Former England international goalkeeper, Ian Walker played for Tottenham Hotspur, Leicester City and Bolton Wanderers. In 2012 he moved to China to become goalkeeper coach of Shanghai Shenhua, before crossing the city divide to join Shanghai SIPG in 2014. In Walks the Walk he talks football and China. Follow him on Twitter: @IanWalks1
It was a great World Cup. There were a lot of teams trying to play attacking football, particularly in the group stages, where there were an all-time record 136 goals. Maybe the defending wasn’t so good, but fans want to see a load of goals, so I think it went down well with everyone.
Let’s start with what I know best: goalkeepers. Keylor Navas of Costa Rica was very good. He played for Levante in Spain last year where I watched him have a terrific season, and he just carried that on into the World Cup, really. Three clean sheets from five matches, three Man of the Match awards and he made some great saves.
Guillermo Ochoa from Mexico had some decent games, including against Brazil where he made that stunning save from Neymar’s header that drew comparisons to Gordon Banks' famed 1970 save against Pelé.
And then there is Germany’s Manuel Neuer… he’s the best goalkeeper around, Neuer. I just like the way he does everything: how sharp he is; how he passes the ball out to the back - he’s a sweeper as well. He can do everything; I think he’s the one any young goalkeeper should be looking up to. Definitely the number one goalkeeper for me.
“Germany’s Manuel Neuer is the one any young goalkeeper should be looking up to.”
As for Germany, I think it was back in 2004 when they didn’t do so well that they decided to press the reset button and revamp the whole thing. In the last three or four tournaments they have been really good.
It is back to business as usual: well-organized, they’ve got good attacking players as well as a very strong defense - they all get back and they work hard. Tough to beat. I think the World Cup victory was testament to their philosophy and what they’ve been building towards for the last 10 years.
I was a bit surprised that Messi got the Golden Ball award for player of the tournament. He scored some decent goals, but he was pretty quiet once it came to the knock-out stages. I think everyone expected a little bit more out of him.
It is hard to say who the standout player was though. Going back to the Germans, I thought Schweinsteiger had a really good tournament. He doesn’t do anything too flash, but he really gets up and down the pitch and is very important defensively for the Germans. Thomas Müller was very good for them too.
Obviously Colombian Golden Boot winner James Rodríguez scored some decent goals, including that absolute beauty against Uruguay. He has just been snapped up by Real Madrid for 80 million Euros (a lot of money, but I’ve read they sold something like 350,000 of his replica shirts in the 48 hours following his unveiling, so they’ve already started to recoup some of it!)
I don’t think anyone else was that outstanding, which was a little bit surprising.
Real Madrid sold 350,000 James Rodríguez replica shirts within 48 hours of signing him
It was a good job Brazil didn’t go out too early otherwise there could have been riots going on. I don’t think they played particularly well, and they got helped a little bit along the way, I think. Of course, in the end they got demolished!
Talking of not being outstanding, England didn’t really perform, which was disappointing. They had good spells, but their final ball and finishing let them down in the end, and they really didn’t deserve to go through.
Unfortunately I had to get up in the middle of the night to watch them, which my girlfriend wasn’t too happy about, and didn’t exactly detract from the disappointment. It’s hard work having to get up the next day, but it’s the same for everyone over here in China and the Far East.
And the rest of the World Cup lived up to the hype for a change – it was really exciting with some special football, plenty of goals and the fans certainly seemed to enjoy it. Not much sleep, but it was all good.
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