footballcircus: And the Fans go Wild!

It Thursday and that can only mean one thing - your brand new Football Circus is here. Right in the middle of World Cup season too - you lucky ducks. We've no shortage of stories to bring to you, with fans rather than players dominating Football Circus this week. We tell you about the sleep deprieved Chinese fan, the Spaniard who got lucky from his team's failure and the Irishman who is World Cup jersey crazy. We also look at a run in between Zlatan Ibrahimovic and a US reporter, check out our World Cup fantasy team's progress and of course provide your usual Mario Balotelli and Italian football news. Before we kick off, we're giving a special shout out this week to 12 year old Esker Celtic player Leo Finan from Lucan in Dublin - our newest and possibly youngest fan! We hope Leo and the rest of you scallywags enjoy this week's edition...

Chinese News Agency Blame World Cup for Death of Fan

A Chinese football fan has died this week and according to news agency Xinhua, it's all because of the World Cup.

Xinhua claim that the fan had stayed up for two consecutive nights to watch the World Cup live from Brazil. The twenty five year old man from the town of Suzhou near Shanhai, was allegedly found dead in front of his television by neighbours after the Spain-Holland match took place. Doctors have reportedly claimed that his death could well have been resultant from sleep deprivation. However they also claimed a heart attack may have been the cause of death - In which case, Spain's defence may have a lot more to answer for than they first thought. Remarkably, another Chinese fan died back in 2012 during the European Championships after going ELEVEN nights without sleep to watch the tournament.

In other Chinese-related World Cup news, the South China Morning Post has reported that some insurance companies in the country have sold 'drunk insurance' for the the World Cup, whereby the policyholder's medical fees will be covered should they be found to suffer from "acute intoxication". We can only imagine that insurance companies in certain other countries would go bust within weeks were they to introduce such frankly insane policies!

Spaniard Cashes in on National Team's Humiliation

Not many Spanish fans were in buoyant mood after their incredible 5-1 defeat against the Netherlands in their opening World Cup game. But there was one Spaniard who was cheering - 56 Jacobo Rios-Carape from Valencia. Rios Carape, an architect by trade, entered a competition run by a petrol company in Spanish newspaper Marca a number of weeks prior to the tournamnt kicking off. The premise of the competition? Simply predict the correct score and win €100,000 worth of free fuel. Little did he think that his pessimistic 5-1 prediction would net him the prize.

Rios-Carape, who is unlikely to ever need to pay for petrol again, had the following to say to the newspaper after his somewhat embarrassing victory:

"I was hoping that Spain would win, of course. I thought that if Holland were to beat us, it would be big, so I came up with the 5-1 scoreline, but I wasn’t convinced.

"Actually after, I thought it was outrageous and wouldn’t come true.

"Watching the game, I could not remember if I had guessed 1-4 or 1-5, so when we conceded the fifth I thought I had screwed up the ante. But I hadn’t, thankfully".

The fan, perhaps a little overcome by guilt and maybe even superstition, now said he would be betting in Spain's favour before their next match:

"It will be my personal revenge for the defeat to Holland.

"Tomorrow I’m going to fill up and I’ll bet that Spain beat Chile 5-1".

Hmm...did you really put that bet on Jacobo?

Zlatan Ibrahmiovic 1, TMZ 0

We made be wrought with regret that Football Circus regular Zlatan Ibrahimovic failed to make it to this year's World Cup, but alas, we can take solice in the fact that he's such grade A legend that the media won't leave him alone regardless.

Spotted outside Boa Steakhouse in L.A. where he was presumably holidaying and trying to unwind, American celebrity website / leeches TMZ approached the big man and tried to get a few words from him. What they got, was an entirely unimpressed Ibra and a few grunts to boot.

The reported began the interviewer in carcrash fashion, calling Zlatan, "Islan". Looking like he was ready to tear the reported a new one, Ibra refrained from answering TMZ's idiotic first question: "Is it hard watching the World Cup not being in it?". He then told the reporter that Landon Donovan's omission from the US squad was "his problem" when questioned about the matter. Finally, a clearly irritated Ibrahimovic was asked "Who do you think is gonna win the World Cup?". Walking away, Ibra sarcastically tells him "USA" but clarifies that this is a "big joke".

The Zlat. Don't mess with him.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rx15r7py2Uw

Football Jersey Enthusiast goes all out for World Cup

His home nation may not have qualified for the World Cup but Republic of Ireland man Kenneth McCoy has not let that fact dampen his World Cup spirits. The Dubliner has decided to go all out with his support for the 2014 World Cup...by donning a different jersey for each day of the tournament...for the group stages at least.

McCoy supports Aston Villa as well as own national team of course but loves the sport of football so much that he does not limit his jersey wearing to the jerseys of the Villains and Ireland. Charting his World Cup jersey escapades on his own Facebook page, McCoy has thus far stayed true to his 'jersey a day' word, displaying jerseys ranging from Brazil to Cameroon to USA.

