INGLEWOOD, Calif. – South Africa are not exactly known for their play out of the back, so one would think, eventually, their opponents would find a way to take advantage. Minutes into the second half, Canada were clearly aware of this issue; they applied pressure whenever they could, a little going a long way as South Africa’s attempts to regain possession only lasted for a few short seconds. Eventually, Alaistair Johnson was off to the races and able to pick out a nice cross on the right flank, a pair of well-placed teammates in position.
The first target was Jonathan David, the Juventus striker perfectly positioned in front of goal. He, though, gets an awkward touch on it and the ball drifts behind him. Not to worry, one would think – Liam Millar is at the edge of the penalty area and has the chance to at least get a good strike in. It was undoubtedly a powerful hit; it also went soaring over the bar, a promising moment lost to time and not for the first time – nor for the last.
The first-ever round of 32 match at a World Cup was already unglamorous in its billing, two second-place teams from groups that were only compelling because two of the three host nations made the cut. It lived up to the reputation in every sense, few exciting displays of soccer in sight. Forget quality shots being few and far between – noteworthy sequences were hard to find. The first impressive moment of the game came after the halfway mark, when Mbekezeli Mbokazi came up with a game-saving clearance, while Alphonso Davies‘ entrance with 15 minutes to go really began to turn the matchup into a soccer game (Wild what can happen when a team’s best player is on the field).Â
The slow transformation into something resembling something worth watching ensured the moment that would put a world’s worth of onlookers out of their misery came in the second minute of stoppage time through Stephen Eustaquio, who scored the game’s only goal in stylish form.
South Africa Hugo Broos was unflinching at the quality of the match and specifically his team.
“We lost the game because there was a lack of power and speed in our team when I compare that with our opponent,” he said post-match about his team, which mustered just one shot on target and 0.12 expected goals. “We lost a lot of duels, men against men and the speed in our team – not only the running speed but also the speed of execution.”
Canada head coach Jesse Marsch gathered his players in a circle afterwards and told them they were Canadian heroes and he is right about that. For a soccer program that started a World Cup partially on home soil, waiting for their first-ever win at the tournament, bagging a second in a win-or-go-home is monumental in its own right. A memorable moment was had at SoFi Stadium, if nothing else, even if his side were not that much better than the opponents.
“I think the performance was really strong and disciplined,” Marsch noted. “We didn’t really give much away and even when the goalkeeper was slowing things down, we didn’t lose our patience. We knew that being compact and being organized so that South Africa couldn’t get themselves out into open spaces was going to be really important and we could’ve made life a little easier on ourselves if we would’ve made a play earlier when we had some big chances but obviously, the timing of the goal means that the win is incredibly dramatic and I think the effect that it will have in Canada and the inspiring of people will be immense.”
As the near chances piled up before Eustaquio’s goal, though, it was hard not to think about the occasion. The biggest World Cup ever was finally in the knockout stages but kicked things off with an unpleasant game, the only one on the schedule for almost another 24 hours. Dull matches make up the numbers at all World Cups but after a fairly exciting group stage, the 48-team format had finally reared its ugly head – a dull, drab and entertaining match between two teams one would otherwise never pick out for a round of 16 slot. The loser, whoever it would be, would truly deserve to go home but at least they would pocket $11 million on the way out.
And therein lies the bleak reality.
Nearly 70,000 people filled the NFL’s most glamorous new build – many clad in Mexico jerseys, for what it’s worth – in a game that saw FIFA president Gianni Infantino fulfil a decade-old promise when he first rose to his throne. He promised an expanded World Cup and, with that, more games and money than many of the game’s relative minnows had ever been exposed to, no matter the sporting merit of the decision. One can only hope things pick up on Monday, when two of the round’s most exciting games await with Brazil‘s clash with Japan in Houston and the Netherlands‘ face-off with Morocco in Monterrey, Mexico. A few duds are baked into the format, though, no matter which way you slice it and Canada have a tough test ahead of them – they get the winner of the game in Monterrey on Saturday, this time in Houston.
“These players understand and appreciate being aggressive and pressing and [being] dynamic and using our speed to threaten opponents so we will do that again but given the quality of the Netherlands and Morocco, we will have to make some match plan adjustments to make sure that we’re not allowing too much space,” Marsch said. “In general, my goal in this tournament – apart from inspiring our nation – was to make a run so that we could get to see one of the giants of the world … Now we’re at that phase of the tournament and I feel like it’s a free hit and we’re going to go after it and do everything we can to see if we can find a way to get a win.”
Sunday’s game, instead, felt like the latest stop on Infantino’s re-election campaign, a race that already seems won even though the vote is nine months away. The executive has a command over the voting body – he already had his supporters two months ago when he announced his new bid at the end of the FIFA Congress in Vancouver, British Columbia, Haiti‘s delegation amongst the group that was happy to be at the World Cup for the first time since 1974 and owing thanks to Infantino for it. The FIFA president has already adopted soccer’s white savior complex, to the point that he argued he could make World Cup tickets free in his pre-tournament press conference but then asked: Who would fund the game in South Sudan?
It is unclear how the representatives of the federations of South Africa and Canada would vote at next year’s FIFA Congress in Rabat, Morocco, but after each team played their first-ever World Cup knockout rounds, Infantino will have given it his best shot to pick up their votes – if he does not run unopposed, which he has in each election since the 2016 campaign that was widely contested.
Suffering through sloppy, unexciting play for 90 minutes – and thankfully not another 30 – is essentially how Infantino sticks around in his job for as long as he sees fit, and he seems unwilling to let go of his grasp any time soon. The unpalatable part of the experience is now a feature, not a bug.
