Cape Verde do it again and Lamine Yamal spurs on Spain – World Cup Daily

0:00Mark Langdon:This is The Guardian.

0:30Mark Langdon:to score his first ever goal. Also in that group, Spain went top, defeating Saudi Arabia before the first hydration break. We'll get Sid Lowe's verdict from Atlanta. In Group G, Egypt beat New Zealand. The Kiwis took the lead before Zico equalised and Mo Salah finally did something. The Kiwis furious not to get a free kick in the build-up of that one before Trezeguet made the point certain. Egypt top after Iran held a disappointing Belgium to a goldist draw. We'll do Japan's excellent win over the hapless Tunisians. There's a musical correction, some reaction to the LA diaries. Your questions, and that's today's Guardian Football Weekly.

1:01Mark Langdon:on the panel today why are you looking so stern barry glendennie hello max hello uh also in la jeff ruta hey jeff hey max and joining us for 10 a 10 day stretch of the racing post mark langdon this is exciting mark hey mark hi max nice to have you the first thing you said in the whatsapp group is no salad for me but we'll uh we'll get to that uh let's start then in group h that looks like this spain are top on four points uruguay second with two caverde have two as well saudi Arabia with one and we'll start with that draw in Miami between Uruguay and Cape Verde 2-2 two games two draws against Spain and Uruguay which Mark is an extraordinary achievement absolutely and I think the World Cup needs results like that I think you spoke about it already on the show over the last few days but there was a lot of criticism of the 48 teams and it will have been because you know teams like Cape Verde should they be in the tournament and they've delivered two of the results of the tournament so far against Spain we saw a very different performance where they were it was just basically 11 people behind the ball and goalkeeper keeping out all of the shots.

2:07In this game against Uruguay they actually played some football and we saw that there's some talent going forward as well and actually towards the end of the game they might have lost it but they also might have won it. It was really fun.

2:19Mark Langdon:Yeah, that free kick Barry from Kevin Peaner I mean the wall is questionable I give you that What do you think? If you could even call it a wall.

2:28Max Rushden:I'm not even sure they mixed their mortar before they assembled it.

2:31Mark Langdon:You're probably right. I couldn't believe it had gone in, but what a moment.

2:34Max Rushden:Yeah, an incredible goal. I think it was 32 yards out. And it wasn't so much a defensive wall as an elevator doors opening to create this gap that Pena shot through. I shudder to think what Marcelo Bielsa had to say about that in his halftime pep talk, but he had plenty of other things to keep him occupied as well. But yeah, that was a brilliant goal, but a bit lucky because what were they doing to the defender?

3:04Mark Langdon:Journalist Ali Howard talking about Kevin Pena, who obviously I'd not heard of before he took that free kick, saying he thought any hopes of a football career were over when his family moved from Santiago Island in Cabo Verde to Brockton, Massachusetts as a 16-year-old. A chance encounter with a guy called Carlos Calo Moraes, who played for Cape Verde years before, to bring him back to the islands, to have a go at being a professional footballer. 11 years later, he scored his country's first goal at the World Cup, which is a lovely, I mean, so many lovely stories on this side. And then you've got to give him so much credit, because that 2-1, once Uruguay score right on halftime, you think, okay, that's done.

3:39Mark Langdon:Their journey is over, type thing. And so to come back again takes great fortitude. And especially, you know, like Mark said, when their first approach had been, all right, let's park it from the opening whistle and let's be able to keep this thing nil-nil, to be able to have that sort of initiative to go forward. And it's incredible technique on the equalizer as well. Needing it past Musler to be able to get him unaware and then striking it before he hit the ground or especially before any Uruguayan could kind of obstruct him. You already alluded to it. It's not a vintage Uruguay. They're certainly struggling up top.

4:08Luis Suarez watching on from the suite offered his services a bit late in the cycle to be able to be part of the squad.

4:14Mark Langdon:Isn't it weird seeing him there looking like quite a nice guy? The brand reconciliation has begun in earnest. I really think it has. But I think that they really did miss him. And when you looked at the bench, it was Darwin Nunez coming off the bench in terrible match fitness right now. Rodrigo Aguirre has been in very poor form in Mexico, I think only nine goals in his last 47 games. So maybe it's the issues up top. Maybe it's that Bielsa has to sit on a FIFA-sponsored cooler, which that's probably some bad juju there too. But yeah, tough one for Uruguay. Yeah, I suppose, Mark, it is great technique from Varela to get past Maslera.

