Day Seven: 17/6/2010

Lots of numbers and surprises!

There are loads of different exciting statistics about today that I've picked up from Fifa and listening to the BBC and ITV. Here are today's top stats:

• Hernandez scores the 2,100th goal in World Cup history! There have only been 18 World Cups, so that's an average (mean) of 117 goals per tournament.
  
• Higuain scores the first hat-trick in a World Cup since 2002, and becomes the top scorer in the 2010 World Cup. Uruguay's Diego Forlan only held onto that title for one day, when he scored twice yesterday.
  
• Greece wins their first ever World Cup finals game, and it's the first time they've scored in a finals too! According to Fifa, they took 404 minutes of World Cup gameplay to score their first goal.
  
• Less happily, South Korean PARK Chu Young scores the second own goal of the tournament.
  
• Sani KAITA of Nigeria receives the third straight red card of the tournament after a stupid kick at a Greek player. Nigeria had been ahead, but went on to lose 2-1.
  
• Mexican BLANCO scores the third penalty goal of the tournament, and helps to damage France's chances of qualifying. France now have to defeat South Africa - and Mexico's game against Uruguay cannot end in a draw - for them to qualify.
  
• The total distance run so far in the World Cup by all players is 4,144,261 metres, or 207,213 metres on average per game. In total that is 103.4 times around the Equator!
  
• Nigeria is the only team in the World Cup to take all its members from leagues outside the country. In other words, no Nigerian team members usually play in Nigeria.

It's the end of the first week of the world cup. In total, 20 games have been played. 38 goals have been scored in those games, and a shocking 75 cards shown to players, with six sendings-off.

The English league had provided the most scorers (8, if you include Mexican Javier HERNANDEZ who is transferring to Manchester United), but only players from La Liga in Spain – Uruguay's Diego FORLAN and Argentina's Gonzalo HIGUAIN, have scored more than one goal so far.

Tomorrow, Algeria's Nadir BELHADJ will be 28 years old, and playing against England. Well, I don't want to wish him an unhappy birthday, but I am English...

The scariest thing about this World Cup is that for the first time, several players are younger than me. That's a statistic that makes you realise you're growing up. Here are some less-scary stats:

Goals per game: Mean – 1.9, Median – 2, Mode – 2, Range – 5
Cards per game: Mean – 3.75, Median – 3.5, Mode – 3, Range – 6