The Netherlands will be one of the teams in Sunday’s final after beating Uruguay 3-2 on Tuesday to reach its first World Cup title game in 32 years. - AP Photo
JOHANNESBURG: Perhaps European football isn’t in such a sad state after all.
Despite all the flair of the South American teams at this World Cup, despite the oh-so-close effort by Ghana to put an African team in the semifinals for the first time, and despite the woeful performances by Italy and France in South Africa, the tournament has once again come down to an all-European affair.
The Netherlands will be one of the teams in Sunday’s final after beating Uruguay 3-2 on Tuesday to reach its first World Cup title game in 32 years. Germany and Spain will square off for the second spot on Wednesday, ensuring that the trophy will remain in Europe for another four years after Italy beat France in the 2006 final.
It’s not a scenario many would have predicted just a couple of weeks ago.
This, after all, was a tournament where the traditional European powers stalled, struggled and scraped by in the group stage, while the South American teams provided the creative sparks, attacking intentions and beautiful goals.
While defending champion Italy failed to win a game and finished last in its group, Diego Maradona’s Argentina poured in seven goals to cruise through the first three matches without dropping a point. While France imploded from infighting and went home in shame, Brazil looked to have found a perfect mix of physical defensive play and flashes of brilliance in attack.
While Uruguay and Paraguay both won their groups undefeated and in impressive fashion, Germany and Spain mixed moments of inspired play with surprising group-stage losses, and the Netherlands spent nearly every day trying to explain its lack of flair despite winning all three games.
Now the Dutch are back in the final for the first time since 1978, and will try to become the fifth European team to win the World Cup.
“This is very special,” said Netherlands coach Bert van Marwijk. “After 32 years we play the final again. Such a small country. We can be very proud of this.”
This was also supposed to be Africa’s World Cup, the first held on the continent and the perfect opportunity for its teams to show that they have caught up to the rest of the world and pose a serious challenge for the title.
Sure, it was far-fetched to expect an African team in the final or even the semis especially after Nigeria, Ivory Coast and Cameroon all were eliminated in the group stage and South Africa became the first host nation not to reach the second round.
But Ghana kept hopes alive by finishing second in its group and then beating the United States to reach the quarterfinals.
In short, it looked like momentum in the football world was gradually shifting until it mattered.
Four South American teams made the quarterfinals, and there were legitimate hopes on the continent that the tournament would feature all-South American semifinals for the first time. Instead, only Uruguay advanced along with the three remaining European teams.
Argentina ran into a masterclass in counter attacking and were dismantled 4-0 by Germany. Brazil self-destructed after letting in a fluke equalizer against the Netherlands and lost 2-1, while Paraguay missed a penalty before being undone by a late David Villa goal to lose 1-0 against Spain.
Uruguay, meanwhile, had to play the role of spoilsports by knocking out Ghana in a penalty shootout, after the African team missed a last-second spot kick in extra time.
Uruguay is one of just three non-European teams to have won the World Cup along with Brazil and Argentina but reached the semifinals for the first time in 40 years. Of the five South American teams who came to South Africa, it was one of the least likely to get this far.
“We’re sad because even though nobody gave us a chance, we were close,” Uruguay coach Oscar Tabarez said.
Instead, for the eighth time, there will be two European teams playing for the title. — AP
