El partido ya va a comenzar*

I spent most of last weekend (especially Monday) on the same side, but now I am forced to disagree with Cllr Vince Maple again – and it’s not about politics!

In case you’ve been living in a cave, you are probably aware that this week sees the start of the FIFA World Cup 2010 from South Africa, and Coca-Cola has gotten in the spirit of unity behind the tournament to produce the official World Cup song.

The song they chose was by K’naan, called (rather fittingly) “Wavin’ Flag”, and, for one of the versions, they also enlisted the help of Spanish pop sensation David Bisbal.

Unfortunately, I hear on the grapevine that Cllr Maple is less than impressed with the spiced-up version, and prefers instead the original, featuring not only K’naan, but also will.i.am and David Guetta.

I can see his point – to a mild extent. However, the Coca-Cola version takes the original and mixes it a little to promote to only the multicultural reality of the tournament of 32 nations, but also introduces a little bit more emphasis on the African culture the other 31 nations will be entering into over the month-long tournament.

The World Cup song has produced an anthem acceptable of provoking fierce patriotism in all 32 countries, whilst, although admittedly not perfectly, maintaining the integral diversity of the different cultures Cllr Maple’s favourite-festival-of-them-all Love Music Hate Racism aims to promote in a similar fashion.

I, for one, am impressed by the song, but, in the interests of fairness and balance, I present you with the anthem so that you can decide for yourself.

*My A-level Spanish tells me this roughly translates to “the game is going to start”.