WHEREIN THE ANTICLIMACTIC NATURE OF THE WORLD CUP BECOMES OBVIOUS

[Torres makes his way home after winning the World Cup: I know I'm not the only one who got extra close to my screen in order to figure out what was on his laptop.

Someone call the creeper police.]

World Cup finals always feel oddly anticlimactic. Maybe it's because every movement becomes so deliberate that the whole match seems to be going in slow motion. Maybe it's because the sense of occasion is so immediately apparent to everyone that surreality enters the picture. Like, is this real life? Another World Cup final? But it looks like a normal match. The grass is still green and aside from Shakira jaunting about in a bikini top and some extensive hand-shaking taking place before kick-off, everything looks the same.

Whatever the reason, the urge to play that free-flowing, 'let's-get-up-there-and-score-a-goal-already!' football has dissipated by the time the World Cup final rolls around. It's a wholly different affair -- as it should be. At this point, the urge to watch that kind of football has left you entirely as well. Foolishly chucking the ball at the goal 'just 'cause' would not longer be put into the 'harmlessly ambitious' category. It would be downright inexcusable now. The time for mistakes -- an adventurous kind of football -- is gone.

Despite the slightly subdued sights on the field though, the tension is always there. It's what renders the weary sort of football we see at World Cup finals bearable. Enjoyable, even. Every time anyone makes a run into the final third or a free kick is given: is this it?! Is this going to be the goal that will live on in highlight reels for all time?

Sigh! No, Ramos misses. And the whole game seems to go on like that.

Simultaneously, and sort of ironically, it's that sense of something always about to happen that kind of, well, ruins it too. You're no longer able to just sit back and enjoy things anymore. Nothing's ever really a genuine surprise. Everything is so hotly anticipated that when it happens a small voice in the back of your mind cries, 'Well it's about fucking time!' When Dutch Kung Fu master Nigel de Jong launches an MMA style high kick into Xabi Alonso's chest, you think, 'Well, the way this was going... that was bound to happen.'