The blog’s suspension for much of yesterday was the result of yet another desperately stupid attempt by Olin Coles, brainless and cowardly owner of the discredited “review” site Benchmark Reviews, to suppress the evidence of his site’s dishonest practices.

At around 4pm I went to check the progress of the site’s rocketing hit counter, which had been spiking skywards ever since the story was passingly mentioned in a footnote to a piece on Reghardware.com. Seeing only the “Suspended” screen, I hurried to my email account and found the following:

Hi Stuart,

We have suspended your account for copyright infringement.
Please find the complaint below:
================================

This is a Digital Millennium Copyright Act compliance complaint.

This message is to inform you that the website podgamer.com located at xx.xxx.xx.xxx has infringed upon the copyright of Performance Computers, Inc, a registered corporation located in Nevada, USA. Several images and
copyrighted text has been taken from our original story located at:
http://benchmarkreviews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=562&Itemid=58> &task=view&id=562&Itemid=58.

Domain: podgamer.com

Website IP: xx.xxx.xx.xxx

Page containing copyrighted text:
http://wosblog.podgamer.com/2010/07/21/benchmark-reviews-busted-more-like/

Copyrighted image:
http://wosblog.podgamer.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/benchmark.jpg

Copyrighted image:
http://wosblog.podgamer.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/hermanp6-450×235.jpg

We respectfully request that you take immediate action to remove all
copyrighted material from the website podgamer.com. Your prompt response
will mitigate potential legal costs and prosecution under the Digital
Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) of 1996.

Thank you for your cooperation.
<Digitally signed>
Olin Coles
President, Designated Agent
olin@benchmarkreviews.com
Performance Computers, Inc.
BenchmarkReviews.com
==========================

Thank you.

–
Kind regards,
Naomi Michell
Just Host
www.justhost.com

You’ve got to admire the friendly “Hi Stuart”, haven’t you? Despite it, JustHost had locked down the entire site without so much as a warning about the alleged infringing material – which is, of course, not infringing at all, as the use of small extracts for the purposes of news reporting is covered by “fair use” under the DMCA.

I immediately sent off an email, and also phoned the “24/7 live support”, to whom my call was very important – so important, in fact, that they answered it in barely over 20 minutes. Taking care not to leave them in any doubt as to the extent of my dissatisfaction, I explained the situation briefly, and was promised that someone would get back to me within no more than two hours.

In the meantime I informed the WoS Forum of developments, whereupon alert viewer “djc” – to whom I’m indebted – provided some very useful information with regard to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, under which Coles had had the site taken down.

Armed with this information, I was able to send off another email to JustHost, in the form of a “DMCA counter-notice”, a legal procedure which if done correctly compels JustHost to “expeditiously” put the site back up, while protecting them from liability should Olin Coles be so epically stupid as to try to bring an actual lawsuit in respect of the alleged copyright infringement.

(And hey, judging by his idiot antics so far, you couldn’t rule it out.)

Two hours later, I rang JustHost again (21 minutes on hold this time) and spoke to a lady who went off for another few minutes and then came back to tell me the site had been restored, which it had. Hurrah!

I was about halfway through writing this post in celebration when the screen suddenly went very strange, and I could see the “Suspended” screen in the background again. I quickly saved the text and went back to the homepage, and sure enough we were locked down again. Hngh.

Back to the phone, and this time it took 35 minutes for my “very important” call to get through to Customer Support. After a few minutes speaking to someone clearly very far away (I could hear a faint echo of my voice coming back a couple of seconds after I’d spoken) and whose accent I could barely make out, I was told that phone support had basically no power to do anything and I’d have to wait for the “senior technicians” to sort things out and get back to me by email.

However, they did advise me that there was an online live support, which I’d missed before due to it being stuck in the bottom corner of the JustHost homepage, so I got onto that and was connected within a minute or so.

I went through my new-found expert knowledge of the DMCA, and without ever really explaining anything, the online support promised the site would be online again within 30 minutes. An hour later it still wasn’t, so I went back to ask, except now the Live Chat window just came up with a blank white page in every browser I tried.

A friend confirmed that it worked fine for them, so I got them to log in and pretend to be me. (Could they really have been blocking my IP for live support chat? It looks like it.) We went through a crazy pantomime via MSN, after which I was eventually told (through my friend) that I’d hear from the billing department – why the billing department? – “In next few hours” (it was already 10pm by then).

And then, astoundingly, this happened:

Darren: Is there anything else I can help you with? [The use of the word 'else' was amusing at least.]

Darren: sorry only they will be able to update regarding this issue

Darren: We are pleased to bring to your attention the following offer.

Darren: Let us take away any worries of accidental deletion or modification of your website or files by backing up your site on a daily basis. If you ever need a previous days backup, just let us know and we will happily restore or upload backups for you – $19.95 per year.

Darren: Thank you for visiting Hosting Support. Should you have any queries or require any further information, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Darren: Have a nice day!! Good Bye.

Chat session has been terminated by the site operator.

That’s right, viewers – “Darren” fed me another load of guff, tried to flog me a backup service for my suspended blog (a veiled blackmail threat, maybe?), and then hung up on me. This was rapidly turning into the wackiest day ever.

I was about to give up for the evening when, unexpectedly, an email arrived.

“Hi Stuart

Thanks for your email

Please remove the following image and we will agree to unsuspend unless further allegations are made against us.

http://wosblog.podgamer.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/benchmark.jpg

http://wosblog.podgamer.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/hermanp6-450×235.jpg

and any copy and pasted text:

http://wosblog.podgamer.com/2010/07/21/benchmark-reviews-busted-more-like/

Please let me know if you require any further assistance.

Kind Regards

Nick
–
Nickolas Pearce-Evered
Billing Supervisor
www.Justhost.com“

I emailed straight back, inquiring as to how I was supposed to do anything while my account was suspended and locked, the fucking idiots. (I’d checked, and still had no FTP access.) A few minutes later another email arrived, saying the site had been restored, but if the listed items hadn’t been removed within 24 hours it’d be suspended again. Then things got REALLY zany.

While pointing out that JustHost was legally REQUIRED to restore the content once I’d filed the DMCA counter-notice, I agreed to remove the listed items in the meantime to get the site back online. I was in the process of doing so when once again the site was locked up, this time with a 403 Forbidden error. Another email from JustHost revealed why:

“Hi Stuart,

Your account was opened for your IP address only.
Please remove the mentioned content as soon as possible.

Thank you.
__
Kind regards,
Oliver Leach,
Just Host
www.justhost.com“

(Two colleagues had been retrieving files via FTP for backup purposes once access was restored, nobody having said this was not allowed.)

Eventually, in the small hours of the morning, access was restored and the items in question have been temporarily removed pending someone at JustHost who knows their arse from their elbow looking into the matter. Hopefully the site should be publicly viewable within an hour or two.

In the meantime, Olin Coles has been haring around the web trying desperately to suppress the entire internet. He’s contacted Zetaboards to have two images removed from the WoS Forum. (Luckily, because Zetaboards AREN’T complete dicks they merely removed the images rather than shutting down the entire site, and even helpfully provided a link by which to file a DMCA counter-notice should we wish to get them back.)

He’s also raised some kind of complaint with WordPress about the old WoSblog on wp.com – the backup versions of all the Benchmark Reviews posts are all still there, but I can’t currently make any new posts. And for all I know he’s sticking pins in a voodoo doll and doing special dances in the nude in his back garden with his face smeared with mud as well.

Stay tuned for the latest exciting developments!

Since then, further developments have transpired. Read on!

The first is that Benchmark Reviews has gone through the text and hastily edited it in several areas to insert qualifiers and disclaimers. For example, on page 4 there’s a passage which on our saved copy of the page from a couple of days ago said this:

“Designed by Bill Stumpf (who pioneered the Aeron Chair) and Jeff Weber, the Herman Miller Embody chair goes a step beyond being merely “heath-neutral”. Over time, it can actually improve the health of the person sitting in it.  Scientific studies have shown that Embody users can experience better circulation, reduced resting heart rates, and less tissue damage around the sitting muscles. Embody promotes natural alignment in the spine, relieving stress across the entire back no matter how you twist and turn. “

Now, however, with no acknowledgement of having been altered, it reads like this (emphasis on changed sections added by WoSblog):

“The Herman Miller Embody Chair was designed by Bill Stumpf (Aeron Chair) and Jeff Weber, who developed the Embody chair to go a step beyond being merely “heath-neutral”. According to Herman Miller, over time the Embody chair can actually improve the health of the person sitting in it. There have been several scientific studies (cited below) to have shown that Embody users can experience better circulation, reduced resting heart rates, and less tissue damage around the sitting muscles. Embody is intended to promote natural alignment in the spine, and relieve stress across the entire back.”

Things which were previously stated as facts coming straight from the personal experience of the reviewer are now merely quotes of Herman Miller’s design aims. The bottom of the page now does indeed provide links to all of the scientific studies praising the chair’s health-enhancing qualities, which by an astonishing coincidence were all undertaken by the dedicated scientists at… Herman Miller. Wow! Who saw THAT one coming, eh?

(Other parts of the “review” have had similar hurried makeovers, and you can compare the results for yourself against the original version by downloading the retrieved original files from this link.)

Quite where this leaves Olin Coles’ angry insistence in the comments thread that “99.9% of the article is a fully independent review of a self-purchased product” is a tricky one to fathom. Clearly, changing those parts would seem to be an unacknowledged admission that they were not impartial, and were in fact stating Herman Miller PR claims as being the opinion of the reviewer. Why, after all, would an independent reviewer make up unsupported and unqualified claims on a company’s behalf in the first place?

So that’s one interesting thing. The even better one, though, is that the current version of the “review” has a whole different bunch of advertisements inlaid on all the pages to the ones that were there when the page came to WoSblog’s attention. And the site they’re advertising is another big surprise.

Because at the time of writing, every inlaid ad across the eight pages of Benchmark Reviews’ fully independent review is a link enabling readers to go and buy the chair in question from… Smart Furniture.

Now that’s properly intriguing. Because it pretty much obliterates any idea that anyone was copying anyone else’s text without their permission, and instead provides what you’d have to call fairly comprehensive proof that independent review site Benchmark Reviews and expensive-chair retailer Smart Furniture are working directly together to flog you these $1200 high-tech bum-rests.

But how, exactly? There are three possible explanations:

1. Benchmark Reviews and Smart Furniture have both simply reprinted a Herman Miller press-release with minor editing. This, of course, would mean that they were both lying about having written the text themselves, and that Benchmark Reviews was explicitly lying to its readers about the review being independent.

2. Smart Furniture did – as they’ve claimed – write the blurb themselves. Benchmark Reviews must logically then have agreed to print it in the guise of a review (presumably in return for payment) and link that review back to Smart Furniture. That would mean that Benchmark Reviews were shilling their readers by recommending a $1200 chair under the pretence that they’d written an honest review of it.

3. Benchmark Reviews wrote a genuine review themselves, and licenced it to Smart Furniture for use on their retail site. That fails to make sense on several levels, however. Firstly, why (as noted above) would a genuine review feature a load of statements that turned out to be Herman Miller PR claims in need of subsequent alteration? Secondly, why would Smart Furniture present a genuine review as merely part of the chair’s specification blurb? Obviously if they published it saying “Look how great this independent review says the chair is!”, that would carry a lot more weight as an inducement for people to buy the chair.

We will, of course, continue with our efforts to get to the bottom of this fascinating mystery. Stay tuned!

