Visa debit, credit and prepaid products are accepted throughout the country.
During the World Cup only Visa-branded credit, debit, and pre-paid cards along with cash, in all stadiums will be accepted to pay for food and beverages, retail goods, and services while attending the event.
For the convenience of all fans, there will be Visa kiosks in all FIFA stadiums to purchase Visa prepaid cards.
Visa cardholders are reminded to contact their issuing banks before leaving for South Africa to alert them of their travel plans and purchases in another country and they should also ask about daily withdrawal limits and ATM fees.
Food:
The food in the country is as diverse as the people who prepare it. Of course there is the traditional braai (barbeque) which is common to all South Africans, but tourists can sample everything from indigenous African cuisine all the way to Michelin Star European cuisine or if they prefer McDonalds.
In major centres, like Johannesburg and Cape Town, tourists will be spoilt for choice when it comes to dining out.
Entertainment and shopping:
Those who will not be at the stadiums, can enjoy the ambience at the FIFA Fan Fest by watching all live matches free on world-class giant screens in a safe and secure environment.
On match days, live music and entertainment will keep fans on their feet between matches. 2010 FIFA World Cup merchandise can also be bought at the official Shop at each FIFA Fan Fest venue. Visitors will be spoiled for choice with various types of entertainment and shopping.
Transport:
Getting around South Africa during the 2010 FIFA World Cup can be a very simple exercise if tourists plan in advance and take advantage of the various modes of transport that are available.
There will be frequent flight connections between host cities, with typically two or more departures per hour between the major cities Johannesburg, Cape Town and Durban.
Health:
International visitors can rest assured that they will be in good hands if any medical problems arise while in the country. The country has an organised emergency response system. This includes fully equipped first-aid stations at match and training venues, fan parks and around the different cities.
The complete Fan Guide is one of its kind and has more information than a typical travel search engine. At the same time it enables visitors to book hotels, flights, cars and packages online.
FIFA World Cup History (Part II: 1990 – 2006)
The first part of this USA World Cup history covered 1930 to 1950, including the third place finish in 1930 and that famous win over England in 1950. But it would be 40 long years before the USA qualified for another World Cup. They made it to Italia ‘90 partly thanks to Mexico being disqualified (for fielding overage players in Olympic qualifying) but very much thanks to this goal from Paul Caliguiri vs Trinidad & Tobago:
1990 World Cup in Italy
So the USA were back in the World Cup. However, this was the period between the death of the North America Soccer League and the birth of Major League Soccer, a period detailed very nicely by Benjamin Kumming on Pitch Invasion. Most of Bob Gansler’s squad was made up of recent college graduates and players from the America Soccer League, which wasn’t granted Division One status by FIFA.
Drawn into Group A, the USA lost 5-1 to Czechoslovakia in the opening game:
(Decent goal from Caligiuri though)
Gansler’s men went on to lose 1-0 to Italy and 2-1 to Austria. Not a complete disaster (if you ignore the first game) but the US finished bottom of the group with zero points. The upside is that several future USA World Cup stalwarts got valuable experience in Italy, including 23 year old John Harkes and Tab Ramos, 22 year old Marcelo Balboa, 21 year old Tony Meola, and the 20 year old pair of Kasey Keller and Eric Wynalda.
1994 World Cup in USA
Serbian coach Bora Milutinović had been drafted in to deliver a respectable performance. Very much the Guus Hiddink of his day, Milutinović had already coached Mexico at the 1986 World Cup and Costa Rica at the 1990 World Cup.
The US opened strongly, with a 1-1 draw against Roy Hodgson’s Switzerland, the goal coming from an impressive Eric Wynalda free kick:
Did I say “impressive”? Clearly I should have said “masterpiece”. Still, good free-kick, good result.
The US went on to win the second game 2-1 against Colombia, who many fancied as potential tournament winners. That game is now best remembered for Andres Escobar’s own goal, and subsequent murder (read the full article: Andrés Escobar’s Own Goal vs USA) but at the time it was a huge huge victory for the USA, with Earnie Stewart scoring the second, and ultimately decisive goal. The USA lost the final group game 1-0 to Romania and finished third in Group A, going through to the Second Round as one of the four best third placed teams. The opponents in the last 16 were Brazil.
Wearing their much less hideous away kit, the US gave Brazil a decent game before losing 1-0 to the eventual champions through a 72nd minute Bebeto goal. The one complaint some US fans have is that their team had a one man advantage from the 43rd minute onwards (after Leonardo was sent off for street-fight style elbowing of Tab Ramos, which you can see in the video above) but failed to take advantage. Still, an excellent performance all around, and a gigantic improvement on 1990 (which itself was a gigantic improvement on the 40 previous years of non-qualification). The other long term effect was that players like Claudio Reyna and Alexi Lalas impressed enough to earn moves to Europe with Bayern Leverkusen in Germany and Padova in Italy respectively. The future looked bright. But then came…
1998 World Cup in France
It was supposed to be the World Cup where the US continued the progress of the last two tournaments, especially now Major League Soccer was up and running. Instead it was the World Cup where the USA finished 32nd out of 32 teams after losing 2-0 to Germany, 2-1 to Iran in a politically charged game and finally 1-0 to Yugoslavia. Brian McBride scored the US’s sole goal of the tournament in the 87th minute of the game against Iran. But it wasn’t the cleanest thing you’ve ever seen:
Coach Steve Sampson took most of the blame for the USA’s terrible terrible showing in France. One of the problems was the radical 3-6-1 formation, a formation which left no room for cult hero Alexi Lalas (who didn’t take the news too well at all).
