England trailing for more than an hour, then good old Harry Kane shooting DR Congo to pieces with a header and a truly phenomenal second goal, for me the goal of the tournament so far.
And then Belgium, being all over the place for more than 80 minutes, probably playing their worst game ever, and then turning things around within two or three minutes and – new roller coaster – becoming the better team in extra-time … and winning, albeit thanks to a penalty decision that looked a bit dubious.
Agree about Kane’s second goal. An absolute belter.
So England are now off to Mexico City. Which raises a question. How on earth do they acclimatise to the altitude before that match. It’s only a few days away and back when entire world cups were played in Mexico teams would spend weeks there getting prepared.It’s no surprise Mexico have been doing so well if everyone else has to turn up and prepare in days while they are settled in nicely for the duration.
England certainly need to be better all round and not just rely on one man to pull them through. And if altitude plays its part they can’t leave it to the last minute again either as they will probably all be struggling to breathe by then.
It’s clear that both England and Belgium need to do a lot better, but both games gave you that special World Cup feeling, that special feeling I missed during that interminable group stage. At least (or should I say at last?) there was drama.
They both now play a home team, England in the thin air of Mexico City, Belgium in the no doubt thick air of Seattle, and in both stadiums the atmosphere will no doubt reach boiling point.
The ‘Round of 32’ has been an unqualified success, full of drama and late winners. The Portugal v Croatia and Argentina v Cabo Verde matches will go down as World Cup classics. The latter featured the goal of the tournament in Sidny Lopes Cabral’s spectacular extra-time equaliser.
The pick of the last 16 ties are Mexico v England and Portugal v Spain. Mexico are an average side but the Estadio Azteca is a leveller. The altitude favours Mexico, however, the ‘daunting task’ awaiting England is a tad overplayed. One commentator even suggested that Mexico would have won two World Cups if they’d played all their matches at the Estadio Azteca! Spain are yet to be tested - Austria were especially feeble in the last game - and Yamal is out of sorts; but will probably have enough to get past their Iberian neighbours. Ronaldo produced a sublime finish (narrowly ruled out for offside) in the Croatia thriller, and may have a point to prove, if he starts.
I agree with Montero that this Round of 32 was a success, 16 games full of drama, turnarounds, late goals and surprises. The Turnaround of the Century was of course completed by Belgium in their game against Senegal. The biggest surprise was provided by Paraguay by eliminating Germany. Cape Verde nearly caused an even bigger surprise by putting the noose around Argentina’s neck, but just like Tuco, the Argentinians were saved when they were already on the scaffold. Unbelievable. Some will say that Morocco caused a surprise by eliminating the Netherlands, but Morocco finished fourth in Qatar and simply has a very good team that can take on the strongest European and South American countries. Whether they are good enough to take on the very best teams remains to be seen.
Anyway, Germany and Holland will have to lick their wounds and build a new team. Both countries seem to have reached a dead end. Germany has now squandered three World Cups in a row, and the Netherlands just cannot win a penalty shootout and—many, myself included, find this even worse—betrayed its own principles in the match against Morocco by resorting to Catenaccio. I would say: leave the Catenaccio to the Italians and return to real Orange football.
Yes, there was entertainment and drama, but still of my 16 predictions for the 8-final, 14 came true. Only Germany disappointed, and the Netherlands, but that was actually a 50:50 gamem so not a surprise. Morocco is strong, will reach the quarterfinal and then they can show how it is against France.
And as the best individual quality will make the WC, I think that France has the best chances for the win.
A final Spain - France is not possible, and in the other leg everything is possible between Brasil, Norway, England and Argentina. Maybe the Messi factor will decide that.
But I’m hoping for England, as I always do, but they rarely failed to disappoint my expectations, but having become the new Germans they may win their 2nd title this year.
Ohh, and Africa, again only 2 teams left for the 8-final, and both needed a penalty shoot-out.
While there are more and more black players in all European teams, and often are also the best of them (a shocking fact for right wing nationalists), Africa itself does not get much further then before.
Except maybe for Morocco with the half final and 3rd place in 2022 and being one of the hosts in 2030.
Interesting note. It’s often thought that football, most notably the results of the national team, have an impact on politics and the popularity of nationalist parties. It sounds credible, but it’s rather dubious. In 1998 France became world champion with a multicultural team, blanc, noir et beurre, that is: players with French, Central-African and North-African roots. It was thought that the country was heading for a glorious multicultural future, but in the presidential elections of 2002, the socialist candidate, Jospin, didn’t make it to the second and decisive round and left-wing voters had to vote for centre-right Jacques Chirac to prevent populist right-wing candidate Le Pen from grabbing the presidency.
