Well, we've got a World Cup.

The opening goal by Siphiwe Tshabalala (a spelling minefield right up there with Eyjafjallajokull) was brilliant, uplifting, and although Mexico snaffled an equaliser they probably deserved, it gave South Africa genuine hope of progress in the tournament.

Tshabalala culminated a superb counter-attack by lashing a left-foot shot into the top-fight corner, then celebrated with a convoluted Macarena-style dance that was just a little too rehearsed to be truly enjoyable.

If you were picking nits, you might say there is something deeply patronising about the way

Steel yourself for the unique brand of agony that is England at the World Cup, as Fabio Capello's men take on the USA on day two.

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Friday's action

Opening ceremony
An hour or so of regulation dancing, children singing an R Kelly. The show was comprehensively stolen by a giant dung beetle, who came on and managed to dribble a Jabulani ball without it flying inexpicably into the crowd. Regrettably, the beetle did not get to take a penalty like Diana Ross in 1994.

South Africa 1-1 Mexico
Despite the outrageous noise created by 94,000 vuvuzelas, it seemed the occasion and Mexico would

Sunday's action

Algeria 0-1 Slovenia - Group C - Polokwane

The Balkan nation claimed their first World Cup win and went top of Group C after Robert Koren's late shot somehow evaded goalkeeper Faouzi Chaouchi and found the right corner. While not on a par with Robert Green's howler, it was a bad mistake by Chaouchi. Algeria blamed the Jabulani ball (Lionel Messi has also now spoken against it) but the replay showed no major movement in the air.

Serbia 0-1 Ghana - Group D - Pretoria

A stodgy game eventually went Ghana's way after Serbia pushed the self-destruct button in the second half.

The Germans
are looking confident, ominous and dangerous, which means one thing - it feels
like a World Cup at last.

It was all
starting to go badly wrong after an enjoyable opening game. The first seven
games produced just nine goals, a pathetic rate of 1.27 per game with no match
yielding more than two.

From those
games, the only goals that could really be described as good were Siphiwe Tshabalala's
for South Africa and Steven Gerrard's for England.

In fact,
two third of the nine involved some sort of howler - goalkeeping errors by
Robert Green and Faouzi Chaouchi for the USA and Slovenia