poptimists | (no subject)

Back! Back! BACK!! It's the Pop World Cup with not one but TWO round of 16 matches.

Group E winners GHANA take on pre-tournament favourites JAPAN: Can

julietk maintain Ghana's momentum? Can

cis build on a sluggish start?

And BRAZIL seek to repeat their group F triumph against dark horses the CZECH REPUBLIC. What has rookie manager

mostlyconnect got up his sleeve? What fresh discoveries has

thenipper brought us?

All tracks can be found at http://www.freakytrigger.co.uk/popworldcup/ and if you've got any problem then email me at freakytrigger@gmail.com.

REMEMBER! These are two separate matches - you'll be rating Ghana against Japan, and Brazil against the Czechs, not all of them against each other. So let's meet the teams:

IMPORTANT NOTE: Doing it as separate polls means you have to vote separately, i.e press submit on EACH poll, probably refreshing in between. If you fill in both and then submit just one your votes for the other won't appear. Sorry - I didn't think this one through!

GHANA

Ofori Amponsah - "Sardin": Manager

julietk told us: "Another out of the hiplife stable - and nominated for no fewer than 8 categories in the Ghana Music Awards this year, so this is a performer on top of his game. Although a little extra time may be required for this Ghanese side to really hit home, since the track clocks in at a possibly rather overdone 6 min."

JAPAN

Tommy February6 - "Love Is Forever": Boss

cis let us know that: "♥ Tommy february6 is the first solo project of Tomoko Kawase, onetime singer in the brilliant green (the best mid-nineties British indie band to come out of Kyoto). She loves Pikachu, cheerleaders, dressing up and eating sweets, and makes cute-as-buttons synthpop with librarian-fetish glasses and a bit of a drinking problem. "Love is forever" was released in 2003, and it's blue-sky happy and charming, all italo beats and big spangly chorus. give tommy all of your love!! ♥"

BRAZIL

Bonde Do Role - "Melo Do Vitiligo": Supremo

thenipper informed the press that: "Our chief ~~post-colonial rip-off merchant~~ scout, Diplo, is excitado muito about his latest discoveries, fresh from the streets of Rio. Eschewing the beautiful game for a Route One, hoof it up to the big sample approach, Bonde de Role are sure to strike fear into the opposition's defence."

CZECH REPUBLIC

Moimir Papalescu and the Nihilists - "Summer Deviation": Gaffer

mostlyconnect informed us: "A whole country bursting with hope, with everything, this is our year, is this our year? This is our year. Talking about the USA, talking to Japan. She says: "what a find!". This is how this goes: robots, a whoosh, then everything at once.

The Nipper a hero in the streets from his playing days, velvet-coated EPs passed around like monuments. A gesture of respect - this sounds like Cansei De Ser Sexy. The biggest stage in the world! "They don't even enter Eurovision", all those years underground now bubbling up into electro and hip-hop and experi and jumbled up folksongs. It's a coming of age, a paper diary left open to show you haven't been home in months, that 'deviation' blowing the perfumed embers up into the air- "lets make the world dumb", this goes, and you'd half believe it means it. Do it for pop music."

How will these matches be resolved?

The knockout rounds work very much like the group stages, except now you get TEN points to divide between the two teams in each match, and you don't have to give a team a point if you don't want to. You'll notice that we have TWO separate polls, one for each game, so you don't have to fill in both at once.

The voting will be done by text poll - this is to keep the results secret. Please enter your scores as follows

"Ghana - 5. Japan - 5." (and "Brazil - 5. Czech Rep - 5")

Except with the "5"s replaced by your scores. If you want to vote but can't use the LJ poll, please email your scores to freakytrigger@gmail.com.

[Poll #721581]

[Poll #721582]

Your voting deadline for both these games is Noon on Monday, and new games will go up on Tuesday - the remaining round of 16 games between Spain and France, and Ukraine and Togo (so I need tracks and teamtalks for those matches by Sunday night, ideally).

As ever, the Pop World Cup thrives only on you the supporters - please listen and vote!