A splendid display of football over the past few days of World Cup. Apart from all the comments, I had made some interesting observations from the matches played in the past few days.
Substitute Goalkeepers
In the match of Sweden VS Trinidad and Tobago, the first-string Trinidad and Tobago goalkeeper, Jack, was injured minutes before the kick-off. As we could see from the broadcast, he sat on the benches with a towel over him, looking heartbroken in missing out Trinidad and Tobago�fs debut World Cup match. However, the substitute goalkeeper performed so well to put out so many dangerous balls from the Sweden side, denying Sweden of the full three points and created World Cup 2006's biggest upset in the past few days. He was certainly the hero of Trinidad and Tobago. He was almost godlike, with most of the attempts put forward by Swedish players rolling right into his hands. He was only a substitute, but he fantastically displayed his goalkeeping skills, proving himself to be the hero of Trinidad and Tobago's successful debut match. He was the savior for Trinidad and Tobago and the nightmare of Sweden. Now we had seen the true heroic performance from substitute goalkeeper of Trinidad and Tobago--Hislop Shaka.
Another great performance from substitute goalkeeper of Paraguay-Bobadilla Aldo.
England was hot favourites in World Cup and Beckham forced an own goal from a Gamarra Carlos in only three minutes of play. It never rain but pours for Paraguay, in spite of their nervous start and the early concede of goal, Paraguay's first-string goalkeeper injured himself when he tried to save a ball. Watching him limping off the field, we thought that Paraguay was bound to face more embarrassment from England. However, the substitute goalkeeper who came up proved us wrong. He put the Paraguay side back into rhythm by keeping the goal safe and indirectly giving Paraguay chances to push forward than just staying at her own penalty area, defending the bombardment from England.
In the second half, his confidence grew and produced two beautiful saves from the two beautiful long shots by Frank Lampard. Apart from these two shots on target, England was unable to create any good goal scoring chances. With the confident goalkeeper and the vigilant defenders, England found no chance to bring forward a second goal and let to the final score line, England 1 Paraguay 0. It was definitely a great performance from Bobadilla, a substitute goalkeeper with no recognition from the fans. However, when the time comes for him to do something for the team, he did it well and saved Paraguay from further embarrassment by England.
Nervous and small wins from the favourites
England, Argentina, Holland and Portugal, certainly the hot favourites in this World Cup, only managed to produce a small win against teams which are not as good. England and Argentina and particularly nervous in the second-half and did not played out their true strengths. England's performance in the later part of the game was definitely not satisfactory as the team was passive and relied mostly on defence to secure a 1-0 small win over Paraguay. In the match by Argentina and Cote d'Ivoire, when Drogba scored for Cote d'Ivoire in the last ten minutes, bringing the score to 2-1, Argentina was seen most nervous and panicky. Argentina wasted as much time as possible and waited for the final whistle by just passing the ball around. Holland, as compared to England and Argentina, was much more confident in their match against Serbia and Montenegro. However, it was still not a very easy win as Holland was pressured by the Serbia and Montenegro side heavily in the second-half. We saw the wonderful display of football by Robben of Holland in the match. I watched him with awe as he was certainly a football prodigy. Portugal too, relied on an early goal, just like England and failed to net once more in the next 85 minutes.
We also saw the upset from Poland and Sweden. Poland, was the favourites in Group A to get into the last 16 together with Germany, but received a heavy blow from South America's Ecuador, which greatly hindered their progress to the next stages. Sweden, Sweden, draw over Trinidad and Tobago. Many certainly would be awestruck by the 0-0 score line of the powerful Sweden and the small Trinidad and Tobago�Cthe biggest upset in all the matches of World Cup 2006.