Saturday, February 25, 2017
Wednesday, February 22, 2017
Sunday, February 19, 2017
Saturday, February 18, 2017
Wednesday, February 15, 2017
Sunday, February 12, 2017
Saturday, February 11, 2017
Wednesday, February 8, 2017
Argentina and Belgium played the very
first match not only of this group, but of the 1982 finals –
reigning world champions had the privilege to open the championship.
It was a worthy opening, it seemed, alas... injured Maradona was not
a sure starter. Menotti said he cannot risk and all depends on the
doctors. But Maradona came on the pitch. Belgium had much bigger
problems – some were already known: Cools was out and in the last
moment Vandereycken had to be replaced. Lozano did not get Belgian
citizenship. Meews carried on one match disqualification to the world
cup. Van Moer was unable to adapt to the Spanish heat. Francois van
der Elst arrived injured from England and was still unable to play.
Finally, Guy Thys felt that there was no point fielding Renquin
without his usual partner Meews. Suddenly, Belgium looked
impoverished and not even remotely up to the task of facing
Maradona-led Argentina. But after referee blew his whistle the
picture was very different.
Argentina showed good football only
briefly at the beginning of the match. Maradona was carefully watched
and met by a swarm of Belgian players, who left him no room. Belgium
was tactically perfect and Argentina faded away. In the 63rd
minute Vanderbergh scored and Argentina had no answer. At the end –
Belgium 1 – Argentina 0. First match, first upset. A sensation
even. After the game Fillol and Menotti said they felt that
Vanderbergh was offside when he scored, but a replay did not make it
clearer – it was not an obvious case of offside. Menotti was a bit
critical of the linesmen, but the reason for the loss was, to him,
his own team lacking fighting spirit. Thys happily praised his boys
for their collective approach and following his tactics to the
letter.
The second match destroyed the modest
aims of El Salvador – there was no question the Salvadorians were
no match to Hungary, but they wanted to better their 1970 record:
three losses and 0-9 goal difference.
They succeeded in one aspect: scored
there first World Cup goal. But received 10. Instantly El Salvador
became the weakest team at this finals, comparable only to Zaire 1974
and most likely even worse. As for Hungary – they did not look
better than expected, but did what had to be done to keep a chance
for going to the second round: huge victory against El Salvador. In
case of equal points, Hungary had goal-difference advantage.
Argentina – Hungary proceeded
'normally': Hungary proved that it was not a miracle team, but a
modest one. Argentina dominated, even looked strong as it was in
1978.
The first half ended with Argentina
leading 2-0, which was made 4-0 by the 62nd minute.
Eventually, Hungary scored a goal, but neither mattered, nor changed
the general impression of the match. Menotti was more than generous
with his praise – he said he was amazed and surprised how good his
team really was. Tarantini and Valdano were injured and had to
substituted, but seemingly the team benefited from that. The
Hungarians did not very upset, which surprised the journalists, but
such cool reaction had to be expected – not only Meszoly knew the
limitations of his squad, but for the moment nothing strange
happened. They still had a chance to go ahead and not their match
with Argentina, but the next one – Belgium vs El Salvador – was
the really important one for their fate.
Which went exactly in favour of
Hungary. Thys wanted his team to score as much as possible against El
Salvador, but there was something well known: Belgium was not a high
scoring team. El Salvador was obviously so weak, that the match
looked a mere formality and the Belgians were not very motivated.
Coeck scored an early goal in the 18th minute, which
perhaps was counter-productive, for it lulled the Belgian team
entirely – the match ended 1-0, a result curiously benefiting
mostly Argentina. Yes, Belgium had a perfect record so far, if they
lost to Hungary, they were out. Argentina, on the other hand,
benefited from any result of Belgium – Hungary, for there was no
doubt they were going to win against El Salvador. Now Hungarian calm
reaction to their otherwise devastating loss to Argentina was
perfectly clear: their most important match was against Belgium and
they had to win. Possible. With motivation and luck.
Belgium – Hungary started as
expected: Hungary was more active and dangerous and scored in the
28th minute. After that luck betrayed them – they had
two more chances and missed. But Belgium had no luck either – in
the beginning of the second half Pfaff and Gerets clashed into each
other, Gerets was heavily injured and had to be replaced. Injuries
plagued Belgium – Pfaff suffered to the end of the match, later,
when Belgium used its substitutes, Coeck was injured and had to limp
to the last whistle useless. But Thys made his important substitute
meantime, fielding van Moer for the first time at this championship.
The veteran instantly took the match under his control and eventually
Czerniatinsky equalized in the 76th minute. At the end –
1-1, Belgium going ahead and Hungary – out.
Argentina – El Salvador was a mere
protocol, leaving no impressions. Passarella scored from a penalty in
the first half and Bertoni added one more goal in the second. If
anything, El Salvador failed in its extremely modest aim to finish
better than in 1970: they lost again all their matches, but ended
with worse goal-difference. Well, they scored their first world cup
finals goal, if it was a consolation.
|
3 |
2 |
1 |
0 |
3 |
1 |
+2 |
5 |
|
|
3 |
2 |
0 |
1 |
6 |
2 |
+4 |
4 |
|
|
3 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
12 |
6 |
+6 |
3 |
|
|
3 |
0 |
0 |
3 |
1 |
13 |
−12 |
0 |
Despite the sensation with which the
group started, it ended as expected and predicted. So far Belgium
appeared to be the most interesting, but also most unlucky team –
if they managed to get the string of injured players fit for the
second round, they would have been quite dangerous. Argentina was
underperforming, but nothing alarming yet – surely, they will come
to their real strength in the second round. Hungary perhaps got more
than expected from their team, coming close to qualifying. In any
case, nothing to be ashamed of. Made a scoring record too.
Sunday, February 5, 2017
Saturday, February 4, 2017
Wednesday, February 1, 2017
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