…Wales Goalkeeper, Wayne Hennessey is third goalkeeper to be sent off in the world cup and 174th red card.
Four African teams had the advantage to play in the quarterfinals of the world cup in history. In 1990, The Indomitable Lions of Cameroon became the first African country to reach that stage after she beat Columbia in the round of 16 matches but were defeated 2-3 by the Three Lions of England in the quarter finals.
Netherlands and Senegal move to round of 16 from Group A
Next was the Teranga Lions of Senegal that defeated Sweden 2-1 in 2002 in the round of 16 but slumped, 1-2 to Turkey in the quarters. Ghana’s Black Stars piped USA 2-1 in 2010 in South Africa but Luis Suarez acted the Devil that stopped Ghana with his hand of the Devil (not Hand of God like Maradona) when he deliberately stopped a goal bound shot with his hands. A penalty was awarded and Asamoah Gyan lost it. Ghana lost on penalty shootouts. Suarez never apologized even when both teams met again on 2nd December 2022 in Qatar. Ghana organized the exit of Uruguay despite the South Americans winning 2-0. Suarez like Gyan wept in 2010 wept uncomforted for the loss.
And here comes the fourth team that came like the fourth man in the Nebuchadnezzar fire set for the Hebrew children, Morocco in this case. The Atlas Lions played goalless with mighty Spain and got them stranded in great pains 3-0 on penalties.
No African team has gone beyond the quarter finals. Will the Atlas Lions of Morocco break the jinx?
Quarter Final schedule:
Croatia versus Brazil at 6pm on Friday 9th December.
Netherlands versus Argentina at 10pm on Friday 9th December.
Morocco versus Portugal at 6pm on Saturday 10th December.
England versus France at 10pm on Saturday 10th December.
Now that the round of 16 matches has been concluded, we have played 56 matches and scored 148 goals making an average of 2.64 goals per match. At the group stages, 120 goals were scored in the 48 matches of that stage making 2.5 goals per match. There was no hand of the Devil at both stages. The group stages were played from 20th November – 2nd December while the round of 16 matches were played 3rd – 7th December.
It is on record that two matches ended in penalty shootout at the knockout stage of the round of 16 matches Japan 1(1) versus Croatia 1(3) and Morocco 0(3) versus Spain 0(0).
Paris St Germaine hit man and France star boy, Kyllian Mbappe is the highest scorer so far in contention for the Golden boot with 5 goals. He is followed by a team of guys each with 3 goals namely Lionel Messi of Argentina; Richarlison of Brazil; Enner Valencia of Ecuador; Marcus Rashford of England; Olubukayo Saka of England; Olivier Giroud of France; Cody Gakpo of Netherlands; Goncalo Ramos of Portugal who scored his goals in a single match, only hat trick of the tournament and Alvaro Morata of Spain.
At the group stages, the highest group score was group E comprising Japan, Spain, Germany and Costa Rica that scored total 22 goals followed by group H comprising Portugal, South Korea; Uruguay and Ghana that scored a total 17 goals. England and Spain scored 9 goals each to emerge highest team scorers at the group stage.
A goalkeeper opened the award of red cards. Wayne Hennessey of Wales got a straight red for a foul on Nicolas Teremi of Iran in a group B match played 25th November. Wayne was the third goalkeeper to be sent off after Humeleny of South Africa against Uruguay in 2010 and Italy’s Gianluca Paglivca against Norway in 1994. Wayne’s red card is the 174th in the tournament history.
Alizara Jahanbakhsh bagged two yellows against England and Wales in group B; Sebes Mendez of Ecuador had 2 yellows against Qatar and Netherlands in group A; Idrissa Gueye in group A also got two yellows against Netherlands and Ecuador; Abdulellah Al-Malki got his against Argentina and Poland in group C; Francisco Calvo bagged his against Spain and Japan in group E. Also in that category, Amadoa Onana got his against Canada and Morocco in group F; Paulo Bento the manager of South Korea got into the books when he bagged a yellow in the match against Ghana; Ko Itakura of Japan was flashed his yellow against Costa Rica and Spain but the two yellow to Vincent Aboubakar of Cameroon were received in one match against Brazil and that immediately translated to red card.
Cards has fine tags on them and affect the teams when Fair Play computation is done for example a straight red attracts -5 points for the team meaning Wales cannot collect Fair Play trophy. Yellow cards are not carried forward to any future international matches. Not even into the quarterfinal stages of the competition.
Incidentally two topmost red carded players at the world cup players now turned coaches who had two red cards at the world cup were the manager of the Indomitable Lions of Cameroon, Rigobert Song in 1994 and 1998 as well as France ace player, Zidane in 1998 and 2006. Zidane is not in Qatar as a Manager.
As at the last match in the group of 16 matches, total attendance was 2,868,668 indicating 51,226 attendances per match. Let us take three highest attendance record per match; Argentina versus Mexico – 88,966; Portugal versus Uruguay 88,668; Brazil versus Serbia 88, 103. The lowest attendance was the Switzerland versus Cameroon match at Al Janoub Stadium that attracted 39,089 fans.
I want to close with three spectacular attractions. One, the Stadium 974 also known as Ras Abu Aboud Stadium that got its name from the number of shipping containers used in the construction of the stadium and Qatar’s dialing code is the first temporary stadium ever used by FIFA. It will be dismantled before Christmas after the world cup ending on December 18.
Two, this is the first time teams do not have to travel by flights to match venues they stay close about 10 kilometers to their venues. They also have training bases near their venues. Most of the eight match venues were close to Doha. Good money and logistics on the Qatar world cup.
Lastly, it was the first time that the Qur’an had to be recited at the opening ceremony. Nigeria’s David Adeleke known as Davido was part of those who sang the tournament song. Nigeria’s song composer of the global hit tune BUGA, Kiss Daniel specially performed Buga in Doha.
There is a need to close with the fact that Nigeria’s Super Eagles were not in Qatar. The team lost to the Ghana Black Stars in the qualifiers even at the National Stadium in Abuja. The Nigeria Football Association President at the time of the qualifiers, Pinnick lamented Nigeria’s absence when Portugal Slammed Uruguay 2-0 at the round of 16 saying Nigeria would have done well at the Mundial. Portugal dazed Nigeria 4-0 at the pre-tournament meeting.
Eniola Olatunji reporting.
#FifaworldcupQatar2022.