We were a little curious about this, bearing in mind site owner Olin Coles’ strident assertion that, apart from the belatedly-acknowledged passages copied from Herman Miller’s press release, “the remaining 99.9% of the article is a fully independent review of a self-purchased product.”

(Actually it’s the remaining 93.6%, but let’s not quibble.)

So inestimable Friend Of WoSblog John X dropped Smart Furniture a line.

“Hello. I am trying to find the source material for your information for the Embody Chair [link]. I presume it is based on a press release, and was hoping to get hold of the original document. Many thanks, John X.”

A few hours later, Smart Furniture replied:

“Hello John,

Thank you for your interest in Smart Furniture and the copy on our Embody page! We did a great job, we agree. All the content was developed in house and there is no document to share. Best of luck to you.

Regards, Melanie

Melanie Silva | Designer | Smart Furniture
430 Market Street | Chattanooga, TN | 37402″

Let’s just read that again. “All the content was developed in house and there is no document to share”. In other words, one of two things has happened:

1. Smart Furniture has just told us a big fat lie. That seems doubtful, since they’re a retailer making no pretence at anything other than trying to tell us stuff, so they’d have no reason to be ashamed of just printing the press release. (And it doesn’t seem very likely that they’d have swiped the copy from Benchmark Reviews, since they do create extensive amounts of “editorial” content for themselves, for example here.)

2. Benchmark Reviews has just lifted Smart Furniture’s copy and claimed it as their own. (Of course, if Smart Furniture IS lying and it IS a press release, that still means Benchmark Reviews has just printed a press release and called it “a fully independent review of a self-purchased product”. In other words, they’re lying either way.)

Option 2 is plainly very much the more plausible of the two. EXCEPT! It surely can’t be right, because Benchmark Reviews HATES the idea of copyright infringement. Conveniently, we know this because barely a week ago Benchmark Reviews threw a bit of a legal hissy fit at Guru3d.com for allegedly copying images belonging to Benchmark Reviews without permission.

What could possibly be going on? How could a company that’s so clearly committed to the concept of intellectual property accidentally “borrow” 4,000 words of someone else’s work and explicitly claim it as its own? What will happen next? WoSblog is on the case, viewers. Stay tuned!

“Like any writer, our work comes under fire from time to time. Most of the criticism is taken to heart and used to improve future work, but occasionally the critic can go overboard and begin making personal threats and accusations. This thread is intended to show our visitors that their accusations and threats do not remain anonymous.”

I had of course made no threats whatsoever, made an enquiry rather than an accusation, and had invited them to offer an explanation using my real name, not anonymously. Benchmark Reviews’ response to being caught red-handed printing press releases under the guise of a review, however, was to not only ban me from their site, but to publish my name, address, email address and phone number, implicitly inviting people to harass me or worse.

It’s hard to imagine a guiltier response, or a more cowardly one. I think we can safely assume  from this deranged outburst  of panic that we’ve caught Benchmark Reviews with their grubby little hands right in the cookie jar.

“I want to know if I’m going barmy”, wrote the clearly-distressed reader, whose cause for doubting his very sanity was – of all things – a review of an incredibly expensive office chair.

The viewer’s issue was that they felt the review read more like an advertisement, and from the opening lines alone it was difficult to disagree with their assertion. I’ll quote the first three paragraphs in full here, because strange things have been happening to the article since WoSblog started to investigate it, and the way things are going they might not be there by the time you come to read this feature:

“Is a chair’s purpose merely to furnish a place for us to sit? There are countless directions to discuss this subjective matter, but suffice it to say that a chair’s purpose goes beyond a solid foundation for resting our weight. In an ideal chair, the design would be suitable for hours of comfortable sitting. The chair would accommodate healthy posture, and relieve stress from load-bearing joints. Ideally, this chair would be attractive and feature a look as competent as its ability. There is such a chair.

Herman Miller is a company that engineers function and architects fashion. They’ve dominated the industry with decades of elite furniture, and influenced our perception of what a chair should be. Herman Miller’s Aeron chair, one of the few commercial products added into the Museum of Modern Art’s permanent collection, was introduced in 1994 and has set the bar immeasurably high for every chair that’s come thereafter. It seems fitting then, that Herman Miller, the name behind the world’s most admired chair, has returned to improve upon their prestige.

Welcome the Herman Miller Embody chair. Designed specifically for people who work for hours at their computer, Embody is the first work chair that benefits both mind and body. More than just a solution towards minimizing the negative effects of sitting, Herman Miller’s Embody chair was also designed to deliver positive effects on the body. In this article Benchmark Reviews takes you on a tour of the Herman Miller Embody ergonomic office chair, and demonstrates how much better sitting all day can feel. “

Originally, the “review” then followed this up with a paragraph of puff about what a super company Herman Miller was. You can see it in the picture below, retrieved from Google Cache (which is the source of all the coloured highlighting, a result of finding the cached page by searching for the text).

Note that the paragraph is presented in exactly the same text formatting as the rest of the review. This will become more interesting shortly.

The entire second page of the “review” read even more like it was lifted straight out of a press release, complete with bullet-point lists of features described in that weird, stilted way that nobody but PR people ever uses – “Creates harmony between people and computers”; “Enables and promotes healthful movement”; “Lets blood and oxygen flow more freely, enhancing ability to stay focused”.

There’s a very good reason for that, namely that it WAS lifted straight out of a press release. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

It transpired that the WoS Forum user (who we must, through gritted teeth, refer to as “VinylPusher”) had raised his concerns about the “review” in the comments section, and had his posts deleted. In an email to VinylPusher explaining this censorship, the Executive Editor of Benchmark Reviews – one Olin Coles – had given him the following explanation:

“Considering how many people visit our website, I’d like to ensure that my article has not led others into believing it’s an advertisement. The Embody chair was paid for out of my own pocket, with absolutely no sample/product coordination with the merchant. If you would please supply examples of how you perceive my eight-page article as an advertisement, it would be helpful.”

The WoS Forum, meanwhile – and particularly those members of it who are professional writers – was busy wholeheartedly agreeing with VinylPusher’s assessment of the “review”. For page after page, it spews out PR-speak that resembles a critical review about as much as Chris Moyles resembles Megan Fox. Page 4, for example, kicks off with the following assertion:

“Designed by Bill Stumpf (who pioneered the Aeron Chair) and Jeff Weber, the Herman Miller Embody chair goes a step beyond being merely “heath-neutral”. Over time, it can actually improve the health of the person sitting in it. Scientific studies have shown that Embody users can experience better circulation, reduced resting heart rates, and less tissue damage around the sitting muscles.”

Oddly, the “scientific studies” in question are neither named nor linked from the piece, leaving the reader none the wiser as to their methodology, impartiality or validity. The text continues “Through years of research and development, Bill Stumpf and Jeff Weber incorporated health-beneficial features such as the Pixelated Support System – a dynamic mesh of adjoining seat materials that has been proven to increase circulation and reduce strain on cell tissue”, but similarly neglects to identify the source of this “proof”.

It being almost impossible to read the review without arriving at the same conclusion as our poor troubled viewer had, I posted a couple of comments myself, politely requesting that in the interests of propriety, Benchmark Reviews really ought to identify the member of Herman Miller’s PR department who had clearly provided most of the text. These comments too were swiftly deleted. In the intervening time, however, another WoS Forums user, Ian Osborne, had located the smoking gun.

This Google search for one of the more glaringly obvious paragraphs of PR-speak turned up the source of the text – Herman Miller’s own brochure for the chair. (Which I’ve mirrored here, as their website is painfully slow.) One of my deleted comments was a link to the Google search, which was where things started to get really fun.

Having had my original comments deleted, I posted another one remarking very briefly on their deletion, using a disposable email account since what normally happens in these situations is that your original username and/or address get blocked. The post was unsurprisingly also deleted, but this time the disposable address got an emailed reply, from “Benchmark Reviews Administrator”.

I was rather hurt by the attack on my reading skills, especially as I was also pretty sure that there had been no such identification of the sources of the text, nor any way of distinguishing it from the rest of the copy. In fact, I knew there hadn’t, because I’d looked for it the first time.

So I went to look at the review again to check, and was surprised to find that it was no longer accessible. Or at least, no longer accessible to me. No matter which browser I tried the link in, I got an error message.

Asking some friends to confirm the problem, I discovered that they had no difficulties at all, which was odd. I then hooked up a laptop to a mobile broadband dongle and got into the site first time, while my normal connection still came up blank. The only reasonable conclusion was that my IP address had been blocked. It’s now the following day, and I still can’t get into any part of the Benchmark Reviews site with my normal PC, while everyone else I know can see it fine.

So I decided to follow Ian Osborne’s lead, and searched for some of the text via Google Cache. It first produced the copy of page 1 that’s pictured near the top of this feature, with the “About Herman Miller, Inc” paragraph in its original formatting. Google Cache described that version as “the page as it appeared on 14 Jul 2010 08:25:39 GMT”.

(The page now italicizes that paragraph, and appends the line “Company Summary Provided by Herman Miller.”)

The results for page 2 were more interesting. Google Cache’s header, however, noted that this was a version of the page created at 02:43:10 GMT on July 18, four days later than the page 1 cache. This time, the opening two paragraphs were italicized, but still lacked the “Source: Herman Miller” tag described in such hurt and angry tones by Olin Coles in his email. There was no other explanation for the italics, and no quote marks, which are the traditional way of depicting a quote.

(The version of the page that’s current at the time of writing has a slightly different prefix to the one claimed by Mr Coles, and does feature the “Source: Herman Miller” line, but the curious thing is the placing of it. It appears directly after the two paragraphs of text but before the bullet-point puff list about “creating harmony between people and computers” etc – which was previously headed “Herman Miller Features” – so we must assume that Mr Coles wrote those himself.)

It seemed that the only way to get to the bottom of this perplexing mystery was to go straight to the horse’s mouth. So I’ve dropped Benchmark Reviews a line, starting from the premise that if they didn’t like “anonymous internet trolls” I should introduce myself properly.

Dear Mr Coles,

Hello. I’m a professional freelance journalist of 20 years’ standing (an archive of my work can be found at worldofstuart.co.uk), and a number of people have recently drawn my attention to your review of the Herman Miller Embody chair. I’m investigating some allegations about the review, and wondered if you could clear a couple of things up for me.

I notice that the article has in the last 24 hours been amended to identify some sections as being written by Herman Miller, which were previously not identified as such. Interestingly, you appear to be claiming that the current version is the original, something which is easily disproven via Google Cache.

Are these the only sections of the article not written by you personally? Can you confirm, for example, that the following passage is your own work?

“Designed by Bill Stumpf (who pioneered the Aeron Chair) and Jeff Weber, the Herman Miller Embody chair goes a step beyond being merely “heath-neutral”. Over time, it can actually improve the health of the person sitting in it. Scientific studies have shown that Embody users can experience better circulation, reduced resting heart rates, and less tissue damage around the sitting muscles. Embody promotes natural alignment in the spine, relieving stress across the entire back no matter how you twist and turn.”

If so, can you provide links to these “scientific studies”, since presumably you wouldn’t have cited them if you didn’t read them yourself? Clearly, in the interests of fairness I’d like to have your side of the story before writing my piece. Should I not hear from you, obviously I’ll have to proceed on the basis of the evidence available.

Best regards,
Rev. S. Campbell

If I hear anything, I’ll be sure to keep you updated. But in the meantime, let’s recap the facts that we know for sure:

1. The original “review” did NOT acknowledge that the paragraphs on pages 1 and 2 were provided directly by Herman Miller.

