Greece Pay The Penalty Despite Domination

Greece paid the ultimate penalty last night as they crashed out of the World Cup at the last 16 stage to a determined and a fighting Costa Rica side. After 120 minutes of near total domination, Greece must wonder how they did not manage to win this tie against a side lacking any real quality but had true spirit as shown in the group stage. Despite this, Costa Rica progress to the quarter-finals for the first time in their history following a 5-3 penalty shoot out victory, after it finished 1-1 after extra time.

The first half was certainly a slow and dull encounter with neither side creating many chances and the majority of the play in the middle third. Greece did however have the majority of the possession but their build up play took far too long to pose any real danger. Dimitris Salpingidis did have the best chance for the Greeks but his effort was well saved by the Costa Rica keeper Navas- the first save of many. 

Greece again started the second half dominating possession but it was Costa Rica who made the breakthrough with one of their first efforts on goal. Bryan Ruiz converted his effort from the edge of the area into the corner of the goal, a very weak finish that somehow found its way in. Certainly all too easy as far as Costa Rica were concerned.

Costa Rica then should have been awarded a penalty shortly after when an apparent hand ball from Torosidis went unnoticed by the referee. Duarte was then sent off for a second bookable offence on 65 minutes, reducing Costa Rica to 10 men and certainly allowing them to focus on defending for the rest of the match. 

As the second half wore on, it looked like Greece were never going to find the all elusive equaliser. Again, their build up play was extremely long and mostly broken down by a dogged Costa Rican defence. Gekas and Fulham’s record singing Mitroglou went close before eventually in the 91st minute, defender Papastathopoulos fired home his first international goal. Greece then almost won it with the last kick of the 90 but Navas pulled off a tremendous save to deny Mitroglou.

Greece looked like the most likely side to progress in extra time but Navas made two more saves denying the Greeks once again. Greece’s best chance came with two minutes left of extra time as Christodoulopoulos found himself through on goal but was stopped by the excellent Navas to take the tie into the dreaded penalty shootout.  

The first seven penalty kicks were put away with ease before Navas made his most decisive save denying Gekas which left Umana to put Costa Rica through to their first ever World Cup Quarter-Final, with a 5-3 penalty win.

Greece will only have themselves to blame that they did not make it through. Poor build up play and a lack of real quality on the wings cost them dear in a match where they had 23 shots with 8 on target to Costa Rica’s 7 attempts all match. It is clear then that the true hero was the Costa Rica and Levante goalkeeper Keylor Navas.

England Crash Out Of World Cup

After just two matches, England’s World Cup dreams have ended perhaps even earlier than the most pessimistic of England fan would have expected. Back to back defeats mean for the first time since 1958, England have failed to make it out of the group stages of the World Cup. With their chances all but over following a 2-1 defeat to Uruguay, Costa Rica’s surprising win over Italy consigned England to their fate. Another World Cup, another failure.

The match against Uruguay was a must win encounter for both sides with defeat not being an option. England started with the same team that lost against Italy and failed to find any finishing touches despite much possession early on. Rooney did come close on a couple of occasions in the first half with his closest effort heading against the bar from close range, where perhaps an inform Rooney would have done better.

England’s frailties in defence were evident in the first half especially when Cristian Rodriguez went close after a Jagielka mistake. Uruguay inevitably took the lead on 39 minutes after Cavani’s inch perfect cross met the head of Suarez after he left his marker to head into the back of the net. The second half started with Uruguay dominating play. They could have so easily scored two or three times in the opening second half minutes but England rode their luck and managed to equalise. Wayne Rooney stuck his first World Cup goal with just 15 minutes left on the clock, following some great work by Johnson out on the right which left Rooney to tap home.

But just as it looked like England had been gaining momentum and looked the most likely team to win, it was that man Suarez who broke England hearts with five minutes remaining. A root one goal began with a punt from the Uruguay goalkeeper which caught out England captain Gerrard who could only flick the ball backwards to Suarez who finished home to seal the win for the South American outfit. 

The defeat left England needing a miracle to qualify but that was soon dashed as Ruiz scored the only goal of the game to give Costa Rica victory over Italy, sending themselves through and England packing.