Grimmigirl here. I'm a neon-photogurti and you can think of me as your friendly guide

to the English language. We talk about writing, history, rules, and other cool stuff. Today,

we're going to answer a question about team names being singular or plural during the

World Cup and we'll talk about the origin of toasting. Here's a question from a listener

named David.

Miss Fogurti, it's David H. Lawrence, the 17th. I miss you. I miss speaking together at

blogging and podcasting events. But right now, I am hurting. I feel like everything that

I've learned about singular versus plural matching has been called into question after watching

the World Cup. I don't know what it is about football, soccer,

announcers, world football, soccer announcers. But they seem to have an issue with what is

normal matching of a name and object with singular versus a group with plural. For example,

France trying to defend their crown. Argentina are in the lead, as opposed to Italy in the

lead. If France missed this kick, not if France misses this kick, but if France missed

this kick, France is a country. Then Argentina win the World Cup. Not wins the World Cup,

then Argentina wins the World Cup. And then the ultimate, Argentina have won the World

Cup, Argentina beat France in a shootout. What is going on in the world where these things

don't match? Or am I missing some rules, some grammar rule that I should have learned

in the third grade? I come to you, oh, grammar girl, please. That means straight.

Hi, David. It's great to hear from you. And I can hear the confusion and frustration

in your voice. You didn't miss anything in the third grade. What you're noticing is

a documented difference between British and American English. In American English, we treat

team names as plural. The Seattle Sounders are playing Sunday, for example. But we treat

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