It seemed an insane decision to leave Harkes out at the time. However, early in 2010 Eric Wynalda alleged that Harkes had had an affair with his Wynalda’s wife in the run up to 1998, and that this was the reason Harkes was dropped.
So maybe Steve Sampson’s not as culpable as thought at the time. But 1998 was still a disaster.
2002 World Cup in Japan & South Korea
After dominating MLS with his DC United team, Bruce Arena replaced Steve Sampson as USA coach after 1998. He’d go on to lead the USA to its best World Cup performance of the modern era.
Not much was expected of the US after their 1998 performance, especially after being drawn into a tough looking Group D with Portugal, Poland and South Korea. But all that changed when they beat Portugal 3-2 in the first game.
Arena’s men raced into a 3-0 lead with goals from John O’Brien, a Portugal own goal forced by a 20 year old Landon Donovan, and a diving header from Brian McBride. Portugal came back, and that 71st minute comedy own goal from Jeff Agoos made things nervy, but the US held on for a shock win.
Clint Mathis and his mohawk scored early in the second game, against South Korea, but the co-hosts came back to draw 1-1. The US lost the final game 3-1 to Poland, but went through in second place because Portugal had lost to South Korea. There should be a spot reserved in the US Soccer Hall of Fame for Park Ji-Sung, who scored that Korean goal.
In the Round of 16, the US faced CONCACAF rivals Mexico. If you know anything about this rivalry, then you’ll know it basically means everything.
Brian McBride and Landon Donovan scored the goals as the USA beat their rivals 2-0 to move on to the quarter-finals. As I understand it, that game was something of a turning point in the history of the USA vs Mexico rivalry. An important victory on the world’s biggest stage that did wonders for US confidence both in CONCACAF and in the wider world of football.
Quarter-final opponents were Germany, who were kept in the game by Oliver Kahn’s performance, took the lead through a Michael Ballack header, and somehow got away with Torsten Fring’s handballing on the line.
Commendable effort by the US, and some definite bad luck with the Frings handball, but it finished Germany 1-0 USA. Still, a quarter-final appearance was the best US performance since 1930, and the emergence of young talents like 20 year olds Landon Donovan, DaMarcus Beasley, plus the performances of Claudio Reyna, John O’Brien, Clint Mathis and Eddie Pope, seemed to confirm that the USA was rapidly improving and 1998 was just a blip.
2006 World Cup in Germany
Bruce Arena was still in charge, and the youngsters from 2002 like Donovan and Beasley were now four years older (and balder). So the USA went into the 2006 World Cup with high expectations. Maybe unrealistically high. They’d been drawn into a rough looking Group E with Czech Republic, Italy and Ghana. But the bigger problem, at least in my opinion, was that Arena had too much faith in the same players that had performed for him four years previously. For example, DaMarcus Beasley was hopelessly out of form, and 32 year old captain Claudio Reyna was clearly no longer physically capable of competing at a World Cup, while in-form but less experienced players like Clint Dempsey started the tournament on the bench.
The Czech Republic demolished the US 3-0 in the first game, with Tomas Rosicky scoring a memorable long range goal. That meant a result against Italy in the second game was crucial.
In an absolute battle of a game, the US went one down, but equalized through an Italian own goal, before the game went mental with three red cards. A 1-1 draw against the eventual champs was a very very good result, but it left the US needing a win against Ghana and a bit of luck. Instead they got a Claudio Reyna mistake for Ghana’s first goal, a thumping Clint Dempsey equalizer, and then a mysterious penalty called against Oguchi Onyewu to give Ghana a 2-1 win.
Despite the misfortune the US didn’t deserve to progress, and exited World Cup 2006 bottom of Group E with just one point.
World Cup Football 2010-Schedule & Venus
The 2010 FIFA World Cup will be the 19th FIFA World Cup, the premier international football tournament. It is scheduled to take place between 11 June and 11 July 2010 in
We announce the release of 2010 World Cup Final Tournament Schedule, a free Excel spreadsheet with a schedule of all tournament games. It automatically calculates the position of each football team according to game scores and FIFA rules and generates the schedule, thus enabling the football fans to keep track of the tournament.
Now that a great football event is approaching, an accurate schedule is what the fans need. The principle of operation is the following: the user enters the results of the games into the corresponding fields, 2010 World Cup Final Tournament Schedule indicates the winner and changes the position of each team. The algorithm is able to manage cases of equal score, so that teams are always sorted correctly and fully automatically, without manual sorting (unlike in other similar calendars).
The layout of the spreadsheet is designed to be clear and convenient, so that the current situation would be obvious. Being an Excel project, 2010 World Cup Final Tournament Schedule does not use macros.
Football fans will definitely appreciate that 2010 World Cup Final Tournament Schedule allows calculating the game outcome, which would bring their favorite team to the next round. It is also possible to make predictions on the basis of 2010 World Cup Final. Fans from all over the world can use it due to multilingual interface and support of different time zones.
The calendar supports 42 languages and different time zones.
2010 World Cup Final Tournament Schedule is available:
Schedule in Excel----------------------------------------------------------
World Cup Venus by Map:
