Copa Crackers

The Copa America has started, and so far we've had great goals, shocking misses, Brazilian babes in the stands and enough cliches about South American football to make you want to samba dance to the nearest carnival with a Colombian flag painted on your body and wearing a massive hat.

But we love it don't we? Why not stay up half the night and watch Trevor Francis and Lawrie Sanchez mispronounce the name of that Bolivian left back over and over again? Or listen to the commentators talking about a game in Venezuela whilst sat in their cosy London studio, seemingly watching it on a black and white portable. 'Oh and, he's going to book the Ecudorian for diving, er, yes, no, it's a penalty. Penalty for Ecuador, and the Chileans don't like that, no, they're protesting, er, in a sort of wall formation. Oh, it's a free kick, yes it's a free kick. Real chance here for Chile, er I mean Ecuador.'

To be fair though, Sky were never going to fly out their team for a three week jolly in South America were they? They don't even send them out to Spain to watch La Liga. But what is broadcast is enjoyable and a good watch for those counting down the days to the start of the season.

The major drawback of course is the time difference, with matches taking place roughly between midnight and 4am GMT. It is here that you discover just what Sky+ was invented for. You can record the games and then easily skip through the boring bits the next day.

Not that there's been many boring bits so far. We've seen Peru hammer Uruguay, an entertaining draw between hosts Venezuela and Bolivia, Chile beat Ecuador 3-2 with two late goals and a woeful Brazil go down 2-0 to Mexico.

There seems to be a magic spell cast over us when we talk about Brazil. The 'Samba Kings', as they were referred to repeatedly last night, are supposed to be all that's good about football, the best side in the world. Those yellow shirts are supposed to dazzle and entertain us. We look to them for the flair and skill that's missing from our game.

So is it hard to accept that they're just not very good? Mexico were simply better than them all over the park in the early hours of this morning, and but for a shocking miss it would have finished 3-0.

Ronaldinho, Ronaldo, Adriano and Kaka were awful in Germany last summer. They are not even at the Copa America, and their replacements haven't faired much better. Brazil had a 20 year gap between triumphs in 1974 and 1994 when they didn't win a World Cup. All the signs are that they could be entering another barren spell.

The champions elect surely must be Argentina, who enter battle against the USA early Friday morning. Their squad reads like a who's who of world football. Crespo, Messi, Tevez, Mascherano, Ayala, Heinze, Cambiasso, Saviola, Aimar. Beat that Brazil.

So set that Sky+ recording now. Or you can put on a pot of coffee and enjoy it live. Either way you have to watch because, to borrow from Sky's cliche book for a moment: this is South American football, and anything can happen.