Last day at the office……

 Well it’s finally here, my last day of work for the next 12 weeks…. It’s been a long time coming and there were times when I wasn’t sure it would actually arrive, but now it’s here. I’m not going to say that I will miss the work, cos I’m a “work-to-live” kinda guy, but I will miss the people, especially my team. It was great have a few drinks with them this evening, and the world’s worst game of table tennis, but I have left them in good hands and I can unplug from work and enjoy my time away.

Fiona and I will not be flying to Santiago on the first leg of trip until Tuesday morning, but I have metric-tonne of things that I need to do, the least of which is packing…!

Now, where is my passport...?

Ticket Update – Final

So last week marked the end of the main ticketing push for us, with the ‘Last Minute’ Sales phase opening for business on the 15^th April. Both Yates and I were prepped and ready at our computers when the sales phase went live, which was no mean feat as it was 3:00am in the morning for Yates, and 10:00pm for me in New Zealand.

Sadly, even though we were both trying to access the website from the second it opened, we were both unable to get on to the site for almost an hour, by which time all the tickets at the last remaining match we were after had already gone..!

There is still hope though….

At past events, there has been a facility to get tickets that are returned before the match kicks off, so we are hopeful that this option may be available to us. Finally, the last hope of the desperate is being able to scalp tickets locally from the venue. We have had surprising level of success in the past, but obviously this is usually a more expensive option and generally seen as being illegal…! I am still convinced that it will be very difficult, but not impossible, to get tickets this way, especially as it is the opening game featuring the hosts Brazil…!

So where does that leave us in terms of tickets? Here are the games for which we have tickets:

Match 7 - Fortaleza - Uruguay v Costa Rica

Match 17  - Fortaleza - Brazil v Mexico

Match 29 - Fortaleza - Germany v Ghana

Match 38 - Greece v Ivory Coast

Match 51 - Winner of Group B v 2nd in Group A

Match 56 - Winner of Group H v 2nd in Group G

Match 59 - Winner of M51 v Winner of M52

The later matches in our schedule look like they could turn out to be interesting fixtures. Right now the teams that are most likely to move forward from Groups A & B include teams such as Brazil, Mexico, Spain & Holland, and any combination of those 4 teams would make for an exciting match. The teams most likely to progress out of Groups H & G are a bit more difficult to predict, but could include any 2 of the following 6 teams; Germany, USA, Portugal, Belgium, South Korea & Russia.

So we are getting close now…… For Fiona & I it is only 27 days until we start on our trip with a flight to Santiago Chile. 18 days later we will meet up with Yates in Sao Paulo, which is just 6 days before the whole tournament kicks-off…. 

Ticketing Update 2

Even more good news, Yates has managed to pick up 4 tickets for Match 17, the clash between Brazil vs Mexico, which should be pretty epic....

That now make 7 matches that we have tickets for, with only the opening match between Brazil & Croatia left to get. We will be keeping our fingers crossed that we can either get these tickets in the final pre-tournament last minute sales phase, or even scalp some tickets when we get to Sao Paulo.

By my calculation, Fiona & I have less than 56 days before we board the plane at the start of next adventure, and only 73 days until we meet up with Yates in Sao Paulo....

Feel the excitement building yet...?

Ticketing Update

So here is a quick Ticketing update...

We have been lucky in the 2nd phase lottery, and now have tickets for some of the later stage games in Fortaleza & Salvador, (M51, M56 & M59). We were unlucky with two of the earlier games, but I am not really surprised, as both of those games feature Brazil.

We are getting ready for the next, first-come-first-served ticketing round that start on the 12th March, and hopeful that we can both get online at the right time, and score us the tickets we are after...

More news to come....

Welcome to a new World Cup year…..

I hope everyone had a restful Christmas and are looking forward to everything that 2014 has to offer…. 

Back in December 2013, the World Cup draw took place and the final 32 team and their groups have been determined. Some interesting pairings have come to light in the first round of the competition, such as Spain v Holland, England v Italy & Germany v Portugal.

 

Of the teams we will be following next year, I think the USA will have the toughest start in Group G, along with Germany, Ghana & Portugal. All the matches in the ‘Group or Death’, are going to be interesting, and I have no idea which of the 4 teams will make it out of that group, and USA will be doing very well if they can be in the top 2 of that group. England have fared a bit better with their slot in Group D, along with Italy, Uruguay & Costa Rica, and if they can scrape a win & 2 draws, that would probably be enough to progress. Finally, with no New Zealand this time around, Australia will one of the teams I will be rooting for next year. The Australians will also have their work cut out, sharing group B with Spain, Holland & Chile, and will really need to ‘punch-above-their-weight’ to make it through to the Group of 16 round. 

