Good evening! Does 5pm count as the evening? I think so.

Anyway, Belgium v Russia has just started — we’ll be watching that over the next two hours, while hopefully doing lots of other (hopefully) fun World Cup-related stuff.

As is pretty much traditional at this stage, everyone at the sports desk has made their predictions for today’s game…

Steve: Belgium 2-1

Pat: Russia 2-1 (controversial!)

Me: 2-2

Eoin: 1-1

How do you think it’ll go?

We’ve just seen the creepiest vine of the World Cup so far…
http://vine.co/v/MTPnY2eJMD2

Millions of kids’ memories of their first official World Cup mascot have been rendered traumatic in one fell swoop.

Harry Redknapp is in the news again (full article here). He’s now weighed in on the ‘why England are rubbish’ argument, claiming their younger players lack the necessary passion for international football.

“When I was at Tottenham two or three international players did not want to play for England,” he told BBC Radio 5 Live on Sunday.

“They would come to me and say, ‘gaffer, get me out of the game’. It happened on quite a few occasions.”

What do you think? Is this just Harry being Harry, or does he have a point?

Nasty clash of heads between two players there. Thankfully they both appear to be fine.

Rihanna has been on fire with her World Cup-related tweets lately.

Is there a place for her on the RTÉ/BBC panel? Could she be this World Cup’s Robbie Williams?

Check out Eoin O’Callaghan’s piece documenting this curious sub-plot right here.

I’m not going to lie, so far this game has been a bit of a comedown compared with the relentless highs of Ghana-Germany last night.

Speaking of which, here’s a sample of the match report from our man in Brazil, Mikey Stafford.

“The Black Stars were fighting for their World Cup lives after their 2-1 defeat to the United States and Akwasi Appiah’s men had enjoyed the better of the first period only to fall behind six minutes after the break — Götze evading the marking of Harrison Afful to force a Thomas Müller cross home via his head and then his knee.

“After his brother and German full-back Jerome was substituted at the break, former German Under 21 international Kevin Prince Boateng followed him off the field prior to the resumption. The Schalke attacker had questioned Germany’s lack of leaders in the lead up to the match, but the former Portsmouth man could not live up to his own billing and it was no surprise when he was withdrawn.”

Read the full piece here.

HALF-TIME: BELGIUM 0-0 RUSSIA

Coxy is unimpressed by what he sees!

If you’re in need of a laugh following that dour first half, then Michael Freeman’s piece on World Cup fans’ ‘maturity’ should provide it.

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This is probably the most interesting thing that’s happened in that first half — Russia were denied a clear-cut penalty, following Alderweireld’s reckless challenge.
http://vine.co/v/MTYuqHjQMaq

Safe to say even the notoriously soccer-averse US are getting pretty excited about their game with Portugal later.

And they say Fellaini lacks hunger. Just look at the way he’s eyeing that ball.

Natacha Pisarenko Natacha Pisarenko

It didn’t take long for Google to come up with a Klose-inspired doodle, following last night’s record-equalling shenanigans.

I’m afraid to say that, bar Nigeria v Iran, this is easily the tournament’s worst game so far, as this tweet perfectly conveys:

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“A chance here perhaps… No!”

Poor George Hamilton.

At least Fuleco’s having fun!

Joe Giddens Joe Giddens

As are the England fans in their crazy costumes!

Joe Giddens Joe Giddens

One last shout-out to Ciaran Behan who won our Sony Xperia Z1 Compact smartphone on Friday. If you missed out, don’t worry though, as there’ll be more prizes over the next few days, thanks to our friends at Budweiser.

We’re not sure what Thierry Henry is trying to do here either (@hairjf claims he’s catching an invisible butterfly with his mouth).
http://vine.co/v/MTYOvJmp7db

SOMETHING’S HAPPENED… I MEAN GOAL FOR BELGIUM!

Great break from Belgium and Hazard gets past his man before slotting the ball to Divock Origi, who slots it into the net…
http://vine.co/v/MTYpVDzh5Ij

Indeed!

FULL-TIME: BELGIUM 1-0 RUSSIA

So Belgium advance to the last 16 without ever really having to play well.

Let’s just forget how boring that game was and concentrate on how awesome this photo is.

Natacha Pisarenko Natacha Pisarenko

‘And a win there for, erm… Belgium!’

Even Bill O’Herlihy seems to have fallen asleep during that match.

Right, that’s all from me.

Thanks for reading and commenting, we’ll have more reaction to come, plus don’t miss our liveblog of USA v Ghana later on tonight.