David O'Byrne saw the Turkey outdo all World Cup expectations despite Hakan Sukur's baleful influence

Before the start of the World Cup, few Turks had ex­pec­ted their team to last as far as the semi-finals. After the first two group matches, that number had shrunk con­siderably. As a scenario of failure, relinquishing a one-goal lead not once but twice had a distinctly familiar ring. A decade of senselessly chucking away pro­m­ising positions was capped last November when Turkey gifted Sweden two goals in the last three min­utes of the final qualifying match, leaving them to face a play-off against Austria.

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The World Cup produced some truly awful TV. Cameron Carter relives the BBC's late-night shocker, while Barney Ronay laments the humiliation of Paul Gascoigne

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I admit it doesn’t take too much to appear the clever one in a broadcasting partnership with Denise van Outen or Kelly Brook, but Johnny Vaughan has been funny and will be funny again (like our plucky England team, he’s relatively young). It is, however, becoming increasingly difficult to find people who still believe this. Like his recent sitcom ’Orrible, Johhny Vaughan’s World Cup Extra provided fewer moments of pleasure than a motivational talk from a reformed crack addict.

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Uli Hesse-Lichtenberger explains why Rudi Völler's battlers were different from their predecessors, and how they made him care about the national side again

Sometime around a quarter to three on Friday, June 21, I caught myself slowly and silently rocking back and forth. Even my son, a nervous chatterbox less than two hours earlier, was very quiet. He is only 12, and at that age it’s not only normal to support your national team but perhaps even, well, healthy. So I kept my mouth shut because there was nothing positive to say and I didn’t want to foster a cynical image by saying something negative. All the more so since there were plenty of other people already doing that.

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Many Irish fans seem to think Mick McCarthy's squad did pretty well to reach the last 16. Paul Doyle says they should have higher standards

The Japanese World Cup organising committee vo­ted Ireland’s fans the best of the tournament, and yes, the Green Army spread the word craic with great gusto. But were all Irish supporters a “credit to their nation”? What, for example, are we to make of the 100,000 who gathered with giddy delight in Dublin’s Phoenix Park to greet Mick McCarthy’s “heroes” on their return home? What were these strange folks saying about their country’s ambitions? Perhaps it was something like: “Anything above na­ked humilation will do for us.”

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This time there was no one else to blame, but that hasn't stopped some people believing England are on the verge of something great. Cris Freddi begs to differ

No need for a blow-by-blow: we all saw the same tour­­nament. When England managed to protect a lead, they had shape and substance. When they didn’t, it wasn’t pretty. Denmark self-destructed and Nigeria didn’t matter, but Argentina was one of the great ones, a spookily complete payback. No coincidence, surely, that it was played under cover, in con­trolled conditions – and that it bucketed down for Den­mark.

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