2. The review has been hastily edited to insert some acknowledgements to that effect, but Benchmark Reviews is claiming that they were always there, something which is provably untrue.

3. Anyone voicing doubts about the integrity of the review has – despite the implicit admission that the original version was misleading and didn’t acknowledge PR content – had their comments deleted, and received a huffy or openly abusive email.

4. My IP address,  seemingly alone in the world, is no longer able to view the Benchmark Reviews website.

5. Olin Coles really, really loves his $1200 chair, which he definitely paid for himself. He even goes so far as to say that “The Embody chair does not come with arm supports by default, which is a good thing, because most times they’ll be unnecessary or unwanted.”

The arm supports, instead, are a $100 optional extra. (Other extras include nicer cloth for an extra $200, a shiny silver-coloured base for a further $200, and “premium translucent casters” for another $50, taking the price of the fully-kitted chair comfortably over £1000. And that’d be before VAT.)

6. None of the following quotes are identified in the article as being provided by Herman Miller, even after its editing, so they must have been penned by a professional, “fully independent” reviewer doing his best to write a balanced and critical appraisal of an eye-wateringly expensive piece of top-end office furniture in order to give his readers useful purchasing guidance:

“Herman Miller Embody chair cloth textiles utilize spacer-and-knit constructions used in athletic footwear and geo-textiles. These materials are meant to enhance Embody, not simply cover up the chair. Contemporary colors paired with either of two frame colors and three base colors help to simplify choice* and appeal to universal tastes.” [Hmm.]

“The Herman Miller Embody chair’s Backfit adjustment and seat conform to your unique shape and distribute weight evenly. Embody’s shape mimics the spine, providing subtle support along the entire back that shifts with your movements. The Backfit creates a dynamic surface that reacts to your movements every time you shift”

“To promote the flow of heat away from the body that can build up under the legs and back over time, Herman Miller developed the Pixelated Support system. This 4-layer mesh is filled with negative space** which permits a much greater amount of air flow than traditional fabric and frame chairs. Every square inch reacts under your movements. When you shift, your seat shifts. The extremely responsive nature of the Pixelated Support material means Embody users can sit for hours without experiencing uncomfortable heat-buildup.”

“By fitting the body form and reducing seated pressure, Embody increases blood circulation and improves the flow of oxygen to help decreases heart rate.” ***

“If there was one Herman Miller piece that goes perfectly with Embody, it’s the Envelop desk. Equipped with adjustable features such as a tapered extending desktop with tilt support, the Envelope could be considered one half of the ideal Embody set.” ****

7. When asked in November 2008 how he selected which products to review, Olin Coles responded by saying this, on the record:

“I used to take anything that manufacturers would offer, back when BmR was starving for donated products.  These days, we work more closely with proven manufacturers to help launch their upcoming products“.

My emphasis, there. Make your own minds up, chums.

(Special thanks to alert WoSblog associate John X – not pictured – for splendid additional sourcing.)

* In terms of those three options alone – that is, discounting the numerous caster types and optional armrests etc – there are a mere 168 combinations to choose from. Thank goodness they simplified it!

** I have no idea what “negative space” in a chair is. Sorry.

*** The source of these medical claims, like the others in the review, is not identified. I suspect it’s Herman Miller Laboratories.

**** Buy more Herman Miller products! In the eight-page review, the words “Herman Miller” appear 71 times, or once every 64 words. The word “Embody” makes 104 appearances, or one every 44 words. For reference, this single paragraph you’re reading now is 44 words long.

UPDATES TO THIS AWESOME SAGA:

Update 1 – Olin Coles publishes my home address and phone number on the internet.

Update 2 – the original source of most of the text is revealed to be a furniture retailer.

Update 3 – suddenly, all the ads in the “review” are replaced by ads for said retailer. Numerous hasty edits are also made to the text as disclaimers and qualifiers, to make it appear less like sales blurb.

Update 4 – Olin Coles files numerous DMCA reports to try to suppress the story, succeeding in having WoSblog suspended for most of a day by its idiot hosts.

Update 5 – Olin Coles admits to taking the material from Smart Furniture – revealing most of his previous statements to have been lies – but claims to have had permission.

(Respective words up to Juxtapixel and Mr. M. Dale)

It didn't seem fair, though, that WoSblog's beloved viewers should be expected to simply picture it in their minds. So here it is.

It should be noted that the shot above (taken this weekend in the pleasant Cardiff outlet) represents the £3.99 meal with a substantial amount of headway already made into it, and with some HP Sauce added for largely visual effect. It actually started off looking like the shot below, but the later one captures its nature more effectively.

(WosBlog's lunch companion, you'll notice, ate rather more conservatively and will live a lot longer. But more happily? I doubt it.)

The Dirty Dog's Dinner comprises – in generous amounts – slices of sausage and very lean bacon, piled high with chips and beans and served in – as you can plainly see – a proper steel dogbowl. (There's no trickery on show here, either – it's as deep as it looks, and I couldn't make it all the way to the bottom. The side order of garlic bread was probably a mistake.) And the thing is, it's delicious. And I don't normally even eat baked beans.

The universal truth rarely spoken is that an honest reflection of Western society would see all men's food – from greasy spoons to Burger King to the Ritz and Heston Blumenthal's Fat Duck – delivered like this.

By all means give the ladies dainty china plates with teeny little moussellines of this, escalopes of that and juliennes of the other, tastefully and artistically arranged on beds of pulses you've never heard of in the shape of the coat of arms of Louis XII, and drizzled with a plume of Bar-le-Duc. They like things pretty and they're forever fretting about diets, bless 'em.

But for men? Smush it all up in a dogdish, pile baked beans on top of it, and don't bother with cutlery. We're tired of holding back.

Because there are also thousands of games which are always free. We're NOT talking about Lite versions or limited demos, but full complete games which, for one reason or another, their developers have decided to make free – WITHOUT stuffing them full of irritating AdMob adverts. (Unless specifically mentioned, all these games are totally ad-free.)

Here, then, in no particular order, are 50 of the best. If you've just bought an iPod Touch or an iPhone or an iPad, start here.

Dropship

Formerly a paid game, this brilliant and gorgeous-looking Thrust derivative has been free for almost a year now. No ads, no restrictions, no in-app purchases, just a fantastic game for no money.

iCopter Classic

There are loads of "Copter" games available, quite a few of them free, but this is my favourite. Fast but fair and with a nice chopper sound, you can play it with original-style graphics or collect coins in "Fun" mode to unlock some rather pretty new themes.

There are ads, but only on the menu screen between games – nothing while you play.

Lux Touch

Terrific lightning-paced Risk game. Plays the boardgame you know and love against CPU opponents, as a taster for a separate £2.99 game (Lux DLX 2) with 80 new maps, multiple difficulty levels and multiplayer. But in itself Lux Touch is a complete game, and perfect if you feel like a Risk session and only have five minutes to spare.

Real Racing GTi

We're making an exception to the rule here, because Real Racing GTi is a Lite version of the proper Real Racing (£2.99). But what a Lite version it is – you get six exclusive Volkswagen cars and three tracks from the full game, with quick-race, time trial and a three-race championship.

Clearing the championship with all gold cups and with driving aids switched off will occupy you for longer than a lot of complete games, and you only have to put up with some very mild and unintrusive menu-screen ads nagging you about buying the full version.

ChickenRun!

I love this unusual entry in the popular running-man genre. The screen scrolls from right to left automatically, and the only control is a giant "RUN" button that makes your otherwise-static chicken peg it in one direction in order to negotiate moving platforms and collect eggs while dodging flame pits and crushers. Cute and highly addictive.

Football U

Plot-heavy American Football-themed fun with clever and punchy minigames moving the narrative along. Great production values, you can zip through the text as fast as you like, and the teen-angst story is funny too.

Driftz

Stopz

Two variants on the same thing here, reminiscent of the prize game you've probably seen in arcades and shopping malls where you have to press a button to stop fast-moving lights in the right place.

Driftz is my favourite of the two, with a clever scoring system that lavishly rewards extra-fine accuracy (and online leaderboards to show it off) and a swift pace that makes for a sky-high "one more go" factor, but Stopz (in which the lights travel in an inward spiral) is an interesting twist on the theme from the same developer.

Gem Ninja

It might look like one of the millions of "Same Game" clones that plague the App Store, but Gem Ninja is in fact an object-finder game. You have to locate the block shown at the top right in the colour grid, a task that gets more and more brain-wounding as the blocks get more complex and your time limit ticks away.

iGoBang Lite

The Chinese game of Five-In-A-Row, also known as Gomuku or Gomoku depending on which spelling you want to believe. Perhaps my favourite classic two-player board game ever, and this is a very nice rendition, entirely complete in itself. The Lite version does everything the 59p full one does (three difficulty levels, three board sizes), with the sole exception of being able to play against another human.

Carnival Shooting Range

Does what it looks like it does. Very nicely-made, and has both touch-shooting and tilt-aiming modes to cater for people who do and don't like to wave their iPod around. One instantly-skippable ad when you load it up, but is pester-free from then on.

Space Deadbeef

Ingenious shoot-'em-up where your finger both targets enemies with your homing missiles and controls your ship. With just one life you can't afford any mistakes as you aim for a new high score, and it's really pleasant to play.

Topple
Topple 2 Plus+

The beautiful block-stacking game Topple and its sequel are both free, though in the latter case you'll have to sign up for a (free) Plus+ highscore account. Both games are slick, nicely-animated likeable tower-builders where your own greed and haste to reach the extra bonus markers before your time runs out are your worst enemies.

Cube Runner

If you're an old Spectrum fan, this game is best described as Deathchase with the visual style of Knot In 3D. Playable in either landscape or portrait mode, it's a simple dodge racer where you fly into the screen and have to navigate an oncoming forest of blocks, but it's smooth and hypnotic and accompanied by the sort of music you'd expect from an episode of Micro Live in 1983. You can also download free user-created level packs.

MadDodge

The iPod version of the immortal Crazygame. Dodge the bullets by tilting your iPod, get a highscore, compare it with the global leaderboards. There's a little ad in the corner of the between-games screen, but none during play.

Valistroke

Terrific co-ordination and mental agility tester where you have to draw a line from the start to the exit going through all the numbers onscreen in sequence. The time limits are increasingly tight but there are big bonuses for going through extra squares, so if you want to make an impression on the global leaderboards it's a question of how much you trust your own skill. Ads on the title screen, but none ingame.

You Cruise

Lovely time-trial racing game, covered in detail here.

Noiz2sa Free

Despite the title, this isn't a demo or Lite version – it's the full and complete officially-approved iPod port of Kenta Cho's classic PC freeware bullet-hell shooter, named to distinguish it from another completely different iPod version. One static ad on the title screen, but none during the game.

rRootage Online

Another Kenta Cho port, and while rRootage looks initially like another Noiz2sa-style shooting game (and is styled in that manner), it's really more of a racer under the skin, since your only task is to avoid all the oncoming obstacles until your laser has destroyed the boss.

With 40 stages, each playable in one of four modes (which are based on classic shmups like Ikaruga and Giga Wing), and separate online leaderboards for every variant, you'll get many hours out of this without even having to play the same level twice.

Dactyl

On a platform full of really simple games, Dactyl is about as simple as it gets. Bombs flash on the screen and you have to tap on them to defuse them. It's all about speed and memory and finding a rhythm, sort of like a version of Simon that has a single infinite level and isn't completely tedious.

