Published by marco on
A not uninteresting match with Iran playing Argentina to a standstill for the first half, stifling all of its chances and putting Argentina on the back foot. Argentina seemed out of ideas offensively and less organized than they needed to be at the back, but Iran couldn’t figure out how to punish them for it. As the second half unfolded, you could see Iran slowly gaining confidence, realizing that they were playing Argentina on an even footing and weren’t even needing a lot of luck to do it. Iran had the best chances and they took their confidence to the midfield, where they even managed to outdribble the fabled Argentinians a few times.
Towards the end of the match, Argentina had the clear upper hand in the midfield, but was still not coming up with any big ideas at finishing time, partly because Iran’s air game was much, much better. Iran tried to break out a few times, but had mostly collapsed to a turtle shell by then and were playing for the tie. There was an exciting attack at the 85th minute by Reza but the Argentinian keeper did well to parry it. Four minutes of extra time: no way to explain that but that they wanted to make sure that Argentina gets enough time to score. And score they did, with Messi firing a beautiful bender at 30 seconds into extra time. Iranians fans will still be pleased at how well their team played; Argentinians will be happy with the win, but justifiably worried about their team’s overall performance.
Germany had a lot of early chances and seemed to have Ghana bottled up in the half for a while, but Ghana exploded out of their half in the 30th minute with a few very dangerous attacks. A few minutes later and it was Germany’s turn, but the Ghanian goaltender was up to the task…and Germany was shooting almost directly at him. The first half ended with both teams having played each other to a standstill, each having had some good chances, but no goals.
In the second half, Germany lobbed in a beautiful ball and Götze headed/kneed it in. Ghana didn’t hang their heads and responded three minutes later with a beautiful header of their own. And then Ghana strikes again with a beautiful through pass to a strong finish! And Germany brings on Klose, who finishes a Schweinsteiger header with perfect positioning! And it’s 2–2 and it’s a wide-open game! They’re flying up and down the field like they’re playing basketball! What a game! Ghana trembles at the German offense and vice versa. Watching on SAT-1 with a German commentator is fantastic. He’s so excited but very fair, just happy to be part of such a good game. The US was damned lucky that a different Ghana showed up for their game; this one is playing the best of Germany to a standstill. Best game of the tournament so far.
Portugal establishes themselves as the better team in the beginning, taking the early lead in the 7th minute. The USA continued to make use of their fast forwards to make dangerous stabs toward the net, but nothing that really made the Portuguese keeper sweat. By the middle of the first half, the US was pressing far forward and Portugal seemed to just be weathering the storm. The US had some dangerous and very hard shots from outside that got quite close. Toward the end of the first half, Portugal was able to take advantage of the more open defense to get a few good chances, but Tim Howard in goal stepped up in a big way to keep the game close.
The US had a huge chance in the 55th minute, but Bradley was too careful with the finishing touch. Despite the Portuguese keeper Beto having already been beaten, he played right up the middle of the goal and into the leg of a defender. And then, out of nowhere, Jermaine Jones rips a bending laser just inside the far post: Beto didn’t even have time to move. Portugal may come to regret having tried to sit on a 1–0 lead rather than trying harder for a bigger lead.
The US is playing with heart and very fairly, taking few fouls and only one yellow card so far. Portugal is getting a bit sulky, taking some ugly fouls and starting to dive in the box (no cards, though). Portugal settled down, took control of the middle field more and got down to work of playing actual football. Then the US took control again, built up and, in the 81st minute, blew apart the Portuguese defense and Dempsey put it away with his stomach for a 2–1 lead.
Portugal will, of course, get five minutes to try to prevent an early flight home. And they would get their goal with a really nice ball from the left to a header. The US was dead on its feet and gave up the goal with 25 seconds left in extra time.
Italy had the majority of the possession but didn’t really do anything with it. Uruguay needs a win; Italy is OK with a tie. Buffon didn’t see much, if any, work in this half. The statistics claim more shots on goal, but I can’t recall having seen anything dangerous.
The second half was a bit more interesting, but Italy was given a red card with about 30 minutes left. Jumping straight to red was far too harsh, but that’s how it is. No video replay, so no checking the ref’s initial reaction. Italy played quite strong with 10 men and Uruguay would have had the chance to do the same if anyone had seen Suárez take a bite out of Chiellini’s shoulder. However, no one saw it—despite the fact that he’s been caught doing it twice before, according to the German commentator—and Suárez got no card at all.
Two minutes later Diego Godín of Uruguay scored with his back on a corner kick. Italy put in a lot of effort and had Uruguay squeezed into one quarter of the field[4], but couldn’t score. Godín played a big role in preventing a goal too, so he’s probably the man of the match for Uruguay. As Buffon said, Italy could not find their offensive rhythm from the first game and went scoreless in the last two. As a colleague wrote, “Italy did not deserve to advance, but that ref is an ASS”. Italy is going home.