A new, (as yet) unofficial World Cup Microformat dubbed ‘hCup’.
Driving around Engerlaaand, it's hard to miss the flags of Saint George flying from buildings and cars. Every second person is sporting a replica shirt and petrol stations are doing a roaring trade in everything from Ferdinand fragrance air-fresheners to Rooney metatarsal merchandise. So in honour of both the up-and-coming Engerlaaand victory and the visit to these shores of talented Microformat's mid-fielder, Tantek Celik for @media2006, I am pitching a new, (as yet) unofficial World Cup Microformat dubbed 'hCup'.
Now I know that Microformats normally take months of logical, reasoned argument to be finalised, but this is World Cup football (?), right? We already know what the outcome will be, so why waste any breath talking about it?
Defining the term
For those of you unsure about the term Microformat World Cup, I'll do my best to define it.
The World Cup is a competition made up of sixty-four, ninety minute games of football over a one month period, ending with a victory for Engerlaaand.
hCup
The World Cup Microformat introduces a new schema called S.V.E.N., and a series of XHTML compounds for each stage of the competition, kicking-off with the opening group stage and leading on to the play-offs, quarter-finals, semi-finals, runners-up and blowing the whistle on Engerlaaand's stunning victory over the Aargies in the final in Berlin.
Group stage
Let's start with the group stage and the XHTML compound and class names that add meaning to the elements. The group stage is marked up as an ordered list with a class of hcup and an additional class of groups to denote the group stage.
<ol class="hcup groups">The list contains items with a class of group for the eight groups (A-H), that in turn contain a header and an ordered list of the results, starting with the winner of each group. Needless to say that Engerlaaand will win Group B by several points over Sweden. The winner is marked with a class attribute of first and the runner-up with second.
<ol class="hcup groups">
[..]
<li class="group">
<h4 class="letter">Group B</h4>
<ol class="result">
<li class="first">England</li>
<li class="second">Sweden</li>
<li>Paraguay</li>
<li>Trinidad & Tobago</li>
</ol>
</li>
[..]
</ol>The last sixteen
The last sixteen follows a similar format (ninety minutes of classic England football action) but includes a new class="playoffs" to accompany hcup" and a class of playoff on each list-item. It also includes a stunning Engerlaaand victory over Poland on June 25th in Stuttgart.
<ol class="hcup playoffs">
[..]
<li class="playoff">
<ol class="result">
<li class="first">England</li>
<li class="second">Poland</li>
</ol>
</li>
[..]
</ol>Quarter-finals
To implement hCup for the quarter-finals, you need only change the stage related class names to qtrs and qtr and cheer our boys on to win against the Dutch on July 1st.
<ol class="hcup qtrs">
[..]
<li class="qtr">
<ol class="result">
<li class="first">England</li>
<li class="second">Holland</li>
</ol>
</li>
[..]
</ol>Semi-finals
The semi-finals will be a little trickier to implement. Not because the code is any more complex, but that we have that difficult game against Brazil on July 5th in Munich (my favourite German city).
<ol class="hcup semis">
[..]
<li class="semi">
<ol class="result">
<li class="first">England</li>
<li class="second">Brazil</li>
</ol>
</li>
[..]
</ol>The one we've been waiting for since 1966
The stage is now set for the final in Berlin on on July 9th. The flags will be flying, our streets will be deserted as the whole of England squints through beer goggles at the big TV screen daarn the boozer.
<ol class="hcup final result">
<li class="first guaranteed">England</li>
<li class="second handball">Argentina</li>
<li>France</li>
<li>Brazil</li>
</ol>No need for penalties
So there you have it, no doubts, no contest, a World Cup Microformat. Maybe hCup can be extended or developed for other sporting events? Maybe hCup will even be endorsed by the Victoria Beckham Tantek Celik.
Now all that is left to say is Football's coming home. Come on Engerlaaand!
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