From: Hildegaard Beauregard [ljlife@yahoo.com]
Sent: Friday, June 14, 2002 2:41 AM
To: Lee Jerome Life
Subject: Japan wins group

Reporting from World Cup Watch Central.

Group H leader Japan pulled away at the finish of the
group stage with a rousing 2-0 win over Tunisia,
adding the group win prestige to their historic
achievement of advancing to the knock-out stage.
Hiroaki Morishima scored in the 48th minute, and
Hidetoshi Nakata in the 75th. The first Asian World
Cup is also the first World Cup to be co-hosted, and
Japan has so far kept up their half of the host
advantage that has been a factor in World Cup history.

With only second place, but a place in the next round,
to play for, Belgium overtook Russia in the group with
a 3-2 victory, continuing the trend this week in the
last set of group matches of the 3rd-place team
jumping over the 2nd to advance. Belgium got a goal
from Johan Walem in the 7th minute. Russia did not
answer until the 52nd, with Vladimir Beschastnyk. Then
Belgium's Wesley Sonck and Marc Wilmots scored in a
4-minute span beginning in the 78th minute. Russia's
Dmitri Sychev scored in the 88th minute to continue
the late flurry, and Russia had several chances going
even into injury time, but could not get an equalizer
that would have kept them ahead of Belgium on group
points.

Japan will face Turkey in the round of 16, while
Belgium must go up against Brazil.

Two hours from now, Korea will try to keep up their
half of the home factor, in another tight group
finish. With Korea in first place facing third-place
Portugal, and second-place U.S.A. facing already
eliminated Poland, any of the top three can still win
the group or be eliminated.

I have now set up a page on the web where you can go
to check the complete schedule and record of matches
at any time or see these reports. From the main web
page, Fixion, here:

http://www.excitingland.com/fixion

take the link heading "World Cup Watch" under "Center
Ring." That page also contains a link to FIFA's (the
sport's international administrative body) official
web site for the World Cup, as well as some other fun
facts to know and tell.

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