4:48Mark Langdon:But Maslera is also there, which is not necessarily where he needs to be. I was going to jump in there and just say to Jeff, come on, the goalkeeping error from Muslery definitely plays its part, I think it's fair to say, in the goal. He's come at, what, 25 yards? If he doesn't do that, there's still a lot of work for Varela to do. As it was, there was less work for him. even the free kick I know you've blamed the wall but any shot that goes in from 30 yards I always think the goalkeeper could do slightly better anyway but he's definitely at fault for the second goal there's been a lot of negativity about Uruguay coming into the tournament and they don't look a happy team I know Bielsa teams are always chaotic in their very nature but it just doesn't feel right for them and they've put themselves in a terrible spot now to qualify where they definitely need something against Spain in the final group game, maybe even a win.

5:47Max Rushden:Whoever finishes second in this group will almost certainly have to play Argentina. Winning the group is paramount. Well, you know, I think Does form go out the window

5:59Mark Langdon:if Argentina play Uruguay? I don't know.

6:01Max Rushden:I did enjoy the bit Uruguay's second goal where Urahu teed up Canobio with the the cushioned header and he slotted home with precision but in the build up to that fedi valverde was helping out one of the cape verdians who had gone down with cramp he was doing the pressy pressy thing and he just dropped it literally left him hanging so he could get involved in the move sort of fair enough and there was another moment where uruguay had a goal disallowed and we were

6:34Mark Langdon:watching it going i think you said mark that's got to be disallowed for something we couldn't work out what but something there was a combination of almost an offside maybe kicking out of the goalkeeper's hands and then something else as well and you just feel like a combination of those means that it does need to be ruled out it was offside in the end which actually it was very tight and it saved the officials what would have been a really tough 50 50 call on whether um that that goal should have stood but it was um ruled out you know it was tight but it still was offside and it puts Cape Verde in a great position now to qualify with that point.

7:11And I always felt that African teams got a really bad deal out of the kind of previous World Cups. And, you know, five or six teams used to qualify and it just wasn't enough. And even this time around, you've got some established nations, Cameroon, Nigeria, being probably the most too prominent. And it's just great to see, actually, that a number of the African teams have started very well. Morocco, Ivory Coast have surprised me with the way that they played and I had Cape Verde down as just one of the worst teams in the tournament and they're clearly not that bad No, well we get to Tunisia

7:43Max Rushden:which perhaps, there's always an exception Mark suggested there that the Uruguayans look like an unhappy camp but apparently they are an unhappy camp and a lot of the players do not like Bielsa's sort of dictatorial regime And he can't bring in Calvin Phillips yeah and he has said like that anyone I coach you know anyone who has to deal with me suffers kind of thing so I think the players are not on his side yeah Voisinho didn't have as good a game as

8:17Mark Langdon:Bruce Joel said having a worse game now that his mum's there watching and he has 15 million Instagram followers so who knows after this game when he has 30 million how he'll do against Saudi Arabia I just one thing yes Baz you you mentioned that idea about substitute celebrating with the players. And I think I agree with you roundly, but I think it's okay, isn't it, for when you're an underdog, when you're a minnow, how do you feel about it? Even your heart could melt for the Cape Verde players.

8:43Max Rushden:No, I'm afraid it has to be a blanket ban.

8:46Mark Langdon:You can't pick and choose. You have to be consistent. Bielsa did say about hydration breaks, playing four halves instead of two alters, the conception that had been culturally constructed to interpret football, it adds nothing and takes away a lot. When it was divided into four, no thought was given to the effect it might have on what made football a sport that captivates people, but rather to another type of repercussions that I neither discussed nor analysed before this decision. Football had one characteristic, now it has another. People fall in love with the game because of its characteristics.

9:15Mark Langdon:So he'll be on the sports bar on TalkSport soon with those kind of... I thought that was quite a good joke, but got nothing. Anyway, let's do Spain 4, Saudi Arabia 0. I spoke to Sid Lowe after this, so let's have a listen to that. Sid, I see you're walking away from the stadium in Atlanta. I mean, that was a procession, wasn't it? It was. It was done inside the first quarter, Max. They didn't even have to go off for the first drinks and Spain were already 3-0 up. It was already done. It was exactly the way I think they would have wanted it because, of course, the doubts that came from the first game when they drew 0-0.

9:49The statistic that best sums it up for me that I most enjoy is that Miguel Ollar didn't get a touch inside the first 30 minutes of the first game. this time inside the first 23 he's got an assist and two goals yeah and it's a great it's great

10:02Mark Langdon:day for him isn't it because a lot of talk about you know do they need a center forward etc yeah i think i think you know michele oyathabal is a guy that no one talks about and in particular michele oyathabal doesn't talk about him you know he's he doesn't sell himself he doesn't make a noise he doesn't talk about how important he is he seems to have no ego whatsoever although i think it's very difficult to be an elite sportsman without some kind of ego and his record for Spain is phenomenal since he became the first choice and it really took the departure of Albano Morata for him to be first choice and I did write the stats in the in the match report I haven't got them to hand but I think I'm right in saying that that's 14 goals and seven assists in his last 13 Spain games now and you know I think he did need that today but I think he's a a phenomenal player.