BaDaBoo

Object-colliding game that reminded me of one of the minigames from Super Mario DS which I spent hours and hours playing. The fun of just smashing things into other things is obvious, but there's some subtlety in the scoring, especially at the end, that makes it very replayable.

Froggy Jump

Probably the pick of the free Doodle Jump clones that litter every corner of the App Store, and certainly the one that's kept my attention for longest, thanks in large part to the fact that it's brimming with character. Strictly speaking it's a "freemium" release, with the chance to buy upgrades for real money, but if you get high enough scores or play the game for long enough you can earn gems and get them all for free, and the basic game is more fun anyway. (Since the upgrades are basically just cheats.)

If you don't pay for the upgrade there's one little ad banner at the bottom of the screen when you start a new game – which you'll only see for about a second – and nothing else.

PicoPicoGames

Not happy getting just one game for free at a time? How about seven? PicoPicoGames offers a whole collection of miniature NES-style games, ranging from racing to maze-running to logic-puzzles to three random mini-RPGs. (You can also buy two larger ones via in-app purchases.)  My favourite is the dirt-simple Crystal Boy, but most of these would stand up on their own at 59p a pop, so seven for nothing is quite the bargain.

Tapword

Boggle, basically. Packed with options (including two sizes of grid and different time limits), and online connectivity, such as leaderboards and special challenges you have to earn points to enter. One small ad on the between-games screen.

Paint It Black

Pure addictive genius, this one. You start with a white square, and a black line moving along the inside edge. Hit the Turn button and the line makes a 90-degree clockwise turn. Your job is to paint the entire square black, but if you turn too early you'll leave part of it unpainted, and if you turn too late you'll crash into the wall or your own trail and die. Online leaderboards provide extra motivation. One ad on the title screen, none in play.

DizzyRoids

Straightforward Asteroids clone, which would have been ruined by the update which replaced the retro graphics with ugly new ones, except that they left the old ones in as an option. Phew!

Cell Splat

Looks like a match-three game but isn't – in fact, Cell Splat is more closely related to the spot-the-difference genre. Blocks appear at the top and you have to swiftly tap however many identical ones you can find in the grid below. The pace is fast, the production values are lovely, and in Hard mode you'll do well to last a minute.

2 Minute RPG

See if you can work it out from the title.

Glaurung Chess

A very comprehensive and challenging chess game with loads of options including playing by email. Um, it's chess. Nothing more to see here. Move along.

Tic Tac Ultimate

Four variants on noughts-and-crosses here – normal, 4×4 (four in a row to win), 3x3x3 and 4x4x4, each available in four graphical themes. You get three levels of CPU opponent, two-player games, and "Standard" and "Scored" modes, the latter of which gives you bonus points for fast moves and keeps on throwing opponents at you until you lose. Without a doubt the most comprehensive noughts-and-crosses game I've ever seen.

Mr. Space!!

Hugely stylish action game where you have to make your little man scamper left and right to find the safe spots as a jagged roof crashes down onto an uneven floor. It's all about speed and lightning visual judgement, and you'll always be certain you could do better next time.

Jump Maze

Ingenious logic puzzle, in which levels appear bafflingly impossible until you alight on the solution. Very basic, with infinite randomly-generated stages, this isn't a game you work through to complete, but one you fire up when you've got two minutes to kill and you want a bit of mental exercise.

iCrossOut

Another pure-logic puzzler, where you have to eliminate all the bricks by drawing straight lines through groups of them according to the instructions (eg three at a time). Four difficulty levels and lots of stages make for hours of challenge, and you'll need all your forward-planning skills.

Traffic Rush

Donut Games have a reputation for perfectly-crafted little arcade minigames, and Traffic Rush is one of their most stripped-down and elegant. Vehicles approach a crossroads from four directions and you have to get them across without collisions, by either swiping to speed them up, or tapping to stop them (until drivers behind them honk them back into life). It seems so easy that every time you fail you can't help but start again.

Zepi: Free

There are eight different versions of unusual object-matching game Zepi available, all of them identical except for their graphical themes. Each release has three different graphic sets, and the free version offers the "Graveyard" theme from Zepi: Dark. The game itself is complete in every way, and the only reason to upgrade is if you'd rather play with pretty butterflies or flowers than eyeballs and skulls.

LightBike 2

A light-cycles game where you're equipped with the ability to jump sounds like it should be easy, but LightBike 2 is anything but, even with the benefit of a very accurate radar screen as well as the beautiful 3D main environment. Plenty challenging against CPU racers, but also offers online deathmatch.

No ads, but stupidly you'll need internet access to sign in even for offline play, although all you're asked for is a username (no tiresome typing email addresses on the iThing's keypad).

Match Match Plus

A match-three with a bit more to it than most, and a rather different play mechanic. Here you're not limited to swapping adjacent blocks, but can shunt entire rows and columns around to get one to the desired location, opening up a lot more scope for tactical play. (Especially as you're not restricted to connecting blocks in a straight line, but can join them in any formation vertically and/or horizontally.) Much more demanding than the average match-three too, most of which can take hours for a single game.

invaderR

Slightly reminiscent of brilliant Xbox Indie game Decimation X, this is a great little micro-Invaders. Tilt to move, tap to fire, one hit means Game Over. At least the invaders don't actually invade, though – they're happy to just stay in the sky and rain down bombs until you succumb, rather than fight it out toe-to-tentacle with you like men.

Card Dealer

More closely related to Paper Toss than anything to do with gambling, this is a neat little game where you have to flick cards into static or moving targets in the fastest possible time. Comes in the form of a Lite version with in-app purchasing, but you can actually unlock all the DLC levels for free just by playing the game, and it should only take you a few minutes.

3D Checkers

It's in 3D! It's Checkers! It's in 3D and it's Checkers! You know how this joke goes, right? Lovely graphics, traditional and modern graphics options, Bluetooth or pass-the-iPod multiplayer, and three levels of CPU difficulty. In other words, everything you could reasonably ask for from a Checkers game.

Bouncedown

One of the many things the App Store is well blessed with is games where you have to fall down a series of platforms. Bouncedown is one of the more professional efforts, with Yoshi's Island-esque graphics (except for the main character being Amiga hero Blob), several control options and a decent level of challenge as you jump down various platforms to escape a descending spiked roof, encountering springs and conveyor belts and all the sorts of things you'd expect in these circumstances. One small advert on menu screen, nothing ingame.

Rocket Bird

Your basic bird-with-rocket-strapped-to-back-hurtles-through-farmland sort of affair. Levels seem to be the same every time, so you can learn them, but you can also take radically different routes through them to see which is best. Tiny ads on title screen and high-score screen, none during gameplay.

Parachute Madness

Squirrel on parachute plummets from high orbit, avoids toxic waste barrels sitting on grassy platforms inexplicably hanging in the sky, destroys UFOs and Zeppelins by throwing acorns. And yet, I can guarantee you not a single videogame player ever looked at it and so much as paused for a second to think "Hang on, that's a bit of an implausible plot, isn't it?"

Ice Tycoon

One of a million (approx) Diner Dash-inspired time-management games on the App Store, this is one of the most enjoyable, and not just because it involves making delicious-looking ice creams. No, it's because it involves making delicious-looking ice creams and selling them to bears.

Unkichi

Basically a variant on the well-known "Lights Out" type of game, where you tap on a square (or in this case a circle) to toggle its binary state and those of the directly adjacent positions.

Unkichi stands out thanks to its lovely visual style and a ferociously unforgiving Arcade mode in which a single misplaced flip means death, and is the first time I've ever found a Lights Out game enjoyable.

Route-Rageous!

Talking of ferocious, Route-Rageous! (which is essentially a simplified version of Chu Chu Rocket) is one of the toughest logic puzzlers I've ever come across. I haven't even managed a perfect completion of the first level yet, but fortunately you can play and replay the 10 stages in any order you like as you search for better and better solutions to get higher and higher scores.

Tournament Reversi Free

"Free" in a title normally means a full version strewn with ads, but TR Free seems to be identical to the Pro Edition other than the warm feeling of giving the author money for a job well done.

In addition to the standard VS CPU game (with five difficulty levels) and a pass-the-iPod two-player game, Tournament Reversi Free even offers live internet play, where you can have a game against random opponents or arrange to meet a friend. What more do you want, blood?

Volkswagen Think Blue

Part of a whole suite of free VW-based driving games covered in fuller detail here, Think Blue is my pick of the bunch for its compelling just-a-bit-further design and unique atmosphere of a pleasant, leisurely afternoon cruise through the countryside.

Coin Dozer

And a little indulgence to finish on. Coin Dozer has constant in-play adverts (rather cheekily not shown in screenshots – they appear in the prize chute area), and barely counts as a game at all, given that it has no final victory and also no way to fail. When you run out of coins, all you have to do it wait a while (or sell some of your prizes) and you'll get more, forever. There's no high-score, and while you can earn bonuses by collecting complete sets of prizes, they make very little difference to anything.

And yet, once you start dropping the nicely-rendered gold coins onto the playfield, see if you can stop. It's the ultimate in completely pointless timewasting, and that probably makes it some sort of art statement. (Particularly as there's also a version available with biscuits instead of coins.) You should have it. Over 2 million people can't be wrong, can they?

(By comparison, Brazil's victorious 2002 side managed to find the net 18 times in the same number of matches.)

A grim final featuring a record 13 bookings and – amazingly – only one sending-off for a brutal, ugly Netherlands side put a judge's black cap on the tournament, but it wasn't all bad. Here's my diary.

JUNE 11, JOHANNESBURG SOCCER CITY

SOUTH AFRICA 1-1 MEXICO

Are we bored of the vuvuzela yet? I think I am. One of the great things about football is the rising crescendo of sound as a team attacks, followed by the explosion of noise when they score, and when there's a constant drone of volume all the way through the game you don't get that – one type of sound is simply exchanged for a different one of similar magnitude, and it robs the occasion of some of its drama.

South Africa's peach of an opening goal – finished superbly by the fantastically-named Tshabalala – deserved to be distinguished more from its surroundings than that. It was the high point of an exciting game packed with fast attacking and loose defending.

The draw was the fair result, both teams dominating the match for two-thirds of a half (Mexico the first 30 minutes, South Africa the first 30 after the interval) with the rest anyone's as the play surged from end to end with plenty of chances and a couple of great saves from South Africa's much-maligned goalkeeper Khune. Even with France and Uruguay still to play, I wouldn't write off either of these teams for the second round.

JUNE 11, CAPE TOWN

FRANCE 0-0 URUGUAY

The BBC told us at half time that there hadn't been a goal scored in a match between France and Uruguay for 25 years, and the two sides looked here as if they could have played for 25 years straight without that changing. The single save of note in the game came from what the commentators interpreted as a misdirected cross, and where South Africa and Mexico had earlier immediately tried to race upfield as soon as they got the ball, the French and Uruguayans opted for a European-style policy of aimless midfield probing that got nobody anywhere, at least not until there were eight or more defenders back to get in the way.

Not until 10 minutes from the end did the two sides revert to something resembling traditional type, with the Uruguayans reduced to 10 men for an awful tackle and the French finally remembering how to get down the wings, beat the man and get the cross in. But by then it was far too late, with only the unedifying spectacle of Thierry Henry trying to claim a penalty for handball to stick in the memory. Rubbish.

JUNE 12, PORT ELIZABETH

SOUTH KOREA 2-0 GREECE

Greece's victory in the 2004 European Championship is one of the most inexplicable blips in football history, and they shed no light on the mystery with a dismal performance in which South Korea resembled one of those giant cartoon boxers holding a diminutive opponent at bay with a hand on their head, leaving them swinging ineffectually and unable to land a blow. Greeks will have to look elsewhere for something to distract them from their economic woes, because this team is coming home soon.

