Gabriela Pires | Staff Reporter
Posted June 19, 2014; 9:00 a.m.

The 2014 World Cup is well into the competition, but the media is still talking about the not-so-successful, short opening ceremony with a dull concert delivered by Pitbull, Jennifer Lopez and Brazilian singer Claudia Leitte. However, the performance was followed by an even more controversial match between Brazil and Croatia.

At Lindenwood, many students are glued to the screen and cheering for their own countries throughout the games. On June 12, World Cup opening day, students were able to watch the game in Evans Commons on a big screen. Ramon Molina, from Venezuela, watched Brazil and Croatia’s match at Evans with other friends.

“Venezuela was not able to classify, but I still like to watch the World Cup. It’s soccer,” Molina said. “I choose to cheer for Brazil, because they have a good team this year. I hope they win.”

Brazilian students who couldn’t go home to Brazil get together to watch the matches in St. Charles. The students have parties at home with traditional Brazilian food and watch the game through online streaming, or go to Tucanos Brazilian Grill.

Student Fernanda Mariani, from Brazil, hopes to see Brazil in the final.

“Before I was going to say Spain [would win]. But after that embarrassing match against the Netherlands, I hope to see Holland win. Even USA would be cool to watch, too,” Mariani said.

As of June 18, Spain, the defending champion, was eliminated from the World Cup after losing two of their three games.

Vivian Morgado, another student from Lindenwood, made bets with her friends on which teams are going to be in the final match.

“Brazil and Argentina for sure. It’s going to be South America this time,” Morgado said.

Even though many Brazilians are cheering for Brazil, if Brazil isn’t able to advance to the final, most of the students want to see a South American team win.

However, Brazilians are not the only ones interested in the matches’ results. Japanese students Hiroka Ono and Sanami Iwasaki got together with other Japanese students to watch Japan play last Saturday.

“It’s exciting to get together with people from your country to watch the games,” Ono said.

When Japan lost to Cote d’Ivore, Iwasaki said that she couldn’t hide her disappointment.

“We knew it was going to be hard. At least they scored,” Iwasaki said. “If Japan can’t go to the final, I hope to see Brazil or Germany win.”

Click here to see the scores from the previous matches.

 Upcoming games in the World Cup 2014 | Central-Standard Time

• June 19: Colombia vs. Cote d’Ivoire @ 11 a.m. | Uruguay vs. England @ 2 p.m. | Japan vs. Greece @ 5 p.m.
• June 20: Italy vs. Costa Rica @ 11 a.m. | Switzerland vs. France @ 2 p.m. | Honduras vs. Ecuador @5 p.m.
• June 21: Argentina vs. Iran @ 11 a.m. | Germany vs. Ghana @ 2 p.m. | Nigeria vs. Bosnia and Herzegovina @ 5 p.m.
• June 22: Belgium vs. Russia @ 11 a.m. | Korea Republic vs. Algeria @ 2 p.m. | USA vs. Portugal @ 5 p.m.