July 3, 2006
World Cup 2006: Days 20-21 - Quarter-Finals
The confident, psychologically-stronger Germans defeat an Argentina that tried to hang on to it’s lead, Italy walk over Ukraine, and France ‘wear the yellow and green’ in their defeat of Brazil.
And, of course, England lose on bloody penalties once again!
Germany 1 Argentina 1 AET (Germany win 4-2 on penalties)
Germany stood up remarkably well to a side that you might think would have beaten them reasonably easily. They remained calm and confident throughout the game, allowing Argentina to retain possession of the ball until it became dangerous, and then either intercepting a pass or challenging the opponent to win the ball before launching a counter-attack.
Argentina also started confidently, but as the game wore on you could see that they started to become a little frustrated by Germany’s defensive tactics. Tevez, who began the game, did not really get too many chances to hurt the Germans, and Riquelme was also less influential than usual.
Ayala opened the scoring for Argentina a few minutes after half-time, and, at first, it appeared that they might try to score more. However, when Pekerman took off Riquelme with about 20 minutes to go and replaced him with the more defence-minded Cambiasso, their intention to hold out became clear.
Germany equalised in the 80th minute - a nice little ball into the box from Ballack to Borowski, who flicked it on for Klose to score once more, with a diving header - and Pekerman’s risky substitution of Riquelme started to look like a real tactical error, especially with extra time looming.
With no further scoring, the match did go to extra time, and finally penalties. Germany continued their 100% record since 1990 and Argentina missed a couple that cost them the match.
Italy 3 Ukraine 0
Italy were, unsurprisingly, so much better than Ukraine. They had the vast majority of the chances, they had more options in attack (poor old Shevchenko was left up front on his own for most of the game), and their defence was a hell of a lot better than the shaky Ukrainian’s.
Yes, Ukraine hit the woodwork a couple of times and had a couple of chances, but Italy would have been exceptionally unlucky if this match had even gone to extra time. Ukraine did have a couple of reasonable results in the competition, but they only actually played two top-quality opponents - Spain and Italy - and they lost quite easily to both.
England 0 Portugal 0 AET (Portugal win 3-1 on penalties)
*Sigh…* Out at the quarter-final stage once again! On penalties once again! *Sigh*
Plus points:
- England played a lot better, retaining possession of the ball and closing down opponents;
- Hargreaves had an astonishing game, covering almost every area of the pitch without looking like a headless chicken (à la David Platt) or a psycho-nutcase (à la David Batty) - on a couple of occasions, he even took on and went past opponents;
- Eriksson finally took Beckham off, and put on the dangerous Aaron Lennon in his place (Lennon gave the Portuguese a couple of scares - as we suspected he might!)
- after Rooney’s dismissal, the defence became a little less panicky and more self-assured.
Minus points:
- Lampard and, to a slightly lesser extent, Gerrard, still look a little nervy and uptight;
- England are uncertain of how to play with a 5-man midfield and one up front - they (and it’s the midfield again, boys!) still don’t quite know how (and when) to provide adequate support to the lone striker;
- penalties require a certain mindset that England don’t appear to have.
Luckily, Eriksson is now leaving the team in the capable hands of Steve McClaren (did I say ‘capable‘?!) who will hopefully (please!) be assisted by Terry Venables - an excellent motivator and tactician. If Steve continues with the job of setting up ‘fun’ training sessions (as some players have described them in the past) and allows Venables to concentrate on the important stuff (team formation, player selection, etc.) then we might see an improvement to England’s game.
Portugal will probably not get to the final (I wouldn’t have thought) as they were unable to break down their 10-man opponents, either in the last half-hour or extra time. As I’ve said, England did make it difficult for them, but a team that’s supposed to be as good as Portugal should really be able to take advantage of their extra player.
Final thoughts on Sven: I read an article by Joe Lovejoy in yesterday’s Sunday Times that contained the following interesting point:
Wherever he went - Roma, Fiorentina, Sampdoria, Lazio - he had an unfortunate habit of losing the big matches, and he was known in Italy as Perdente di Successo (the Successful Loser) until Sergio Cragnotti bankrolled him, Abramovich-style, for Lazio to win the league in 2000. Source: What England got for £25m: sweet FA, The Times
I think ‘Perdente di Successo‘ says it all, really. He’ll definitely get you to the major tournaments, but don’t expect to really challenge for them…
Brazil 0 France 1
If it wasn’t for the fact that you knew the players’ faces, you might have thought the two sides had swapped shirts before kick-off! France were utterly superb - Zidane was outstanding, like his old self, as was Vieira. Ribery was brilliant too, with some fantastic runs. I can’t come up with enough superlatives - France were superlative!
It’s not that Brazil were particularly poor - correction, in absolute terms, they were not that great, but compared to their other performances in this World Cup, they were OK. Brazil were simply out-classed by a team finally ticking-over on all cylinders.
Congratulations France - if you play like that again, not only will you walk past Portugal, but you’ll more likely than not turn over Germany or Italy in the final.
Final prediction
Before the tournament started, I told a number of people that I thought that Portugal might actually win the thing with Scolari in charge (perhaps I should have ‘blogged that prediction, as now it looks like I’m trying to be wise after the event!) Now, though, I can see the final being played between the most consistent team, Germany, and the team that have consistently improved with every game, France.
And the winner? After seeing them beat Brazil so emphatically, I have to go for France!
(Or Germany!)
OK, sitting on this fence is quite uncomfortable anyway, my final answer is France!
