World Cup Mirror (Part 3) |
The 48-team World Cup promised upheaval. For a fortnight, it looked capable of delivering one. Paraguay dumped four-time champions Germany out on penalties in the Round of 32. Morocco did the same to the Netherlands hours later, in a game the Dutch seemed content to see out on penalties. Brazil, the most decorated nation in the competition's history, were beaten by Norway in the last sixteen, continuing their run of being eliminated by a European side at every World Cup since they last won one in 2002. Egypt led Argentina 2-0 with eleven minutes left in that same round before Lionel Messi and two late goals turned the game on its head.
None of it lasted. By the semi-finals, the tournament had reverted to type. France, Spain, England and Argentina remain, and for the first time in World Cup history, the last four are exactly the top four-ranked teams that entered it. The underdogs had their say. Then football's oldest hierarchy reasserted itself, the way it usually does once the smaller sample sizes of knockout football give way to the bigger tests.
Spain against France, in Dallas, is probably the tournament's finest tactical puzzle. This is not the Spain of endless possession and sterile domination that came to define the tiki-taka era. They have built their run on defence: one goal conceded in six matches, five clean sheets, a run so mean it briefly set a World Cup record before Belgium finally breached it in the quarter-final. There is a question........