Monday, October 11th, 2010
Can London progress beyond its first death match against Istanbul?
The Steampunk World Cup officially started yesterday in a formal ceremony attended by mayors of every moving metropolis in the world. Pride of place went to the sixteen mayors whose cities will battle to the death over the coming weeks.
Below, we give our thoughts on the coming tournament, and predict the four semi-finalists - with one huge surprise.
The Smaller Cities
The less-populated cities will not last long, and we predict quick, and quite possibly brutal, ends to Toronto, Sydney, Dubai and Tripoli. But will they fight, or surrender swiftly in order to preserve as many lives as possible?
Top Half of the Draw
After seeing off Sydney, we predict New York will progress to a death match against Buenos Aries. After seeing the former Argentinian capital off, New York will battle against Tokyo in the first semi-final. Many people consider Tokyo’s third seeding a travesty, and would have liked to see a New York-Tokyo final. As it is, this semi-final is too close to call. It is hard to believe, however, that in a few weeks time, only one of these two mighty cities will survive.
Bottom Half of the Draw
Replete with no less than five of the tournaments eight mega-metropolises, both semi-finalists in this half of the draw will have faced at least one tough battle before they face each other. We predict Beijing (seeded second) will beat Ontario, and will then go onto a quarter-final against Mexico City or Mumbai. That will be a much harder fight, but Beijing should limp through - but will the former Chinese capital face London?
London’s position in the tournament has been controversial from the start, when mayor Joris Bohnson first proposed the idea of a Steampunk World Cup of metropolis death matches to solve the world’s over-population crisis. Then Mayor Bohnson said London should be excluded from the first few tournaments because the whole thing was his idea.
In response, the Steampunk federation insisted that London take the first of sixteen places in the first tournament. Then London was given the fourth seed in the tournament, ensuring it would not have to face New York, Beijing or Tokyo until the semi-finals. While Mayor Bohnson argued furiously that London should have been seeded higher, the rest of the world was stunned London had been seeded at all.
Ironically, in the first round London faces Istanbul, the city most people believe should have received the final seeding. We predict an Istanbul win, as Mayor Bohnson’s taunting of that city -calling it Constantinople - backfires. After that, Istanbul should beat Johannesburg or Dubai in the Quarter-Finals, if it isn’t weakened too greatly by its battle with London, which should all put the former Turkish city on course for a semi-final showdown with the mighty Beijing.
So, to summarise: our predictions for the semi-finals are New York v Tokyo and Beijing v Istanbul. Our prediction for best match of the tournament? If all goes to plan, the first semi-final. New York v Tokyo! Can’t wait!
Tags: Steampunk, Steampunk Metropolis World Cup
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