Now that the draw has been made we know which teams will meet in the initial group stages of the tournament. Yates & I have ordered and received some of the match tickets we are after for Brazil, and we now know who will be playing in all group stage matches we want to get tickets for:  

·         Match 1 - Sao Paulo - Brazil v Croatia

·         Match 7 - Fortaleza - Uruguay v Costa Rica

·         Match 17  - Fortaleza - Brazil v Mexico

·         Match 29 - Fortaleza - Germany v Ghana

·         Match 38 - Greece v Ivory Coast

 Note

-          We already have tickets for the matches highlighted in  BOLD

-          There are 3 matches in the later stages which we are trying to get tickets for as well

It’s always a heap of fun trying to get tickets for World cup matches, especially now that the draw has been made, it makes getting tickets for games with Brazil in almost impossible to get… Them is the breaks…! We are well into the 3^rd Sales phase right now, which is another ballot process, and we will not find out the results until early in February. The 4^th ticketing phase starts on the 26^th February and the tickets for that are sold on a “first-come-first-served” basis, so Yates & I will need to be at our computers with Credit cards in hand as soon as that phase starts. There is a 5^th phase in April, and after that it is pretty much only ticket returns.

I will update everyone on our progress with tickets over the coming couple of months, check back to see what we get… 

The great thing about it being 2014 at last is that it is starting to feel like the big trip is finally getting closer. It’s now less than 147 days until the tournament kicks off, and only 135 days until Fiona & I get on a plane bound for South America…. It can’t come quick enough…

Prediction Review 2

So its all over.... The qualification rounds for the 2014 World Cup are now complete and the final 32 teams are as follows: -

Honduras / Mexico / Ghana / Ivory Coast / Algeria / Nigeria / Uruguay / Colombia / Chile / Ecuador / Belgium / Germany / Switzerland / Portugal / Greece / England / Spain / Bosnia / Russia / Cameroon / France / Sweden / Croatia

The teams in green above are the ones I failed to predict to make it through, but overall I am happy that got the majority right.

Sad to see that New Zealand could not turn-around the 5-1 drubbing they took at the hands of the Mexicans, in the 2nd leg of their play-off, but they gave it a good try and will now have to start looking forward to the World Cup Qualification for Russia in 2018.

Now we have to wait until Friday 6th December when the World Cup Final Draw will take place in Costa do Sauipe in the Brazilian state of Bahia. This is when we, and the rest of the the world, will find out who will be playing who, in the Group Stages of the tournement.

 

After the Final Draw, the 3rd Ticketing Sales Phase starts on the 8th December, which will be another lottery style draw for tickets. So far, Yates & I have only managed to get 3 sets of tickets in the 1st Sales Phase, and none at all in the 2nd Phase, so we are hoping to pick up the remaining 5 sets of tickets that we are after in this next phase.

 

So far we have tickets to the following :

• Match 7 - 14th June - D1 v D2 - Estadio Castelao, Fortaleza
• Match 29 - 21st June - G1 v G3 - Estadio Castelao, Fortaleza
• Match 38 - 23rd June - C2 v C3 - Estadio Castelao, Fortaleza

After the 6th December I will be able to tell you which teams we will be watching with the above tickets, and the game we are trying to get tickets for.

 

Only 203 days until the World Cup in Brazil gets underway. The good news is that it is only 180 days until Fiona & I start the first leg of trip, heading fro Santiago, Chile....

 

Can't bloody wait....

Prediction Review

So, how did I do on my prediction from the last blog post, of which teams would progress to the World Cup Finals next year…?  

The teams below in Red qualified and each of the remaining team all have a change to make it through the play-off in November:  

Honduras / Mexico / Tunisia / Ghana / Ivory Coast / Algeria / Nigeria / Uruguay / Colombia / Chile / Ecuador / Belgium / Germany / Switzerland / Portugal / Greece / Ukraine / England / Spain / Bosnia / Russia / Sweden 

NB. Only one of either Portugal & Sweden will make it through, as they have been drawn to play each other in one of the European play-offs. I also missed on the fact that both Iceland & Croatia would make it through to the play-off’s, so one of them will make it. 

The upcoming play-off fixtures are as follows, (the team underlined is my prediction to win over the 2-legs):  

 

Iceland v Croatia

Portugal v Sweden

Ukraine v France

Greece v Romania 

Burkino Faso v Algeria

Ivory Coast v Senegal

Ethiopia v Nigeria

Tunisia v Cameroon

Ghana v Egypt

Jordan v Uruguay

Mexico v New Zealand

 

I really hate tipping Mexico to progress at the expence of New Zealand, but I still can't see how NZ can win over 2-legs against Mexico. If they manage to beat Mexico, it will be a massive upset and I'll be grinning from ear-to-ear....