Played One. Drawn None.

And so every team has taken a bow. And a long, loud plastic tube has taken the headlines.

Complaints about the vuvuzela have been embarrassing. The World Cup is in South Africa. That's what the fans over there use when watching football. Deal with it.

Complaints about the quality of the football have been justified. Balls flying miles over bars. Free kicks blasted into walls. Posts slapped. Crossbars shuddered. If it wasn't for goalkeeping errors, the scorers and statisticians would have been even less troubled. Either way, the tournament thus far will have failed to draw non-football fans to their television sets.

Picking a potential winner from the bones of a first round skinny on skills is tricksy. It's easy to big-up the Germans, but just as easy to put-down the aged Aussies they thrashed. Brazil weren't exhilarating against a team many expected them to rack up a cricket score against. My tip, the Dutch, looked bright, but who could fail to in that incendiary orange.

An inauspicious start then. Here's hoping things open up, nets fill up, and people shut up moaning about the background noise.