Germany v Sweden * Argentina v Mexico * England v Ecuador * Portugal v Holland * Italy v Australia * Switzerland v Ukraine * Brazil v Ghana * Spain v France
Get ready for the business end of the World Cup! The real Germany 2006 starts here! I guarantee that commentators and anchormen will roll out such phrases around the world as the Round of 16 games kick off on Saturday.
Germany v Sweden is first up (KO 4pm BST, Munich), I expect the hosts to beat Sweden. As always, the Swedes saved their best performance for England and laboured against Paraguay and Trindad and Tobago. Their record against Germany isn't good - no win for the Scandinavians since 1978. The Germans look quite lively up front but a little shaky at the back and the match against Poland may well be a guide to the meeting with Sweden - both are solid sides with little cutting edge. If Zlatan Ibrahimovic is fit again for Sweden he can provide that one moment of the unexpected for Sweden although Germany should be OK if they can defend crosses and throw-ins better than the hapless English defence.
Saturday's later game (KO 8pm BST, Saturday, Leipzig) between Mexico and Argentina should be very interesting. The Mexicans will take heart from their draw against Argentina in the Confederations Cup last year when they only lost on penalties and haven't lost to them in their last three meetings. Having said that, the Mexicans looked less than impressive against Iran and Angola while Portugal were clearly the better team in their meeting in the last group game. There was a bit of an over-reaction to Argentina's thumping of Serbia & Montenegro but they are surely the better team and should progress.
On Sunday, the entirety of England will cram into pubs and living rooms everywhere (no doubt lobster-red from a spell of sunbathing in the morning) to see if England can play more than 45 minutes of good football against Ecuador. Ecuador's 3-0 win over Costa Rica is not quite as sensational as has been made out while their reserves getting duly humbled by Germany doesn't mean they are as bad as that result would suggest. Edison Mendez and Luis Antonio Valencia are impressively forceful wide midfielders while they have good strikers in Agustin Delgado, Ivan Kaviedes and Felix Borja. England should get through although they have been pretty unimpressive so far but it may be a game too far in Europe for the Ecuadorians.
Portugal v Holland (KO 8pm, Sunday, Nuremberg) should also be an entertaining match but in Luiz Felipe Scolari and Marco Van Basten they have two of the more prosaic managers in those two country's history. But both are dedicated to wing play and there will plenty of ball players on both sides. Unlike the match against Argentina where the Dutch record gave them plenty of encouragement, Holland have only beaten Portugal once in the last nine games (stretching back to 1991) and maybe this will be the year Portugal manage to reach the quarter finals for the first time since 1966.
Australia's reward for getting that memorable draw against Croatia is a second round meeting with Italy (Monday, Kaiserslautern, KO 4pm). Italy lost their heads against the USA but dealt with the challenge of Czechs easily enough. The new-ish strikers Gilardino, Toni and Iaquinta haven't quite gelled and Pippo Inzaghi and Alex Del Piero may be called on more readily than Marcello Lippi would have liked. Australia will give them a tough game and their confidence has grown with each game but surely the Italians will have too much quality for them. But if Australia do get a result we will all laugh heartily at the Italians.
Switzerland v Ukraine (Monday 8pm, Cologne) does not set the mouth watering - two largely defensive but neat teams playing a physical brand of European football. Andriy Shevchenko will be the best player on the pitch but has yet to really find his rhythm. Switzerland, despite qualifying from a relatively easy group, are an under-rated side with a solid (if young) defence and a clever midfield. Swiss main striker Alex Frei will need to find some more sharpness in front of goal if the Alpine nation are to have a comfortable Monday night.
The first game on Tuesday (Dortmund, KO 4pm) is one of the more exciting games: Brazil v Ghana. Ghana were toothless against Italy but superb against the Czechs. Brazil have stuttered so far but have managed to beat everyone they've faced. The Ghanaians have lost Michael Essien to suspension but see Sulley Muntari return - even if the Chelsea man was playing, it's unlikely that the Africans can beat Brazil. But their rugged and fluid midfield play should mean that they can create chances - but will they take them?
The last match up sees the least impressive big European team take on the most impressive - France v Spain (Hanover, 8pm). Thierry Henry looked good in France's defeat of Togo, and although that has been put down to the absence of Zinedine Zidane it's more likely that Togo didn't provide the stiffest of challenges. If those two can click (and there's no reason that they can) then France can challenge for the title. I hope not, because Spain look great and I have a colossal amount of money on David Villa as top scorer (£2). Packed with entertaining footballers it would be great for football if the Spanish can break their World Cup jinx and progress a long way.
