I have to say that I did a terrible thing before the World Cup started, no I didn't buy those ticket off Robbie Earle. I wrote off the Germans. Yep, just put a line through them and thought "no, can't have 'em". How wrong I was and it certainly cost me a few bob. But you can't help admiring just what they did in this World Cup. With their brand of counter-attacking football they were a breath of fresh air and provided one client with his bet of the tournament in their Quarter-Final ass-whopping of Argentina. After buying Germany Score 4+ and win at 1.5 for £100 (market awards 25pts if score is correct at half-time and 50pts if score is correct at full-time) not even Paul the Octopus would've predicted such a scoreline as this young German side ran riot against Messi and co. Thomas Muller opened the scoring after three minutes and that's how it stayed until Miroslav Klose doubled the lead, Arne Friedrich trebled it and Klose finished it with his second (two thirds as many goals as he got in the Bundesliga in this game alone). The striker's 89th minute goal was enough to unlock those 50 prized points and a profit of £4,850. "Germany, Germany, above all..." (for a bit anyway).

This World Cup hasn't produced many classic games to join the likes of Brazil v Italy (82), Portugal v North Korea (66), even England v Cameroon (90). But one of the few that will live in the memory will be the Uruguay v Africa Quarter-Final extraordinaire. One punter will have felt a comedown of Glastonbury proportions after buying the Total Goal Minutes in extra time before the game started at 35 for £25. With the whole continent behind Ghana, the football world was desperate for Pele's immortal statement about an African team winning the World Cup to finally become a reality. After an engrossing and bad tempered 90 minutes in which Sulley 'the strop' Muntari struck a long range opener only to be cancelled out by Diego 'should've done better in his career' Forlan's free-kick (yes a World Cup 2010 free-kick), the client had got his extra time call home. Remember a goal in say, the last minute of extra-time would make-up 120 minutes not just 30, so our man was now playing for big money. The dangerous Asamoah Gyan had a couple of chances but nothing prepared the footballing world for what happened next as in the last seconds of ET, Appiah then Adiyiah had their shots blocked by Luis Suarez on the line. The second block now the most infamous in tournament history. Gyan stepped up, the swing was £2,400. It was either m/u 0 or 120. Let Marcel Desailly explain what happened.

F1 Special Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button head into the British Grand Prix in first and second place in the Drivers Championship. But whilst Hamilton was the pre-season favourite at 25-28 on our Drivers Championship Index, Button started out unfancied at 13-16 and is still some way back from Hamilton (at 26-29). Whilst the man on the good side of this girl is currently out on his own at 39-42 with danger man, Sebastian Vettel right up his exhaust.

As Hamilton, Vettel and Button have seen their stock go up, Michael Schumacher has not been able to live up to the hype surrounding his return. The seven-time World Champion started amongst the favourites at 23-26 but has not finished higher than fourth this season and has seen his price slump to 0-0.5. Many believe Schumacher has lost his edge but old rival Damon Hill reckons he can't be written off (and Damon knows a thing or two about old Schuey) – "Just never write the guy off. I made that mistake." Indeed he did.


YouTube Based Banter

Here's summariser and former Spain coach Jose Antonio Camacho getting rather excited about a Spain goal. I don't think I ever saw Trevor Brooking behave like this.

It's the Tour de France at the moment and Aussie rider Cadel Evans is very protective about his dog.