10:50Mark Langdon:Jamal started, obviously. Is it as simple as he starts Spain good? Yes and no, which is the inevitable answer. I was always going to say that to you, wasn't I? I think what he does is he changes the mood. I think he changes the way the others feel about it. And I think you saw that in the enthusiasm today. I think you saw that in the response of others. I think it's quite contagious in terms of his attitude, in terms of the approach. And I think also, of course, he draws a load of people in. There's a brilliant interview with him today in El Pais. and he says basically i've always got three men on me and he's challenged on this he said oh always three maybe if i'm lucky too but never just one never and i think there's an element of truth in that that opens things up and i think it's not entirely chance that you saw that actually what spain created came from the other wing today mostly not from the mean but i think it's partly about people being drawn into him and being and that being part of it i don't think he was fit enough to play for very long i think it was the right decision to take him off at halftime but yes he changes I think the way that Spain feel about themselves he changes by the way the way it feels in the stadium as well enormously yeah that's so interesting it wasn't the only change though was it what did you make of the the other changes well I think there's a couple of things that I thought were very interesting I think one of them was one of them was um the change in structure so it wasn't just a change in personnel I think Spain have been leaning towards something like a 4-3-3 in the last game she had Fabian and Pedri and Rodri in midfield when Luis La Fuente one of the things he'd done was kind of break with Spain's tradition by playing 4-2-3-1 and having an actual number 10 and I think what happened in the first game amongst many other things was that 4-3-3 kind of obliged Pedri to play the most advanced role of the three in the middle so he almost still was 4-2-3-1 with him as the number 10 and although that's where he began his career it's not where he's played really well for the last couple of years with Barcelona and I felt that there was something very very simple which is that Pedri is better when the game's in front of him and I think in the first game the game was behind him and I think with the game in front of him today i thought he was much much better i think he he uh he controls the tempo he controls the the the kind of thought process of of the team i think when he plays deeper and he's got the game in front of him i think the introduction of danny olmer meant that they had an actual number 10 the kind of player that can see a space when there isn't really any you know around the area can drop those little passes off and i thought that was really important as well and the player that people haven't really talked about who i thought was very very good today was was alex bionna who's actually had a really terrible season uh well not terrible that's probably a bit harsh a not very good season in his first year at Atletico Madrid but I liked him a lot today yeah um how was the atmosphere there I had the Saudi fans below me making quite a lot of noise and I think the atmosphere from the Spanish fans was they kind of needed this you know because there was a bit of tension off the first game I personally think too much tension I know the players think this and Luis de la Fuente had said you know every the players were the phrase he used was picado which kind of means stunned you know they were they were stung they were angered by the criticism I was thinking well the criticism wasn't that bad really but if it helps to fuel you if it helps to make you angry give you you know a chance to kick against the pricks then then you know it works out quite nicely in the end happy day sid have a lovely day thanks for coming on what's what's that for you now what do you do from here i'm now going to drive back to chattanooga where spain's training bases right okay well have a nice drive thanks mate cheerio sid low there on his way back to chattanooga you have some criticism for me

14:05Max Rushden:barry on the end of that interview well i just thought it was a gross dereliction of duty on your part um not to ask sid if he was going home on the chattanooga choo choo yes the train made famous by glenn miller and his orchestra back in the 1940s yes uh well i do apologize

14:24Mark Langdon:it's a very catchy number yeah yeah no i don't know sax and trumpet heavy max i knew he was driving so like i knew he wasn't unless the chattanooga choo choo has a bit like you know you know you can drive on the channel tunnel yeah does it have that i don't know i don't know maybe jeff knows do you have any other thoughts on this game i mean sid's covered it quite well yeah anything you could add well i think that the saudi arabian performance i thought really deserved the scoreline right and it's just interesting because we're now a few years into the pro league experiment right and we're very used to seeing that sort of level of investment um for for players leaving europe especially uh and i i think about all of the the the blather about the Club World Cup and the idea that this would help a lot more domestic leagues because then suddenly you're giving these prize pools where they're reinvesting across the league in theory.