The football fanatic claims to own jerseys for as many as 27 of the teams involved in the World Cup. He also states that he has a jersey representing a team that will be playing on every day that the group stage of the competition - And we may not be mathematical geniuses here at Football Circus but we're pretty sure that puts him in with a good chance of being able to wear the jersey of a team that's playing on every day of the competition in its entirety. McCoy has abundance of Dutch jerseys, seven in fact, but when asked by Football Circus to pick a winner of the competition, he plumped for Argentina.

You can follow Kenneth's progress on his Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/kenjay12/media_set?set=a.755908394447308.1073741825.100000844645106&type=1

What's Mad Mario Upto this Week?

In case you've been living under a rock for the past week, Balotelli has been making headlines for the right reasons for a change. Balo scored the winning goal in Italy's World Cup encounter with England, rising to meet teammate Antonio Candreva's cross to head the ball into the English net and silence some critics who may have faulted his enigmatic style. The goal, and by virtue the victory, put the Italians into a strong position in Group D and Balotelli and co. will be confident of progressing to the next round.

Since the match, Balotelli has been a busy boy, constantly posting new social media messages and photos. He made sure to thank both teammates and fans after his performance against England, with the following two tweets:

"Forza azzurri ! Continuimo così! Man of the match today so happy!A big Thanks to my team mates!".

"For all those ones that always support me, believe in me, and understand me. This is for you all! Thanks…".

Super Mario also uploaded some photos he took from airplanes whilst travelling in Brazil and made known the fact that he was overawed by the beautiful views and scenery. But our two favourite Balotelli uploads of the week come in the form of Instagram and Facebook photos - One being a water melon sculpture of Balo, the second, being a photo Balotelli seemingly designed himself prior to the England match. The downright bizarre photo post on Balotelli's official Facebook page, was accompanied by the tagline "Redesigned for victory". Right you are Mario.

Italian Football Story of the Week

- Baresi backs Prandelli-led Italians for Success

Legendary Italy and AC Milan defender Franco Baresi has gone on record to state his belief that a Cesare Prandelli managed Italian side will go on to great things at this year's World Cup. Having watched the Azzuri defeat England in their opening game, Baresi, who missed a penalty in Italy's shootout which they lost to Brazil in the final of the 1994 World Cup, told Il Mattino:

"I really like the ideas that Prandelli has for this Italy team.

"We are trying to keep the ball and control the game that way.

"The Italy-England game was the best of the World Cup so far, for me – as well as Spain-Netherlands of course!

"We look really strong in midfield. With De Rossi, Pirlo and Verratti there is great quality in the middle of the park – that’s our great strength.

"Now we just have to focus on the Costa Rica game and try to gain passage into the next round.

"The World Cup is as tough as it gets. We just have to focus on the next game, and that’s it. Anything else would just be a mistake".

World Cup Fantasy Football Team and Predictions

- Football Circus World Cup 2014 Fantasy Football Team

We've had a quick glance at our fantasy team's progression and we're suitably impressed at how poorly they've been doing. With the exception of Captain Fantastic, Mr. Balotelli, our bunch of clowns have failed to accumulate a single goal between them. FIFA.com accredit them with, as of writing this (prior to England-Uruguay second round match kick-off), a wholly underwhelming 58 points. They also rank the Football Circus boys 581,626th in the world. Granted, the website doesn't bloody tell you exactly how many people are participating in the competition worldwide, but we're quietly confident we're ranking pretty badly nonetheless.

- Football Circus 10 World Cup Predictions

Just to recap on our 10 predictions of last week:

1. Italy to progress to at least the quarter-finals with Mario Balotelli scoring at least two goals along the way
2. Kevin Grosskreutz to do something stupid
3. The Dutch squad to have a massive falling out
4. The French squad to have a massive falling out
5. Wayne Rooney to be pants
6. Cristiano Ronaldo to finally make an impact at the World Cup
7. Javier Mascherano to be sent off
8. Spain to relinquish their crown as champions
9. At least one team to blame poor performance on the heat
10. Julio Cesar to cry

Thus far, we can smugly state that number 8 has already proven correct and we're optimistic that number 1 will happen and numbers 5 and 10 will still pull through. We're a little on the nervous side about numbers 3, 4 and 6 - the perennial in-fighters seem a bit too chilled for our liking and Ronaldo seems to be bottling on the big stage again. Next week we should have a few more answers.

Artist's Impression of the Week

- 'Balotelli Redesigns the World Cup Trophy'.

Football Recommendation of the Week

- Panini Cheapskates; We think this is bloody brilliant. A lad and his other half have decided that collecting all 639 stickers for this year's Panini World Cup sticker album is far too much of a financial burden. So they've taken it upon themselves to DRAW each an every one instead. You can check out their progress by clicking the link below to their blog.

http://paninicheapskates.wordpress.com/