On this basis, I predicted Germany to win but I had not looked that the player composition of all the teams carefully. Now I have done that on the team that played on that night:

World Cup semi-finals (7th July 2010)
Germany – 4 players (including subs) are from Bayern Munich
Spain – 7 players (Barcelona); 3 players (Real Madrid)

Based on these facts; the Spain should have been predicited.
Spain beat Germany 1:0 on 7th July 2010

Lets look forward to the

World Cup Final (Uruguay vs Germany) 10th July 2010

Germany to win as it has the player core based around the Bayern Munich players of Lahm, Schweinsteiger, Klose & Muller (4 players).
Uruguay does not have a core of players from the same club.

World Cup Final (Holland vs Spain) 11th July 2010
Spain to win – 7 players (Barcelona) and 3 players (Real Madrid)

Prediction:
- Germany to beat Uruguay
- Spain to win 2010 World Cup in South Africa

Dr Michael Oon

Background Information:
Football Teams World Cup 2010 – Players and Clubs

Holland (6th July 2010)
Maarten Stekelenburg (Ajax).
Khalid Boulahrouz (Stuttgart)
John Heitinga (Everton)
Joris Mathijsen (Hamburg)
Giovanni van Bronckhorst (Feyenoord)
Mark van Bommel (Bayern Munich)
Demy de Zeeuw (Ajax)
Arjen Robben (Bayern Munich)
Wesley Sneijder (Internazionale)
Dirk Kuyt (Liverpool)
Robin van Persie (Arsenal)
Subs
Rafael van der Vaart (Real Madrid)
Eljero Elia (Hamburg)

Uruguay (6th July 2010)
Fernando Muslera (Lazio)
Maxi Pereira (Benfica)
Diego Godin (Villarreal)
Mauricio Victorino (Universidad de Chile)
Martin Caceres (Juventus)
Diego Perez (Monaco)
Walter Gargano (Napoli)
Edigio Arevalo (Penarol)
Alvaro Pereira (Porto)
Diego Forlan (Atletico Madrid)
Edinson Cavani (Palermo)
Subs
Sebastian Abreu (Botafogo)
Sebastian Fernandez (Banfield)

Germany (7th July 2010)
Manuel Neuer (Schailke 04)
Philipp Lahm (Bayern Munich)
Arne Friedrich (Wolfsburg)
Per Mertesacker (Werder Breman)
Jerome Boateng (Manchester City)
Bastian Schweinsteiger (Bayern Munich)
Sami Khadira (Stuttgart)
Piotr Trochowski (Hamburg)
Mesut Özil (Warder Bremen)
Lukas Podolski (Koln)
Miroslav Klose (Bayern Munich)
Subs: Jansen (Hamberg)
Kroos (Bayern Munich)

Spain (7th July 2010)
Iker Casillas (Real Madrid)
Sergio Ramos (Real Madrid)
Gerard Pique (Barcelona)
Carles Puyol (Barcelona)
Joan Capdevila (Villareal)
Xabi Alonso (Real Madrid)
Sergio Busquets (Barcelona)
Pedro (Barcelona)
Xavi (Barcelona)
Andres Iniesta (Barcelona)
David Villa (Barcelona)

He gave me a very simple rule to predict the next winning team. The winning team will have the nucleus from a single football club where the players know instinctly the actions of their fellow team-mates. This saves them fractions of seconds in their actions and gives the team the winning touch.

For example

The 1966 winners, the England team was built around Moore, Peters and Hurst who were members of West Ham United.
The 1970 winners, the Brazil Team was built around Pele and members of the Santos Football club

He said that as players now played in many different clubs and countries, it was more difficult to find this combination but when it happens, you will know the winner.

The current Germany Football team, is built around Bayern Munich players – Schweinsteiger, Lahm, Muller, Gomez and Klose.

They have defeated England 4-1 and Argentina 4-0 – these are remarkable performances in itself.

Using this criteria, I going to stick my neck out and going predict, Germany will win the 2010 World Cup.

Mind you, I have not looked that the compositions of the other teams but, they have not been impressive or cohesive as a team.

Dr Michael Oon

I have been following England in Football as I see it as a reflection of society. Having lived in England for more than a couple decades, I see the same constant repetition of human behaviour before and after England’s World Cup experience. This is neatly summarised by Simon Kupar and Stefan Szymanski in their book “Why England Lose”.  Iain Dale’s Diary

The performance in the 2010 World Cup in South Africa was so bad and it hardly resembled the pre-match publicity. The England Football Team did well in the qualifying rounds and it was assumed that, because of the talent they had, it would do well in the competition. They had beaten Germany in Berlin by 2-1 in a friendly in 2008.

However, developments occur when England was “sitting on their laurels”.

An article describes how the Germany team was transformed after a serious injury to a key player Michael Ballack at the FA Cup Final.

We are currently in an age of instant communication, as soon as you do something different at any major event, the information is available instantly on the internet throughout the world. Using the example of the World Cup, the performance of each team is instantly available to all to see.

The World Cup is a competition and the team with a competitive advantage will have a better chance of progressing up the competition. This is just like in the business world or in nature.

Having watched England play in the qualification matches and the World Cup, the overall pattern of play seemed similar to me. If you were a potential opponent, you would know how to counter this method of play.

The point I am making is in a competitive environment, we should change or adapt to the changing situation that is happening around us. This is the Darwinism – adapt or die. This is what the German Squad did, they adapted to the new situation. Their opponents (England) did not know how to handle the situation.

However, with regards to the FA choosing Fabio Capello, as I understand it, he has the distinction of winning the domestic league title of every club he has coached. His specialism is league football but is he good at knock-out tournaments? It is a different mindset where change or adaptation is required to have a competitive advantage for the moment.

The type of manager England should be looking for one who has an adaptable mindset. A person who is prepared to change with the situation. I do not know enough about football managers but perhaps one whose mindset adapts to the situation – a translator becoming a successful manager – Jose Mourinho or someone with an adaptable mindset.

The issue is with the FA board of directors, do they want to change? Or else, England will be just repeating the same old process as described in Iain Dale’s Diary

I had a look at the feng shui aspects of the FA head office in Wembley, I do not see anything about change, it is more about insecurity. With this insecurity, it goes back on relying on tradition; this is how we have did it before. There starts another cycle.

Dr Michael Oon

It has been reported that the FIFA President Sepp Blatter and World Cup 2010: Blatter apologises for disallowed goal

has apologised to the English FA over the disallowed goal in the England – Germany match . FIFA will open discussions on technology in the July meeting.

Initially, FIFA were adamant that there was no point discussing about Goal line technology because…………………there was a long list of objections.

However, Frank Lampard’s disallowed goal has clearly shown it to be a referee’s mistake because he did not clearly see it. Technology would have allowed him access to the information. As a result, the credibility of FIFA has been affected severely.

The point of this post? – the available technology has changed the rules of everything from football to politics. It is transparency that is changing everything.

It’s transparency stupid!

Dr Michael Oon