Friday was yet another day of big upsets, with England being knocked out of the reckoning, thanks to Costa Rica’s sparkling 1-0 win over Italy. The Switzerland-France encounter was a goal fest, with the Frenchmen taking the match 5-2. Ecuador won their encounter with Honduras 2-1.
Thumbs Up
Our first Thumbs Up, without a second thought, goes to Costa Rica. Not just did they pull off a great win over Italy, they also managed to decide the fortune of biggies England, their win, showing the doors to the English team. The first great thing about Costa Rica’s win, was the fact that they were in a particularly tough group: Uruguay, England and Italy. To emerge as a team that’s booked its knockout round slot from this group is itself commendable. Costa Rica had a plan, which they executed clinically. They never gave the Italian the time or space to score. In terms of shots and shots on target, both teams fared equally: 10 out of 6 for both. In terms of ball possession, the Italian were better with 58% compared to Costa Rica’s 42. Despite that, a goal from Bryan Ruiz helped his team seal the win.
In the match between France and Switzerland, France had the cake and ate it too, literally, crushing their opponents like it was nobody’s business. They were aggressive right from the word go and dominated the match throughout. The first half was a completely French show, with the Swiss men reeling under a 3-0 deficit. They just heaped one embarrassment after another on the Swiss men, stopping only after they won the match with a comfortable margin. Compared to the 8 off 17 ratio by the Swiss men, the Italian had 16 shots on target of their 22.
In the tie between Ecuador and Honduras, our first Thumbs Up would go to Enner Valencia, whose brace brought his team from behind, to equalise, take a lead and finally win the match. The second one would go to Ecuador itself, for 5 of their 8 shots were on target as compared to Honduras’ 9 off 16.
Thumbs Down
In the encounter between Costa Rica and Italy, the Thumbs Down would go to the Italian strategy that didn’t work for them whatsoever. What their coach Cesare Prandelli had said about the weather before the beginning of the match — that the players would suffer — was true in another context altogether. There seemed to be a clear lack of motivation. The first half clearly showed that the Italians lacked the sheen needed for a big tournament like the World Cup. They couldn’t adjust to the Costa Rican style of play and they made too many errors of judgement to recover from. Their strategies lacked aggression and novelty and that’s what caused them (and England) a great chance. Our second Thumbs also goes to this match, to Balotelli, who displayed a rage in field, that promptly earned him a yellow card. Â
Switzerland gets our next Thumbs Down, because they literally looked clueless about the flurry of goals shot by France. Despite having a better ball possession of 57% compared to France’s 43, Switzerland simply couldn’t do anything to stop France from winning. They let the first half go to the French kitty and despite their last attempts that yielded two goals, they never looked in the game.
The last Thumbs Down goes to Honduras, who could not convert a better hit rate to a win. They let Ecuador ruin their leda, take a better ball possession olf 51% and win the match from behind, putting them on the brink of a loss.