JUNE 12, JOHANNESBURG ELLIS PARK

ARGENTINA 1-0 NIGERIA

Nigerian goalkeeper Enyeama single-handedly (often literally) kept the scoreline in this action-packed match to a single goal when by rights it should have been at least 4-2 by half-time.

Nigeria's counterattacks frequently exposed a suspect Argentina defence only to finish abominably, but far better efforts from Argentinian strikers also went unrewarded as the Nigerian keeper pulled off a string of top-drawer saves to keep his side in the game. Argentina looked imperious, with Messi in particular seeming to be permanently in possession of the ball, but sterner opposition could wreak havoc in their back four, particularly down the wings.

JUNE 12, RUSTENBURG

ENGLAND 1-1 USA

The tournament still has 28 days to run, but it's a safe bet that we've already seen its biggest howler – ITV's hilarious interruption of their HD coverage of the match with an advert brilliantly timed to obscure England's goal. Only marginally less awful was Robert Green's freakish clanger that saw him scoop a speculative 25-yard trundler from Clint Dempsey into his own net to secure the USA a merited point from a game of a lot of huffing and puffing and running but few moments of great skill.

The Americans spent the last 20 minutes booting the ball optimistically straight up the middle of the pitch, but a great save from Green and the ref's bizarre reluctance to send Jamie Carragher off for a forearm smash to the throat when he was the last man ensured that they didn't pinch all three points.

JUNE 13, POLOKWANE

ALGERIA 0-1 SLOVENIA

An apparent attempt by both teams to outdo France-Uruguay for the accolade of Worst Game Of The Tournament so far was eclipsed by Algeria keeper Chaouchi's personal mission to commit a worse goalkeeping cock-up than England's Robert Green. He didn't quite manage it – the ball was coming at him slightly faster and at a slightly more challenging angle – but it was still an astonishing feat of butterfingers, and with custodians of this quality viewers must be rubbing their hands at the thought of how many times we might see the net bulge in the remaining matches. Assuming Algeria and Slovenia can actually muster another shot at goal between them, that is.

The real action should start to get under way next week as the bottom half of the draw, featuring the Spanish, Brazilians and everyone's would-be whipping boys from North Korea, take to the field.

JUNE 13, PRETORIA

SERBIA 0-1 GHANA

A comically blatant and pointless swing of the arm from Serbia's Zdravko Kuzmanovic quite literally handed Ghana all three points as Gyan converted the penalty that followed Kuzmanovic's rush of blood to the head. The African side should probably have had the game wrapped up before then, but couldn't turn their domination into any more goals.

JUNE 13, DURBAN

GERMANY 4-0 AUSTRALIA

The Germans haven't won the World Cup for 20 years, and on this showing they look like they're tired of waiting. The unhyped young side were taking the Australians apart convincingly even before Tim Cahill was rather harshly shown a straight red by a card-happy referee who also booked two Germans for diving, but with 10 men the Aussies were clinging on desperately for the final whistle to deliver them from their torment. Suddenly England's path to the quarter-finals looks a lot more hazardous.

JUNE 14, JOHANNESBURG SOCCER CITY

NETHERLANDS 2-0 DENMARK

A less than stellar performance from the fancied Dutch, but they never looked in much danger from the toothless Danes, who needed a deflection to even score in their own net. Apart from that the game was only enlivened by a few nasty tackles, but Holland will need to develop a killer instinct in front of goal as well as where 50/50 balls in midfield are concerned.

JUNE 14, BLOEMFONTEIN

JAPAN 1-0 CAMEROON

The first game to literally actually bore me to sleep, so apologies to Japan and Cameroon if they managed to put together anything approaching some football after about the 55th minute, because I missed it after their first 54 minutes sent me into a deep nap. Complete rubbish, the most interesting aspect of which was Cameroon's weird away kit, with a sort of half-shoulder wrap in a very slightly different shade of yellow to the rest of the shirt.

JUNE 14, CAPE TOWN

ITALY 1-1 PARAGUAY

A strange first half saw Italy dominate possession but Paraguay look much more threatening with their meagre share of the ball, and a tremendous free kick gave them a lead they always looked like taking. Camoranesi's second-half appearance as a substitute gave the Italians the menace they'd lacked in the first 45, and it was shortly after his introduction that Paraguayan keeper Flapesto "Flappy" Flapquez [sub: please check name] raced off his line in order to wave at an Italian corner as it sailed past, leaving the net exposed for a tap-in equaliser from De Rossi.

Their belief sapped by the soft goal, Paraguay retreated and dug in for the point, and while the Italians pinged the ball around with confidence and urgency thereafter, they never actually looked like scoring a winner. Their traditional slow start to international tournaments, then, continues to be one of football's enduring predictabilities.

JUNE 15, RUSTENBURG

NEW ZEALAND 1-1 SLOVAKIA

No goal rush in Rustenburg, despite New Zealand being basically an amateur side with a goalkeeper as nervous as a kitten at Crufts. Slovakia somehow contrived to look like underdogs, but a marginally offside goal from a terrific header settled their nerves and they looked comfortable until an almost-identical headed goal in the last minute of stoppage time brought the All Whites an equaliser that they deserved for playing far above their station.

JUNE 15, PORT ELIZABETH

PORTUGAL 0-0 IVORY COAST

A bad-tempered first half saw the muscular Ivorians kick and bully the relatively slight ball-players of Portugal into tetchy submission, with the assistance of a referee who offered the European side no protection at all in the weakest officiating performance of the tournament so far.

The only moment of footballing excitement was a long-range thunderbolt from Ronaldo that swerved onto the post at the last moment with the goalkeeper beaten, but the winger became more subdued after picking up a ridiculous booking when he was scythed down and then abused for his pains, and then shown a yellow card for nothing more than protesting his (on this occasion genuine) innocence.

Losing the dead weight of Danny and Deco in the second 45 gave the Portugese a bit more purpose, but to no effect. The Ivorians had clearly come for a 0-0 draw and despite opening up a fraction in the last 15 minutes they got it, without either keeper having to make a save.

This was a game, though, whose most remarkable feature was the Africans' figure-hugging shirts – in the cold South African winter there were more nipples on show in the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium than the average issue of Nuts, but to much less energising effect.

JUNE 15, JOHANNESBURG ELLIS PARK

BRAZIL 2-1 NORTH KOREA

The most disappointing aspect of the tournament so far was perhaps the fact that only two minutes of stoppage time were granted in this captivating match. A woeful Brazil performance in the first half saw them be a little bit lucky to go in on level terms, and N Korea were made to regret not committing more men to their frequent counterattacks when Maicon finally broke the deadlock with a brilliant was-it-a-shot-or-was-it-a-cross? at the near post. (Personally I can't decide – he seemed to look up and across the box rather than at the goal, but that could have just been to fool the keeper, and he didn't half give it a belt for a cross.)

When Brazil added a terrific second Korea's race seemed to be run and it looked like only a matter of how many the suddenly-confident South Americans could knock in before the final whistle, but a fantastic Korean goal made for an exciting last five minutes when it looked as though either team could score again. In the end Brazil held on, but North Korea emerged with much honour, and Brazil might live to regret a goal difference of only +1, given that Ivory Coast will almost certainly pack their defence looking for another no-score draw.

JUNE 16, NELSPRUIT

HONDURAS 0-1 CHILE

Chile qualified strongly for World Cup 2010, finishing second in the South American group behind Brazil, so we shouldn't be surprised that they can play a bit. They outclassed Honduras comprehensively in this game, and with a bit of luck and cooler finishing could easily have run in three or four more goals. As it was they were kept down to one, but they look a pretty strong bet to make the knockout stages alongside Spain.

JUNE 16, DURBAN

SPAIN 0-1 SWITZERLAND

Fabregas and Torres is a hefty slice of talent to be missing from your starting XI, and without them Spain were a shadow of the team who are many people's favourites for the tournament. Even with the dour Swiss ceding 70% of possession and about 90% of territory, the Spanish only managed to trouble the Swiss keeper once, when he raced out to smother Piquet's shot, and most of what opportunities they created came from Route One punts over the top.

It wasn't Piquet's night – he took a sharp boot to the head as Switzerland bulldozed their way to a goal early in the first half with their first serious attack. The introduction of Torres and Navas shortly afterwards transformed both Spain and the match, but a hatful of golden chances were spurned and it was the Swiss who should have scored another, hitting the post when a pass across the box would have left the Spanish goal undefended.

Xabi Alonso smashed a long-range effort off the underside of the bar, but even an inexplicable five minutes of stoppage time wasn't enough to wear the Swiss down and the last match of the first cycle provided World Cup 2010's first shock result. With the tricky Chileans still to play and Switzerland with three points in the bank, Spain's only consolation is that they play Honduras next while the Chileans and Swiss will have to cut each other's throats.

JUNE 16, PRETORIA

URUGUAY 3-0 SOUTH AFRICA

The hosts' bubble bursts in a one-sided match in which a Diego Forlan-inspired Uruguay eased to a scoreline that was flattering in terms of the actual goals (the first deflected, the second the result of a penalty from the merest contact and for which the keeper's red card was extremely harsh), but an accurate representation of the match overall. South Africa tried until the final whistle, but carried no goal threat at all, and from the moment Forlan's long-range rocket smacked the underside of the bar on its way into the net there was only going to be one result.

JUNE 17, JOHANNESBURG SOCCER CITY

ARGENTINA 4-1 SOUTH KOREA

A comedy of errors, this, as all three first-half goals went down to terrible cock-ups. First of all South Korean centre forward Chu-young scored in the wrong net, standing dumbly in the six-yard box and letting a Messi cross smack off his shin past the helpless keeper. Then the same keeper somehow dived over the top of a weak Higuain header, and just as Argentina looked like switching to cruise control, a diabolical bit of defending from Demichelis let Chung-Young in for an easy goal out of absolutely nothing with the last kick of the half.

The Koreans took heart, and squandered a golden chance to equalise before their luck ran out with another bad mistake, this time from the officials – Higuain scoring from a clearly offside position after great work by Messi. A few minutes later the striker was offered the first hat-trick of the tournament on a plate and made no mistake.

JUNE 17, BLOEMFONTEIN

NIGERIA 1-2 GREECE

It must be Keystone Football day. In a dire game, a 35-yard Nigerian free kick is going nowhere much until the centre-half ducks underneath it and the goalkeeper dives out of the way, leaving the ball to just float straight into the net. Then with Nigeria looking in total control against a team that's never even scored a goal in the World Cup and didn't look like doing so if they played all day, Kaita stupidly retaliates against nothing at all by gently shoving the toe of his boot across the outer edge of Katsouranis's thigh, who promptly goes down like he's been kneecapped by the IRA.

The ref shows a rather excessive red card, Greece suddenly liven up at the prospect of playing an hour against ten men, and then a wildly deflected shot from Salpingidis flies past both the goalkeeper and a well-offside Greek striker standing right in front of him, and it's 1-1.

The slapstick continues 15 minutes into the second half when a suicidal pass across his own box by a Nigerian defender gives Gekas a free shot from six yards, but Enyeama pulls off a brilliant point-blank stop, the ball is immediately pinged up the pitch, Yakubu is clean through but Tsorvas in the Greek goal pulls off an amazing one-handed save, the ball breaks to Obasi seven yards out and he incredibly misses the open goal by 15 feet.