15:09And you see it with Egypt, for example, picking up a lot of players. Al-Ali, certainly over the last two years. And with Saudi Arabia, there just wasn't a lot of domestic talent who really looked like they were challenging, right? And in the league, they're not the headliners when you think of Al-Halal's run that they made last summer at that Club World Cup. And you look at this game, every loose ball was Spain's. Every possible switch off with the off-ball movement, they didn't know how to pick it up and there weren't really a lot of players who seemed to know how to grab a game and try to wrestle it back into their control it just looked like they were really compliant and wanted Spain to be able to have their sort of bounce back after their opener

15:43Mark Langdon:yeah and yet Mark they can still get through they have to beat Cape Verde which I suppose if you'd said that to them at the start they'd have probably taken it yeah I mean it's it's a last 32 tie before the last 32 for Saudi Arabia it's you know must win match for them I thought they were lucky against Uruguay to get the draw, and they completely battered, really, in this game. Spain declared at four, so I'd be surprised if they won the game. And how do you see Spain-Uruguay?

16:16Max Rushden:Well, on the evidence of what I've seen of Uruguay so far, I think Spain will beat them, but you don't know. Spain will want to top the group, they'll want to win the group. They're a much better team than Uruguay. This Uruguay team is not Uruguay of yore. They're not even dirty. You know, they're disappointingly disciplined and meek.

16:37Mark Langdon:Yeah, I had a look at that starting line-up, and actually there weren't that many familiar faces in that starting line-up. I don't know if that's a reflection on me, but apart from sort of Agate and Ventancur and a couple of others. The strikers, isn't it? Like, you know, when they had Cavani and Suarez, you had two elite sort of forwards that were playing at the very top of European football and now they haven't and Darwin Nunez can't get in the team he can't get in his club team either and just looks completely short of confidence and fitness and so you're just lacking did the midfield Agati Bentancourt Valverde should still be able to sort of have got Uruguay more points than they've got so far but just at the top end of the pitch they don't really feel like they can hurt you anymore How we miss the movement of Cavani Right that'll do for part one on part two we'll do group g welcome to part two of the guardian football weekly uh so we just watched uh new zealand one egypt three um egypt's first world cup win at the ninth attempt after 92 years um which has surprised me as a statistic jeff um how did you feel this game went they built into the game right and they looked a little bit rattled by that first goal by new Zealand.

17:56I mean, who needs to build a meat wall when every man in the wall is meat himself? And, you know, it's something that I almost wonder why New Zealand doesn't lean into more. They have players who can do a long throw like Michael Boxall, who does this in MLS with Minnesota United all the time with precision. And they were so late to be able to try to throw in and create some more of those chances. And they gave Egypt time to get back into the game, find their way through, especially Moselah, as they have been, as they did against Belgium as well, try to get immediately up to that right channel and then cut inwards.

18:24And either he takes a shot or tries to bashed it to Marmouche and they'd get it intercepted but um certainly fought a lot better in this game

18:30Mark Langdon:I thought yeah um I mean look New Zealand started so well but like the goal is great and and and at halftime he sort of thought like Egypt hadn't really arrived yet in this game and and I thought

18:41Max Rushden:New Zealand were gonna win yeah they were a better team in the first half Finn Sermon's header was brilliant as I call it he was completely unmarked like there's no near him and about a yard away from him, two Egyptians jumped together as if they were marking each other. So that was a bit of a gift, but, you know, it still took scoring from Sermon. And it just looked at halftime as if Egypt were kind of hoping Marmouche and Mo Salah would dig them out of a hole. And Salah certainly helped dig them out of the hole. He got a goal. Their coach made some changes at halftime, not in personnel, but just tactics.

19:22Max Rushden:Yeah, they ended the game on top, deserved winners, but it did look ropey for them for a while.

19:27Mark Langdon:Yeah, New Zealand had one chance at 1-0, didn't they? Which was well saved. And maybe that changes things. But, you know, we were looking at this group going, Egypt, they were the pot two team and by the end they showed that. They did. I'm just relieved I was on sort of US time to watch it because having tried to stay up for all of these games in the UK, the last one of the four has always been the most difficult and New Zealand versus Egypt wouldn't have sold it to stay up all night. So it was nice to eat that with dinner cooked by producer Joel. Yeah, good roast chicken and potatoes. It was.

20:01But yeah, so I think it's probably important to just give, for the UK viewers, I don't think many would have watched it. It really was a game of two halves, wasn't it? Because New Zealand, I thought, were the better team in the first half, used their physicality. But by the end, Egypt definitely deserved to win and by a comfortable margin. And Salah's goal was important for him because he hasn't been playing well for Liverpool. And he was criticised for his performance in that opening game as well. He looked a long way off it. He wasn't amazing in this game either, but he did produce one moment of brilliance that sort of really turned the game in putting Egypt 2-1 up.

20:39Great team move. And I just felt Egypt played much quicker in the second half. It was just too pedestrian early on. It made it easy for New Zealand to stay in their shape, but Egypt moved them about much more in the second half.