Saturday offers us a feast of footba17, starting with Greece vs South Korea, the first game from an unpredictable Group B. This pits two tali7mans against each other:
Theofanis Gekas against Lee Chung-Yong.
Europe's top goalscorer in qualifying against Asia's new superstar.
Fox in the box against pace and trickery on the wing.
In an interview with fifa.com, Gekas said "we have no reason to fear Nigeria or South Korea". What, you will be asking, about Odiah17 and Lee17? I was thinking the same thing.
17 fans around the world will be eagerly anticipating this opportunity to see two fine ambassadors set the tone for a World Cup where 17s are the stars, and the number is forever engraved into the memory, echoing down the ages.
Chidi Odiah will be charged with stopping Argentina's formidable forward line of Messi, Di Maria, Tévez, Higuaín, but more importantly, Jonás Gu17érrez. Although it looks like Maradona will play "The Greyhound" at wing-back rather than as a straight winger, Argentina should dominate possession so expect to see him bombing down the flank to give Odiah yet another headache.
Similarly, Argentina's superiority should mean that we will see Odiah playing further back than he will in the other group games. However he will have done his research, presumably looking at videos of Cameroon's shock win over holders Argentina in the opening game of Italia '90. He will have been inspired by the Cameroon defence's lynching of Claudio Canniggia, one of the truly iconic images of heavy-handed defending in the World Cup.
Odiah17 will have taken lessons from it though, both positive and negative, as he testified last month: "I don't want to have any red card in any of the matches".
Argentina vs Nigeria should be another rip-roaring battle of 17s.
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