Word: nigerias
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...France, Argentina and Portugal are not the only sides to have provided insufficient entertainment. Overshadowed by the fall of the European and South American giants was the dismal showing by the principal African challengers. Cameroon and Nigeria came into the tournament fully expecting to make the last eight, and perhaps go even further. Nigerian coach Adegboye Onigbinde and Cameroonian captain Rigobert Song each boasted that his side would fulfill, if belatedly, PelE's old prophesy that an African team would win the cup in the 20th century. Instead, both sides suffered early shocks and then exited with bad grace, Cameroon...
...lime-green shirt and runs, roaring, to strike a pose in front of his countrymen. Carefully, almost reverently, he places the shirt on the turf like an offering to the faithful. His fans bang bongos and clank cymbals and bellow right back. But hold on?aren't Nigeria's Super Eagles out of the World Cup, first-round casualties, winging their way back to Africa and ignominy? Not in Thailand, where they have firmed as favorites after a 6-1 trouncing of Japan in last week's opening match of the 1st Klong Prem Central Prison World...
...plays it, and Thailand's jailhouse version has all the ingredients of the genuine article: passion, pain and simply the opportunity to exult in the beauty of the game. "This is our chance to salvage some national pride?and some pride in ourselves as men," says Jovenal Prince, Nigeria's strapping midfield general and team captain. He's 35, and has spent more than a third of his life behind the bars of Thailand's biggest prison. "One day starts to feel exactly like the one before," he says. "You start to feel like a caged animal. So our World...
...Teams of seven, with three substitutes, were chosen by prison staff to represent Nigeria, Japan, the U.S., Italy, France, England, Germany and Thailand. Games comprise two 20-minute halves on an approximately half-sized pitch. Only inmates nearing the end of their sentences, in good health, with sound behavior records?and some ability with a football?were considered for selection. The winners won't be granted anything as extravagant as their freedom?merely jail-bragging rights and a passable copy of the real World Cup trophy made of wood in the prison workshop...
...Each of the teams is led out by the silicone jiggle of a "ladyboy" (Thailand's English term for transsexuals) to the off-key oom-pah-pahs of the prison brass band. Stubble shows through sweat-beaded pancake as the transsexuals teeter in stiletto heels on the turf. Miss Nigeria has an Afro wig, Miss England a ball gown and crown. Miss Japan is mincing in a kimono. Miss America has a jerry-rigged hula skirt that threatens to fall down. A thick papier-machE chain is snipped with giant scissors, and its two halves waft skyward, borne by rafts...