If you're new to international football, you ought to know that this is typical for the first round of games at the group stage in pretty much any World Cup. The venue is huge, teams are afraid, and they haven't played together at high level in months, maybe years. So it's normal that the first match be reserved for "studying" one's own game as well as the opponent's.
Surely enough, we've seen a lot of fine individual plays and even a few exciting minutes of football here and there... but by and large we're far from how World Cup games can (and will) be like.
Below is my quick, down-and-dirty assessment of the fourteen teams who've played so far in the first three days of the South African mundial.
Typical home-team syndrome: want everything, want it now, think they can actually win. If they get lucky, like South Korea in 2002, they may just do something important. Otherwise, they're a rather forgettable team as seen against Mexico.
Mexico
Its first half against SA has been by far the best football seen so far, but they didn't close a game they should have dominated and in the distance they lost both skill and focus. A potential big-time outsider if they get their game straight.
Uruguay
The ghost of the highly technical, strongly physical team that nearly upset Italy in 1990. An uninspired, uninteresting formation that needed no more than its moderate technical means to stop an equally dumbfounded France.
France
The team that shouldn't be here (after Henry's handball against Ireland in the last qualifying match) confirms that it really shouldn't be here. Italian sports newspaper Gazzetta puts it best by wondering "who's supposed to score in this team?" More than that--who's supposed to do anything?
South Korea
Along with Mexico, the most convincing team so far. Their strength is teamwork, like in 2002, but what they have learned since is some skill and a more refined sense of tactics (as also witnessed by the fact that they're the only Asian team to have an Asian coach). They even have the star player in Manchester UTD's Park Ji-Sung. My money is on them to pass in group B with Argentina.
Greece
Might it just have been a bad game? One hopes so, or this team isn't going anywhere. They too are like the ghosts of the tough, skilled, and lucky players who brought home the controversial 2004 European Cup. Maybe their German coach Rehhagel really has exhausted his good luck.
Nigeria
Hard to judge. When they played, they played well; but they were dominated by Argentina for most of the game. Still, with the exception perhaps of Martins, they're light-years from the Eagles who knocked out Spain and (almost) Italy in 1994. But that's only natural.
Argentina
An offensive wonder who... wanders. Against the clunky Nigerian defense they should have scored six. Yes, the Nigerian keeper was in a state of grace, but Messi and (most of all) a horrid Higuain were simply imprecise. None the less, Veron and Messi are inspired and even the defense is kind-of holding, so with more cynicism in the box their ticket to the semis is already printed.
England
A Capello team, for better and worse. By far the most mature and Cup-ready team so far, and yet not quite as concrete as they should be. Never mind Green's mishap: they didn't kill the game when they could (and boy, could they!) and the American goal was in the air anyway.
United States
A game of surprising strength against an all-around better prepared England. They kept playing their game and seriously endangered Green's goal in more than a few occasions. Given as the MLS is currently in session, their physical condition might just be their best weapon (yes, only five play in the MLS, but they're also five key players).
Algeria, Slovenia, Ghana, Serbia
By far the two most utterly boring games seen so far, so not much to say about these. In the case of Ghana and Serbia, we know this isn't their best. Ghana got plain lucky in a game that shouldn't have awarded more than one point each. Hoping to see better/more next time.
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