A few minutes later, a vicious late swerve from the much-maligned Jabulani ball wrongfoots the excellent Enyeama and he can only parry a long-range shot to Torodiris, who pokes it in to give a frankly awful Greek side their first-ever victory in a World Cup match.

JUNE 17, POLOKWANE

FRANCE 0-2 MEXICO

France reached the final of the last World Cup and only lost on penalties, but the shattering psychological effects of losing home and away to the minnows of Scotland in their next tournament have been plain to see for the three years since. A dismal showing in Euro 2008 (bottom of their group with 1 point and 1 goal) is now almost certain to be followed by elimination as the top seeds in Group A with barely even a whimper.

The scenes towards the end of the match were extraordinary, with the entire France bench huddled behind one of the goals, as far as possible from the manager, seemingly desperate NOT to be brought on for the last few minutes of a game in which their team absolutely had to score. The players on the field looked even less interested, and Mexico were so full of enthusiasm and energy by comparison that goals were only a matter of time.

Linesmen have made some excellent calls in this tournament, and this was perhaps the best, with Hernandez looking yards offside but in fact correctly given as being a couple of inches on, and the already limp-hearted French just gave up entirely after he rounded the keeper to score.

France have now failed to score against a team with 10 men and one with a 5'7" goalkeeper. Who'd put money on them overcoming the hosts in five days time? At this point, personally I wouldn't even bet on 11 players turning up.

JUNE 18, PORT ELIZABETH

GERMANY 0-1 SERBIA

Not the most exciting first half, until the referee decides he wants his mum to see him on telly and gives Miroslav Klose two yellow cards, for one absolute nothing of an accidental brush and one innocuous foul on the halfway line, and Germany go down to 10 men with almost an hour to play. They're still shellshocked when Serbia take the lead thanks to some poor marking and weak goalkeeping from Neuer, who more or less dodges out of the way to let Jovanovic score.

The Germans don't pull themselves together until the closing moments of the half, when Khedira almost separates the crossbar from the posts with a howitzer of a drive from 15 yards, and a German striker is penalised for trying to net the rebound with a totally legitimate overhead kick.

With a man advantage, Serbia adopt the bold strategy of trying to cling on to a one-goal lead, and Germany dominate the second-half until Vidic gives away an idiotic penalty. However, a feeble effort from Podolski is saved (apparently the first penalty Germany have missed in a World Cup, including penalty shootouts, for 28 years) and the heart goes out of the Germans at that moment.

The Serbians hit the woodwork twice with breakaway attacks, then the Germans are denied a strong claim for a second penalty in the dying seconds as Gomez almost gets his leg amputated at the shin by a wild kick from Stankovic, but in keeping with Germany's luck all day the referee, five yards away, gives the free kick to Serbia for Gomez recklessly leaving his leg where someone could kick it. A game ruined by the referee, with extremely confusing ramifications for England.

JUNE 18, JOHANNESBURG ELLIS PARK

USA 2-2 SLOVENIA

An action-packed first half gets off to a great start with a fantastic long-range strike from Birsa that proves there's nothing wrong with the Jabulani ball if you hit it right. The USA try to fight back with a very square formation that's regularly broken up by the more fluid Slovenians, but still manage to carve out some decent half-chances before Slovenia hit them with a sucker-punch breakaway just before half-time, helped by another very good decision from the linesman.

What the game really needed after the break was a quick American goal, and it got exactly that when Donovan worked himself through at a tight angle, and with not much in the box to aim at simply blasted it at the Slovenian keeper, who rather than – say – trying to stop it with his arms, flinched out of the way like a little girl and let the ball smash into the roof of the net. As the half went on, the US pressed Slovenia further and further back into their own half, and got a deserved equaliser when Altidore's only positive contribution to the match gave Bradley a chance which he seized on with verve.

The Americans had looked dangerous for the whole game with long inswinging free kicks into the middle of the box, and five minutes from the end one finally bore fruit when Edu came through the mass of bodies and crashed one into the back of the net. At least three fouls were being committed as the cross came in, all of them by Slovenians on Americans, but the feeble Malian referee blew for an inexplicable free kick to Slovenia and the game ended in a thrilling draw.

JUNE 18, CAPE TOWN

ENGLAND 0-0 ALGERIA

In which England and Algeria get confused, think they're Mexico and Uruguay, and play out a cynical draw in which nobody makes any concerted, co-ordinated attempt to win the game before realising all too late that they in fact haven't both just qualified at all. I counted one save in 90 minutes, between both teams, that the keeper didn't just have to stand still for. Worst game of the tournament so far? Quite possibly.

JUNE 19, DURBAN

NETHERLANDS 1-0 JAPAN

For the second time in a week, a damp Dutch performance against ineffectual opponents delivers a win after which their goalkeeper could have returned his gloves to the shop for a refund as unused. Japan, with three points already in the bank, had clearly come for the draw, and didn't start to play until Wesley Sneijder's explosive shot from the edge of the box had rearranged the Japanese goalie's wrist bones on its way into the net.

But having left it so late they couldn't adjust, and so Holland win a second game while expending less effort than if they'd gone for a walk round some museums. If anyone provokes them into waking up and knocking the ball around in anger, we could really see some football.

JUNE 19, RUSTENBURG

AUSTRALIA 1-1 GHANA

A rollicking good game from the 11th minute onward, when Ghana keeper Kingson made his entry for Worst Goalkeeping Error Of The Tournament, shovelling an easy catch straight into the path of Holman. Ghana bounced straight back and 10 minutes later some brilliant work from Ayew on the by-line led to Kewell stopping a goalbound shot with his arm, earning him a red card and Ghana an equaliser from the penalty.

If you joined the game at half-time you wouldn't have known Ghana had an extra man, as both teams flew up and down the park and created several golden opportunities each, of which Australia probably had the best two, but neither side could convert and the game ended in a fair draw, with entertainment aplenty.

JUNE 19, PRETORIA

CAMEROON 1-2 DENMARK

No idea, sorry. Was watching the rugby. Go Scotland!

JUNE 20, BLOEMFONTEIN

SLOVAKIA 0-2 PARAGUAY

It was a lovely day so I went out for lunch and only caught the last 10 minutes of this one, just in time to see a well-improvised second goal for Paraguay and what was apparently Slovakia's only shot on target, three minutes into stoppage time.

JUNE 20, NELSPRUIT

ITALY 1-1 NEW ZEALAND

Controversy a-go-go in the opening 30 minutes. First New Zealand score an eighth-minute goal that's a mile offside, but justice is done because before the offside player touched the ball Cannavaro clearly handled it in the middle of the box, which would have been a penalty to New Zealand anyway. 20 minutes later Tommy Smith brushes a bit of fluff off the front of De Rossi's jersey, De Rossi hits the ground like he's fallen down a mineshaft and Iaquinta coolly slots the spot-kick the way the goalkeeper isn't already diving.

For the rest of the game Italy throw pretty much everything they've got at the Kiwis, and with only the occasional counterattack for relief, the Kiwis sit there and take it. Paston in goal and Nelsen in defence play the game of their lives, and when New Zealand bring on a part-timer on special leave from his job in a bank in the dying minutes, you just know it's not going to happen for the lacklustre Italians.

All to play for in Group F on the last day, and we're still looking at the plausible possibility of France, England, Brazil, Spain and Italy all failing to qualify for the knockout stages.

JUNE 20, JOHANNESBURG SOCCER CITY

BRAZIL 3-1 IVORY COAST

An uninspired first half, with Brazil sloppy and Ivory Coast ineffectual, enlivened only by Luis Fabiano breaking Goal Club's striker duck. Put through on goal at a narrow angle and with the keeper hugging the near post, the Brazilian reasoned that the only way to score was to hit the ball with the force of an asteroid colliding with Earth, and it almost uprooted the goalposts as it hit the roof of the net.

The centre-forward doubled his tally shortly after the break with a virtuoso solo effort employing his right foot, left hand, left foot and right arm – bizarrely leading to cameras showing a smiling referee running alongside the striker immediately afterwards, tapping his upper arm – and Elano added a third a few minutes later. Even at 3-0 down, Sven Goran Eriksson couldn't be persuaded to send his players on all-out attack, but the introduction of the inexplicably-omitted Gervinho finally gave them some threat, and his 70-yard run eventually ended in a consolation goal for Drogba as well as a couple of other good chances.

But the Premiership-star-studded Ivory Coast have been one of the disappointments of the tournament so far, and are unlikely to play any further part. The jury's still out on Brazil, who ended the game with 10 men after an absurdly stupid off-the-ball elbow in the chest of Keita by Kaka, and the striker will miss what could be a crucial game (in terms of who wins the group) against Portugal.

JUNE 21, CAPE TOWN

PORTUGAL 7-0 NORTH KOREA

A sad day in the World Cup, not least because it's the last one on which armchair fans can enjoy watching three games in one day. One goal was a poor return for 45 minutes of committed attacking football from both sides in this match (initially the North Koreans, though Portugal gradually started to dominate in the last 20), but Meireles' fantastic finish from a tremendous Tiago through ball was all there was to show for the teams' efforts, with Carvalho's header off the upright being the next closest thing.

The Portugese carried on where they left off after the break, though, and two early second-half goals in three minutes knocked the spirit out of the North Korea and seemed to burst the bubble of self-belief that had sustained the tournament's lowest-ranked team. A fourth for Portugal followed quickly and from that point the Koreans were broken. The fifth threatened to arrive three or four times before it eventually did, and from there it was just a question of how many the rampant Portugese strikers would get before time ran out.

With North Korea now officially eliminated from the tournament, under Goal Club rules all goals scored in their games count for 1.5 in the Team category, which lifts their score to 15 and puts your host and James Sweatland joint top of the table. With Ivory Coast relying on goal difference to have any chance of qualification, they'll be looking to pile on the misery for the Koreans in their last game, a fate this brave and positive side doesn't deserve.

JUNE 21, PORT ELIZABETH

CHILE 1-0 SWITZERLAND

A quietly extraordinary little game in Port Elizabeth, packed with incident (including a terrible red card) but mostly characterised by squandered chances. The Swiss guard their nets like they guard their secret bank accounts, and had just broken the record for longest period without conceding a goal in the World Cup finals (something like 500 minutes) when Gonzalez finally broke down the 10 men with one that looked marginally offside.

Derdiyok spurned a golden opportunity to smuggle away a point with a minute to go after Chile has passed up numerous chances to put the game to bed, but both of these sides could yet make the second round.

JUNE 22, JOHANNESBURG ELLIS PARK

SPAIN 2-0 HONDURAS

A game eerily reminiscent of the lunchtime match in several ways – a team from the Iberian peninsula in red shirts who'd suffered disappointment in their first game taking on a white-clad minnow team troubled by domestic traumas determined to attack their high-ranking opponents – but a much less exciting outcome. For all the orgasms going on in the commentary box and TV studio, Spain resembled nothing so much as Sting, stroking it back and forth endlessly and taking forever to get to any sort of end product.

Much like Sting, they scored eventually, but goal fans would have been throwing sofa cushions at the cat as David Villa fired a penalty beyond a near-empty net, the keeper having long since deserted his post before Villa's boot sent the ball skidding inches past the post.

JUNE 22, BLOEMFONTEIN/RUSTENBURG

SOUTH AFRICA 2-1 FRANCE
URUGUAY 1-0 MEXICO

For the first time ever, the World Cup hosts depart from the tournament in the group stage, but Bafana Bafana do so with their heads held high, eliminated on goal difference after beating Group A's top seeds. In the end, with Uruguay and Mexico surprisingly not playing out the draw, South Africa fell three goals short of the turnaround they needed, but they had more than enough chances to have pulled off the miracle.

