Japan/South Korea '02 saw two teams who expected to achieve more fall short..Portugal's Golden Generation of Luis Figo, Rui Costa and co. had missed out on winning Euro 2000 after a painful penalty golden goal semifinal defeat to France. 2002 could have seen them go further at the bigger tournament. But they fell short after an opening defeat to the US. In their final match against South Korea they only needed a draw. But they had two players sent off and lost 1-0. The two sendings off were not the only story, nor was the fact that South Korea won against a 9-man team. What was incredible was that Portugal had chance after chance after they were down to 9 players. And even more incredible was that in the final few minutes with Portugal giving up on defending, South Korea could not score again. Two or three times they had three players on the attack with only Vitor Baia, the Portuguese goalie, to beat but Baia did his bit to make the miracle happen. It didn't.
England, led by David Beckham and managed by Sven Goran Eriksson felt this could have been their time. After a comfortable 3-0 win against Denmark in the last 16 they faced Brazil in the quarterfinals. Michael Owen put them ahead, but Rivaldo equalized right at half-time. In the second half Ronaldinho scored the winner for Brazil with a memorable World Cup goal, but more for it's "was in intentional or was it a mis-hit cross?" than for it's quality. David Seaman, I'm sure, can still see that ball sailing over his head.
No comments:
Post a Comment