Photo Credit: Getty Images
With only 2 days of matches left until the World Cup 2014 quarterfinals begin, the anticipation is at an all-time high. There’s no arguing that the Costa Rica team has been the rising star of this tournament so far. Many predicted a short stay for the team, as it was a part of the challenging Group D, which included former champions England, Italy, and Greece.
There have been numerous upsets in the tournament so far. The elimination of the defending champion, Spain, shocked us all. Number 28 ranked Costa Rica, making only its 4th ever tournament appearance, beat number 9 ranked Italy, thus moving on to the second round for the first time since 1990. The match is now said to be one of the biggest upsets in World Cup history.
Costa Rica continued its winning streak today in a thrilling match-up against Greece. The first half was uneventful, a yellow card for each team, but no goals. The second half followed suit with another yellow card for Costa Rica. Finally, in the 52nd minute, Bryan Ruiz of Costa Rica was able to score a goal from the top of the box amongst a slew of Greek defenders. Following its first goal, the Costa Rican team lost a player with forward Oscar Durate’s second yellow card, resulting in a red card suspension for the rest of the game. Costa Rica was forced to play the rest of the game with a 10-man team.
During the last seconds of full time, Sokratis Papastathopoulos managed to score a rebound goal to tie up the game 1-1. After several more failed scoring opportunities for Greece in extra time, the game called for a penalty kick shootout. Frustrated by his team’s misuse of the extra time, Greece head coach Fernando Santos got into an argument with Australian referee Benjamin Williams, who ended up dismissing the coach to the stands prior to the penalty kicks. Santos said the referee’s ruling was unwarranted, stating:
“The referee said we couldn’t go onto the pitch, that we and the substitutes have to be off,” Santos said. “I pointed to the other side and said, ‘They’re all on the pitch.’ The players, the technical staff, everyone of Costa Rica was on the pitch, and those of Greece couldn’t cross the sideline. So I said, ‘That’s not right; that’s a double-standard.'”
Santos, who is Portugal-born, commented on the remainder of the match during a news conference:
“I don’t think we used the 30 minutes (of extra time) as well as we should. We started it as if it was the last minute of the game, but there was still 30 left. We just needed to pass it around well and go into their half of the field and do things well. We were controlling the game, but then we wanted to try to finalize things individually.”
Both teams were ruthless in the penalty kick matchup. After 4 successful kicks for Costa Rica and 3 for Greece, Greek player Theofanis Gekas missed his opportunity, followed by a successful shot by Michael Umaña, giving Costa Rica the win.
Photo Credit: Getty Images
Costa Rica is now moving on to the quarter finals for their first time ever. The team will play the Netherlands next, in hopes of securing a place in the final 4.
This tournament as a whole has been surprisingly high-scoring, with 3-4 goals average per match. If this average persists throughout the rest of the World Cup month, it will be the highest scoring average since Sweden in 1958.