France played most of the game with 10 men after Gourcuff recklessly and dangerously led with the elbow for a high challenge in the first half, but while the home team took a 2-0 lead into the break, the critical moment was probably when Mphela missed a glorious opportunity to make it three shortly after the restart, losing his head and smacking the ball onto the post when a simple little dink would have guided it into the back of the net and given the hosts a heady momentum.

With nothing to play for themselves, France reinforced their position as the planet's least popular football team and killed the atmosphere stone dead with a pointless goal midway through the half, and in case there was a shred of doubt remaining anywhere, Domenech despicably refused to shake Parreira's hand after the game. May their wine sour and their cheese rot.

JUNE 22, DURBAN/POLOKWANE

ARGENTINA 2-0 GREECE
NIGERIA 2-2 SOUTH KOREA

Can anyone think of a good reason not to just abolish Greece? The entire country, I mean. Their economy is threatening to drag all of Western democracy into the gutter, and their football team is basically a crime against humanity. Personally, I can live without hummus.

Something happened tonight that I don't think I've ever seen before – a team playing at the World Cup not all wearing the same kit. Some of Argentina's players had shirts with distinct black stripes on the front, crossing over to a sort of back-brace pattern on the reverse side (also prominently visible in France's shirts, and less so in others), whereas others clearly had plain shirts without the black detailing.

I mention this because it's so much more interesting than anything that happened on the field in this, the worst game of World Cup 2010, if not the worst game of football of all time. Argentina, safely qualified for the last 16, rested several of their first-team players and played the 90 minutes at training-ground-kickabout walking pace, but Greece – needing a win to go through – were so abominable and so incomprehensibly lacking in ambition that the South Americans still managed to secure over 70% of possession.

It took until four seconds before the end of normal time before the Greeks mustered a shot on target, and that's a generous description of a long-range hoof aimed straight at the startled Argentinian goalkeeper, who'd been playing Solitaire in a deckchair until that point.

For professional reasons, I felt duty-bound to watch the game in Polokwane than the four-goal thriller between Nigeria and South Korea that eventually saw the Asian team join Argentina in the second round (after the Nigerian striker Yakubu Aiyegbeni surely took Chris Iwelumo of Scotland's crown for the Worst Miss In The History Of International Football), and for that I hate you all.

JUNE 23, PORT ELIZABETH/PRETORIA

SLOVENIA 0-1 ENGLAND
USA 1-0 ALGERIA

England continue to follow their standard tournament template with a mediocre performance against poor opposition that nevertheless gets them into the second round and will doubtless see the media portray them as mighty contenders for the trophy again. But the late, late, USA goal in Pretoria (which saw the Algerians eliminated without scoring a goal, the only team apart from Honduras yet to find the net) might yet see the English have to face Germany in the second round rather than the likes of Serbia or Ghana, and on this showing they'll struggle.

Despite England looking good for 10-15 minutes either side of halftime, this was a grim game of football, with most of the chances for both sides coming from punts up the middle. Defoe's goal cunningly outfoxed the Slovenian keeper by being fired straight at him, but the otherwise-impressive Handanovic flapped it into the net, and from then on Slovenia never looked much like equalising. Like Greece against Argentina, they showed very little ambition even after going behind, and appeared to suffer a nosebleed every time they did catch sight of the 18-yard line.

Having had two legitimate goals disallowed in two games and creating a bucketload of chances in Pretoria before finally getting one in in the 92nd minute, the Americans thoroughly deserved to squeeze past both Algeria and England at the last and top the group. It remains to be seen if they'll be rewarded by the outcome of tonight's Group D games.

JUNE 23, JOHANNESBURG SOCCER CITY/NELSPRUIT

GERMANY 1-0 GHANA
AUSTRALIA 2-1 SERBIA

Got distracted from these by the amazing tennis, if I'm honest. Ghana made the Germans work hard, but a special goal from Ozil eventually settled the matter in a game of several good chances for either side. Meanwhile in Nelspruit Australia went out with honour, completing their recovery from their opening-game spanking but unable to overcome the goal-difference problem it left them with. Man, that tennis, though.

JUNE 24, JOHANNESBURG ELLIS PARK/POLOKWANE

ITALY 2-3 SLOVAKIA
NEW ZEALAND 0-0 PARAGUAY

Before we start, let's have a word of tribute to New Zealand. Ranked 78th in the world and appearing at the World Cup for the first time since 1982 – when they somehow managed to concede five goals to Scotland – they've gone out, as expected, in the group stage. But what nobody expected was that they'd go out unbeaten, and having finished above the world champions.

Such a thing happened because Italy lost what was probably the game of the tournament so far, a fantastically thrilling toe-to-toe encounter with an incisive counterattacking Slovakian side, making its first appearance as a nation in the World Cup, that fully deserved to take a first-half lead then extend it to 2-0 with 17 minutes left.

The ITV commentating team promptly wrote the Italians off, only to see them pull a goal back, and have another disallowed for a hair's-breadth offside decision made by the same English linesman who'd earlier made an impossible call to deny them another goal when Skrtel kneed Quagliarella's shot off the line, or maybe from behind it. (Both decisions looked to be correct by the narrowest of margins, maintaining the incredible standard of linesmanning that's characterised the tournament.)

When Slovakian sub Kopunek scored with his first touch of the tournament to make it 3-1 in the 90th minute, it seemed hopeless for the Italians, but back they stormed with an absolutely exquisite 25-yard goal from Quagliarella, showing that the way to get the Jabulani ball into the net is to aim it, rather than just try to blatter the paintwork off it.

Italy piled forward as the Slovakians fell over by the dozen to try to run down the clock, but as it ticked into the 97th minute the ref finally blew and the world champions were bottom of their group and out.

JUNE 24, RUSTENBURG/CAPE TOWN

JAPAN 3-1 DENMARK
NETHERLANDS 2-1 CAMEROON

Older viewers might remember that back in the late 80s and early 90s, Denmark had a formidable football team. A fast, attacking side graced by the talented Laudrup brothers, they were a sort of Scandinavian Holland. Those days are long gone now, and for most of living memory Denmark have been more of a sort of blond Switzerland, taking up space at tournaments just to make up the numbers and fill out the schedules without ever looking like raising anyone's eyebrows.

Japan basically toyed with them, assisted by a very wobbly performance from Sorensen in the Danish goal, but the match was a foregone conclusion as soon as the Japanese took the lead, and by the end it was just a question of whether they could add a couple more.

It's been a poor tournament for the European sides so far, but the Dutch are flying the flag for the old guard of world football, brushing the disappointing Cameroon aside to finish the game with a perfect 9-point record, joining Argentina as the only two teams to manage that feat so far. (With Brazil and Chile the only other two who might also notch three from three.) Cameroon go home with no points, proving that Africa isn't having much better a time that Europe in its first home tournament.

JUNE 25, NELSPRUIT/DURBAN

IVORY COAST 3-0 NORTH KOREA
BRAZIL 0-0 PORTUGAL

Anticipating a low-scoring snorefest between the Brazilians and Portugese, I tuned into the game at Nelspruit instead in the hope of action and thrills. Ivory Coast needed a nine-goal turnaround in goal difference to have a chance of qualification, and with a bit more calm and precision they could have had most of them by half-time. Two goals, two off the post and a hatful of other chances arrived as a demoralised North Korean side sat back in their own third, but with 70% of possession the Ivorians still couldn't quite bring themselves to really go for it.

The most memorable moment of the half was when Didier Drogba's persistence won him the ball down by the Korean goal-line, and with two defenders around him he held the ball up for a good 30 seconds, waiting for support and then deceiving them both with a simple kick-and-dodge putting him clean through in the area, yet even after all that time he didn't have a single Ivory Coast team-mate to pass it to.

Perhaps encouraged by the African side's lethargy and profligacy, the North Korean side that came out for the second 45 much more closely resembled the one that had played against Brazil and for the first quarter against Portugal. Pressing, attacking and in a 4-4-2 formation, they actually looked more like scoring until Kalou got on the end of a long ball to make it 3-0 with 10 minutes left.

Idiotic play from Dindane got a fourth chalked off, and the game petered out with the Ivorians sullenly hanging onto the label of most disappointing team of the tournament*. For a side comprising many tens of millions of pounds of club talent, they really were hopeless, and didn't even appear to care very much about it.

Meanwhile in Durban, one of the most predictable results of the competition played out, as Brazil and Portugal – both assured of qualification by a draw – duly drew in a match which by all accounts was an excellent cure for insomnia and saw both teams booed off the pitch.

*Because surely nobody was expecting France to do anything but fail, right?

JUNE 25, PRETORIA/BLOEMFONTEIN

CHILE 1-2 SPAIN
SWITZERLAND 0-0 HONDURAS

An absolutely freakish first half in Pretoria, as Chile dominate the game but go in 2-0 down and reduced to 10 men. The first goal comes out of nothing, Torres chasing down a hopeless ball and the Chilean keeper charging out to tackle him and win it, only to send it to David Villa who lofts it from about 40 yards out on the wing into the unguarded net.

Chile come within a defender's toe of equalising, the Spanish are denied what looks a nailed-on penalty, and then the referee sends off Estrada of Chile for the tiniest of completely accidental trips on Torres off the ball in the lead-up to a second Spanish goal as against the run of play as the first.

Oddness continues with a drastically deflected goal for Chile two minutes into the second half, sparking a few lively moments until the evening closes with the bizarrest sight of all – Spain spending the entire last 15 minutes of the game passing the ball back and forth across the 10-yard strip on the Spanish side of the halfway line, while Chile made no attempt to go and win it from them.

A goal for Switzerland against Honduras would have put the Chileans out, but they evidently decided to gamble that it wouldn't come, and that the 2-1 defeat would put both them and Spain through. Sadly it proved to be true. Chile had deserved a spot in the last 16, but not after that display of absolutely craven cowardice.

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KNOCKOUT STAGES

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JUNE 26, PORT ELIZABETH/RUSTENBURG

URUGUAY 2-1 SOUTH KOREA
USA 1-2 GHANA (aet)

It's too hot.

JUNE 27, BLOEMFONTEIN/JOHANNESBURG SOCCER CITY

GERMANY 4-1 ENGLAND
ARGENTINA 3-1 MEXICO

Cheers, lads. Just three days after we celebrated the high quality of officiating from the linesmen of World Cup 2010, two of them provide some of the worst examples of the art you could ever hope to see. First, with a perfect, unobstructed view, the Uruguayan assistant somehow failed to notice Frank Lampard's delicately-judged shot off the crossbar landing at least two feet over Manuel Neuer's goal-line, denying England an equaliser that would have pretty much defined the word "undeserved" but could have easily changed the entire complexion of the game.

The distance by which the ball crossed the line looked about the same as the staggeringly obvious margin by which Carlos Tevez was (doubly) offside as he headed a Lionel Messi shot into Mexico's net a few hours later, but again the officials failed to notice it. At least, until some hapless/enraged Soccer City employee disobeyed FIFA's rules about not showing contentious replays on the stadium's giant screens, leading to the astonishing sight of a referee and linesman seeing their catastrophic error and plainly having a touchline conference about whether there was any way within the rules that they could reverse the decision, before concluding that there wasn't and they'd have to allow the goal.

