You take this ball, and put it in that net

I can’t be there watching twenty-two grown men chase a little bit of inflated rubber round a field. Yes, I know that is the third stalest joke in the world, but it’s world cup season. You are going to be hearing it all over the place for the next bunch of weeks. You should start getting used to it.

(Actually, I’m reminded that that should be twenty grown men. The goalies don’t chase the ball around) .

Time to get acquainted with the rest of the things we shall be hearing about. Like footballers, for example, Ronaldinho.

The estranged son of a Buenos Aires dental practitioner, Ronaldinho fell out with his father over his decision to keep his teeth bucked as hell. With his father’s words, “No esta dos mi cuando tumbavu cilabe Puffy!” (No son of mine shall walk around looking like Puff Fucking Daddy!) ringing in his head, Ronaldinho left Buenos Aires, and his family, and set off searching for a new home where he would be accepted as he is.

It was while trying to eke out a living as a flatfish vendor in Caracas that he first met Ronaldo. Vendor and customer forged a friendship based on the similarity of their names and their teeth.

Ronaldo inducted Ronaldinho into the secret Venezuelan chapter of Opus Dei, which sought to conceal the truth about the secret hidden behind the Mona Lisa’s smile. However, one tactless mistake from Binyo cost them both their membership. (He blurted out, “She’s trying to hide it, but I can see that she is as bucktoothed as me and my boy Ronaldo here!”) The pair were not only expelled from the club, they were disgraced and had to flee the nation in shame. Most of us thought they were dead, and we spat Good Riddance on their assumed graves (It’s an Opus Dei thing. You wouldn’t understand).

Imagine our surprise when, look who shows up in the Brazilian world cup squad…chasing a bit of inflated rubber round a field…