Both in Holland and Belgium populist right-wing politics are popular; Geert Wilders is one of the most influential Dutch politicians and Belgian prime-minister Bart de Wever is a nationalist and right-wing, albeit not extreme right (but the extreme right party, Vlaams Belang, was the most popular party in a recent poll). Results of the Red Devils or Oranje haven’t influenced their popularity. Voters for these parties apparently are like most other football supporters: if players with foreign roots do well, they’re ‘one of us’, if they miss a penalty, they’re stupid foreigners, not worthy to wear the orange or red national shirt. Cody Gakpo’s wife lost a child last week: He was buried, so to speak, under a rain of condolences on social media. Everybody loved Cody & his wife, even if they were people ‘of color’. But three black players missed a penalty and they were buried as well under an avalanche of posts, but those posts weren’t positive: all three had to close down their pages of FB and X because things went completely out of hand.
(A bit off-topic, I know, but it’s an interesting side-effect of the sport)
I now understand why Germany didn’t get past Paraguay. I had only seen some highlights of the Paraguay - Germany game, but after watching France - Paraguay last night, everything has become clear.
Paraguay is the dirtiest team I have seen in years. I understand why they played defensively: for one Mbappé or Olisé you can buy the entire Paraguayan team, but the way they tried to frustrate France was an absolute disgrace: all types of dirty tricks were used, including blows, elbows and kicking the shinbone. And what made things worse: the referee did absolutely nothing to stop them from cheating: they received not a single yellow card while the French got three! Absolute madness. The Var remained impassive as well, except for one single moment: thanks to the VAR (there must have been at least one member who realised that the whole affair was stinky) France got a penalty, which was converted (thank God) by Mbappé. It would have been a real shame if this dirty Paraguayan team had progressed further in this tournament.
Once again, Brazil were dumped out of the World Cup by the first European team they faced in the knockout stage. Norway dominated possession, yet Nyland produced a string of outstanding saves to keep the Norwegians in the contest. As the match entered its ‘fourth quarter’, and with Norway in the ascendancy, Haaland inevitably supplied the finish; and then followed up with the coup de grâce - 2 chances - 2 goals. Neymar a disgrace at the end.
It seems England never do it the easy way. Down to 10 men in the Azteca after 54 mins yet hold out for a famous win. Mexico played far better than I expected and came roaring back into the match after going 2-0 down. Tuchel called it “a crazy match of football in a crazy atmosphere.” Mexico seem fated never to break their quinto partido curse.
Brazil’s loss did not come unexpected, they are good but not that good, but they still had enough chances to win the game due to some of their individual quality.
Too bad that Norway and England meet already in the quarterfinals. A half final between both seems more fitting.
But let’s see how Argentina fares, they still have an easy way to that half final, at least it looks easy.
The most heroic defensive battle of the British since withstanding the Blitz
Congratulations to Harry & his men.
Like @stanton I usually root for England when The Netherlands are out (well, Belgium is still in the tournament, but they’re in the ‘other half’ of the schedule), but this time it’s difficult: I found myself strongly supporting Norway yesterday in their game against Brasil, and I’m afraid ( ) that I’ll root for them during that game in Miami. Not absolutely sure, I like them both to reach the semi-finals, but unfortunately that’s impossible.
Now it happened what I expected with Infantino and a WC in Trump country. I asked my if some obvious manipulation for the US team will happen, just like very obvious for Italy in 1934 and most likely also for Argentina in 1978.
With the Fifa now not inflicting a red card against the top scorer of the USA Balogun, apparently after Trump invented, they show again how corrupt they are.
I’m only surprised that it happens so openly by ignoring the rules.
Don’t know if it’s all true or just hearsay, Trump picking up to phone, talking to Infantino, Infantino talking to the FIFA Disciplinary Committee, etc. They’re all capable of doing so, and the FIFA is as corrupt as can be, but I can live with the decision to withdraw this red card because in my opinion Balogun did nothing to deserve this punishment, two players went for the ball and collided, it happens in football very often and this time it went wrong. I felt sorry for this player of Bosnia, but he just had bad luck.
The whole of Belgium is in an uproar because of this decision, as was to be expected, but I think we just have to accept it and play the game.
There’s no hearsay about it: Trump had a word with Infantino and the suspension was overturned. Unlike the only other precedent - when a linesman was paid to ‘disappear’ ahead of Garrincha’s disciplinary hearing prior to the 1962 World Cup Final - it’s all done out in the open with no attempt to hide the flouting of the rules. But there’s nothing Belgium can do about it, except use it as extra motivation to win the match.
What I don’t understand is the measure they took: if FIFA were of the opinion that the red card was unjustified (and many think it was, personally I don’t think it was a red card), they could have withdrawn it. That possibility exists: a red or yellow card - or more in general a punishment - can be waived. But they didn’t do that: they suspended the penalty, as if saying: the red card was correct, but the punishment wasn’t. In my opinion, that is against all the rules. But I don’t work for FIFA and I am not a lawyer either.
But that kind of foul inevitably leads to a red card, which automatically leads to a one game suspension. It was most likely not done on purpose, but it is still that kind of foul, at least it was not a complete wrong decision. And the Fifa did explicitly instructs all teams before they play that a red card leads to the suspension of one game and can’t be changed.
Why should we now not be very suspicious if tonight questionable decisions for the USA happen?
) that I’ll root for them during that game in Miami. Not absolutely sure, I like them both to reach the semi-finals, but unfortunately that’s impossible.