Stupidly, Mexico then spent the next 70 minutes without once managing to get into the Argentinian box and fall over, for the embarrassed whistler would surely have seized on the merest hint of an opportunity to give them a penalty, and despite an admirable spirit and a performance that pinned the Argentinians back in their own half for the entire second 45 the Mexicans just didn't have the cutting edge to overcome a free-scoring Argentina side who'd somehow managed not to have their morale destroyed by the hideous colour-clashing atrocity of a kit they'd been sent out it.

In the end they had a clear margin of victory over and above the disputed goal, thanks to an incredible second-half strike from Tevez that almost broke the speed of sound as it flew past Mexico's 5'7" keeper, who'd have had to be 7'5" to have a hope of getting his gloves on it.

Back in Bloemfontein, meanwhile, England captain Steve Gerrard was giving a post-match interview in which he carped that "it was never a 4-1 game", a view which was entirely correct. Had England's wrongly-disallowed goal been allowed to stand, a fair reflection of the play and chances created would have seen a final score of about 10-3 to Germany.

This reporter's earliest memory of the World Cup is watching the 1974 final, and in the 36 years since I don't believe I've seen a more abominable performance by an England side. The Germans – who for most of the game were average at best – threw into sharp relief just how dismal England's failure to win their group matches had been. (Not a single team from Group C now remains in the competition.)

My English viewing companion and I were watching in open-mouthed astonishment even before a goal was scored, as England simply didn't bother to get within 10 metres of German players until they were approaching the 18-yard line. Can ANYONE explain to me what on Earth Glen Johnson is doing anywhere near the starting eleven of a decently-ranked international football team with any business other than taking their pizza orders?

When the deadlock WAS broken after just 10 minutes, it came with a goal that would have shamed a school playground, as a German goal kick was allowed to descend unmolested into the English penalty area. From the moment it left the goalkeeper's boot it was touched just once more – by Miroslav Klose from 10 yards – before it found the back of the English net.

A second followed quickly, and the standard of England's defending was so woeful – and Germany's finishing so uncharacteristically imprecise – that they could and should have been four or five goals down before a goal out of nothing from Upson sparked a brief 15-minute flurry of life from the English players, including Lampard's "goal".

For those 10 minutes before the break and five after it, it was clear that the Germans' confidence was fragile in the extreme when their possession was pressed before the final third. But when they pulled themselves together and mounted a decent attack five minutes into the second half, England simply shrugged and gave up, reverting to the "after you, Claude" defending of the first half.

The result from that point was merely a question of how many Germany would score, and that it ended only 4-1 (thanks to two embarrassingly badly-defended pub-league breakaway goals from Muller) was a mercy that the pitiful excuse for a football team in red shirts scarcely merited. England's true shame wasn't in being so easily thrashed, it was in being so easily thrashed by such an unexceptional side.

I had money on Wayne Rooney for the Golden Boot, so thanks for showing me what happens when I try putting my faith in the English, you hopeless potato-faced muppet.

JUNE 28, DURBAN/JOHANNESBURG ELLIS PARK

NETHERLANDS 2-1 SLOVAKIA
BRAZIL 3-0 CHILE

The game in Durban needed an early Dutch goal like a hole in the head, but unfortunately that's exactly what it got in the shape of an excellent solo effort from Arjen Robben after 18 minutes. After that the outcome of the game was never in doubt, with the shot-shy Slovakians rarely troubling Stekelenburg, and Sneijder's goal six minutes from time looked like window-dressing, until the referee gave Slovakia a very soft penalty in stoppage time to make the scoreline look more interesting than it was.

But this was another dull, energy-saving-lightbulb of a performance from the Dutch – we can only hope they can find a couple of extra gears when they have to, otherwise it'll be a question of whether they go home before everyone in the world switches to Coronation Street.

There were no surprises in Johannesburg as Chile threw everything they had at Brazil to little effect. They made chances, but could only watch as Brazil showed them what you do with chances.

JUNE 29, PRETORIA/CAPE TOWN

PARAGUAY 0-0 JAPAN (aet, 5-3 on penalties)
SPAIN 1-0 PORTUGAL

These games were so boring I immediately forgot they ever happened. Actually that's a little unfair on Paraguay and Japan, who were at least trying, and created plenty of chances without ever having the finishing skills to put them away. A single ballooned penalty from Japan finally sent the Paraguayans through to their first ever quarter final.

Over in Cape Town, irritating goalhanging twat David Villa scored the only goal of a game after which frankly, both teams should have been eliminated from the tournament so that the USA or North Korea could be let back in.

JULY 2, PORT ELIZABETH/JOHANNESBURG SOCCER CITY

BRAZIL 1-2 NETHERLANDS
URUGUAY 1-1 GHANA (aet, 4-2 on penalties)

Neither Brazil nor Holland have been very likeable in this tournament so far, with Brazil in particular exhibiting a sort of surly petulance and the Dutch looking lethargic and toothless. Neither has played very exciting football, and when Brazil took a 1-0 lead thanks to a brilliant through pass by Melo after completely dominating the first half, the result looked a foregone conclusion.

That assessment, however, couldn't have predicted Brazil's spectacular implosion of self-harm in the second 45. Bastos was incredibly lucky to stay on the field for a ridiculous scythe on Arjen Robben by the touchline, but fate took a hand from the free kick as a long, aimless cross from Sneijder simply floated all the way in, skimming off Melo's head but only after Julio Cesar had already completely missed it.

15 minutes later some schoolboy defending gifted the Dutch the simplest of second goals from a corner, and another five minutes on the same Melo executed a sickening and pointless stamp on Robben after chopping him down deep inside the Netherlands half, and completed his eventful day with a well-deserved red card.

Both sides scorned good chances, not least when Huntelaar somehow managed to squander a three-on-one in the Brazil box in stoppage time, but it was an ugly game from two sides more renowned as standard-bearers of beautiful football. With only a semi-final against either Uruguay or Ghana standing between them and the final, one of Holland's least attractive footballing sides in living memory must surely fancy becoming its most successful.

A cracking first half in Johannesburg, though, as after a nervy opening 10 minutes Ghana forced their way into contention against a slightly startled Uruguay, and Muntari's incredible 40-yard goal with the last kick of the half was no more than they deserved, having shaved a couple of layers of paint off Uruguay's woodwork already. The second 45 was even better, packed with action, not least Diego Forlan's fantastic free-kick equaliser.

Both teams went for the win throughout extra time, and in scenes of incredible drama Ghana were awarded a penalty in the final seconds when Suarez handled a goal-bound shot and got a red card for his trouble. But tragically, his act of desperate cheating paid off when Gyan scooped the penalty off the crossbar with the last kick of the game.

To his credit, Gyan was first up to take a spot-kick in the shootout, and smashed a perfect one into the postage-stamp corner like he should have done a few minutes earlier. But two dreadful Diana Ross penalties from his team-mates eclipsed one Uruguayan miss, and the South American side sent Africa's last representatives in Africa's first World Cup cruelly home. Much of the world sobbed with them.

JULY 4, BLOEMFONTEIN/JOHANNESBURG ELLIS PARK

ARGENTINA 0-4 GERMANY
SPAIN 1-0 PARAGUAY

I really, really hope Germany win this World Cup. Or even Uruguay. And when was the last time Germany and Uruguay were the most likeable teams in an international football tournament? Or an international anything?

The Spanish and the Dutch have been dismal disappointments this year, with the Spanish having the lowest points total of any team left in the competition – a dismal EIGHT goals being scored by either side in their five matches so far (compared to 15 for the exciting Germans), and five out of Spain's six coming from one player.

Based on their play so far, a Spain-Netherlands final might just kill football off altogether.

JULY 6, CAPE TOWN

NETHERLANDS 3-2 URUGUAY

Another pretty limp rag of a first half from the Dutch, and a largely ineffectual one from Uruguay, enlivened by two amazing individual strikes, though Stekelenburg ought to have done better for Forlan's well-struck but central long-range equaliser after Van Bronckhurst had opened with an incredible 35-yard shot.

The most remarkable thing about the 45 minutes, though, was Van Bommel being allowed to stay on the pitch for an absolutely dreadful late, over-the-top leg-breaker of a "tackle" on Gargano. Surprisingly the South American player made nothing of it, adding to the weird air of role reversal that has surrounded the Netherlands side in this tournament. You'd normally expect Uruguay to be the dirty, cynical, diving cheats and Holland to be trying to play the attractive attacking football, but World Cup 2010 seems in many ways to be taking place in some weird Opposite Universe.

The Dutch continued to enjoy some barely-deserved good fortune in the second half, as a deflected Sneijder goal was allowed to stand despite Van Persie being offside and clearly trying to play the ball (and therefore "active" under the rules). But they posed much the bigger threat as Uruguay struggled to make an impact up front without the suspended Suarez, and a few minutes later Robben put unmuddied waters between the sides with a superb, precise header in off the post with the keeper stranded.

A stoppage-time goal from Pereira made for a brief flurry of late excitement as the orange defence wobbled, and reignited the controversy by ensuring that the offside goal was decisive after all, but it was hard to dispute the assertion that the better team won. The ugliest Dutch team in living memory could yet justify itself by being the first one to take home the World Cup, but the presence of Van Bommel in the final will lend the occasion a sour edge.

JULY 7, DURBAN

SPAIN 1-0 GERMANY

Anyone got a good book they can lend me for Sunday? I think we're in for the dullest World Cup final of all time.

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JULY 10, PORT ELIZABETH

URUGUAY 2-3 GERMANY

The final many neutrals had hoped for instead took the shape of the traditionally highly entertaining 3rd/4th-place playoff. An open game saw Germany, then Uruguay, then Germany again lead, and I can't have been the only viewer desperately hoping that Diego Forlan's last minute free kick had been four inches lower and gone in rather than clattering the German crossbar, because another 30 minutes of that game would have been a most attractive prospect.

JULY 11, JOHANNESBURG SOCCER CITY

NETHERLANDS 0-1 SPAIN (aet)

Only the second World Cup final to end goalless after 90 minutes, and at least Italy-Brazil in 1994 had the excitement and drama of penalties at the end.

As predicted by this reporter as far back as July 4th (while every idiot pundit was inexplicably hyping an imminent feast of beautiful football from the tournament's two dullest sides with the possible exception of Greece), Holland and Spain served up an insomniac's dream of a final, a murderously boring game enlivened only by a couple of hopeful balls down the middle providing a handful of chances that most of our mums could have put away but that were cack-footedly muffed by the world's finest players.

("WHAT A MISS!" was the most repeated phrase on the Guardian's always-entertaining live update.)

The Dutch were bewilderingly lucky to finish with as many as 10 players on the field, but the only one who did get sent off was probably the only one who didn't deserve to, Heitinga picking up a second yellow for briefly very lightly resting his hand on Xavi's shoulder, the Spaniard hitting the deck like he'd had an oil rig dropped on him from orbit.

So Spain, having scored just 8 goals in 7 games (one of which was against Honduras, for God's sake), are the world champions, and the only thing more depressing than that fact was that on the night they so comprehensively deserved it. The Dutch were absolutely awful, seemingly having no gameplan other than to kick the Spanish up in the air whenever they eventually stopped passing the ball sideways along the halfway line, which was rarely.

By extra time, when the Spanish suddenly realised that maybe they didn't fancy penalties, the game perked up, occasionally reaching the giddy heights of "stultifyingly mediocre", but this was a miserable display of anti-football that sullied the name of even this relatively poor World Cup.

Not entirely unrelatedly, can someone please, please murder Alans Hansen and Shearer with the greatest possible urgency? Cheers.

"NEXT SUNDAY: CAR BOOT SALE"

The original versions of these pictures, and many more, can be found here.

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