Before the World Cup in Qatar began, David Beckham and Peyton Manning, Anglo-Saxon sports icons, got together to film a commercial for Lay’s, the brand of snacks which has been appearing for quite some time among the main sponsors of football events. Although the essence of the short is to promote the PepsiCo subsidiary and the World Cup, it also adds fuel to an almost ancient debate between the English and the Americans about how to call sport more universal.
“football or soccer?, Ask Beckahm and Manning, who are not surprising with their positions. Beckham, a London gentleman with decades of service to Manchester United, defends the soccerwhile Manning, a boy born and raised in New Orleans, defends the footballbecause soccer it was what he practiced as a quarterback for more than 20 years.
Although the commercial insists that it doesn’t matter what we call the sport of crowds if we enjoy the World Cup with Lay’s, Beckham loses when he admits that he has his own team of football (Inter Miami) in the most important league in North America, where he also played for five years between 2007 and 2012 with the Los Angeles Galaxy jersey.
However, the most common name among the British, Europeans and a good part of the world is that of socceror soccer, as we Hispanics say with a certain Argentine accent, the one that Maradona taught the English themselves in the 1986 World Cup. Even the Americans, who play almost fully in Europe, are getting closer and closer to the soccer what of the football, too local an adjective for a sport that is cosmopolitan by nature. The most universal, remember.
Thus, with that modern and vertiginous style, Tim Weah, Christian Pulisic, Yunus Musah, Anthonee Robinson, Tyler Adams, Winston McKennie, Sergiño Dest and company know how to bite up, play fast, run into space, connect with electrifying combinations and shoot on goal , all under a frenetic pace. With that formula, they managed to lower the tempers of the English in Al Bayt, where the clash between soccer Y football it ended in a draw and goalless.
Apparently, Garrett Southgate’s boys used too much gunpowder in their previous duel with Iran and this Friday they could not overcome the American encirclement. But it was not only that, if we coldly analyze the game, the northerners were closer to winning and hanging another surprise in one of the Doha skyscrapers, although with the draw they managed to preserve a historical record.
Since 1950, when they first met in World Cups, England have never been able to beat the United States in three appearances. During the meeting in Brazil, in the middle of the last century, the northerners beat the English 1-0 with a team made up of students, dishwashers, teachers and funeral home employees. The goal of that game, perfectly reconstructed in the film The Game of their livesIt was marked by Joe Gaetjens, a boy of Haitian origin who never played with the national team again after the World Cup.
Sixty years later, in Rustenburg, South Africa, they met again, but finished level with one target for each side, the works of Clint Dempsey and Steven Gerrard. Come on, let him soccer he has not seen her pass in front of him football in the World Cups.
After this result, the United States will clash with Iran at the end of bracket B, in what will mean a decisive duel to advance to the round of 16. Two nations in usual political wrestling will now fight on the field, the Americans, forced to win, and the Persians with the mission of scoring, as long as England fulfills its part of the bargain and beat Wales.
Just a few days ago it was hard to imagine that this would be the group’s outlook, especially after the British thrashed Iran. But Carlos Queiroz’s team showed that a team is not as bad as when it is mercilessly overwhelmed by the rival, and brought out its best side this Friday.
Without frills, without fanfare, but with a lot of desire and impetus, the Iranians tormented the Welsh team led by Gareth Bale, who became the footballer with the most caps for his team. After singing their anthem almost in a whisper, they played looser, sending two balls to the posts, running frantically and scoring two goals in injury time. Crazy!
By the way, much calmer was the atmosphere in Al Thumama, the stadium that was designed in the shape of a “gahfiya” (traditional woven cap for men and boys used in the region). There, we don’t know if the Qataris played soccerfootball, football or something else. The only thing that is evident is that, before the first week of their World Cup is over, the hosts are already eliminated and are carrying the heavy burden of lack of love from their fans, who never understood the magnitude of receiving the gift of organizing the Cup. Perhaps within Four years from now, or a century from now, understand what you’re missing, because at this level you’re unlikely to qualify on your own merits.
Many fans left at half-time in the game against Senegal, leaving the stands in the stands, as had happened at Al Bayt during the opening game. The most striking thing is that all those fans went home despite the fact that Qatar showed a better version than at the Cup opener, with touches of good play, especially from the boots of Ismaeel Mohammed and Akram Afif, who even claimed a very clear penalty that the Spanish referee Mateu Lahoz inexplicably swallowed.
After seeing the forced penalties that fell almost as a gift to Portugal or Argentina, no one understood how this was going to be overlooked, even for the VAR. “Come on man!”, the Qatar coach, Félix Sánchez, yelled at him from the line in perfect Spanish, perhaps predisposed like almost all Catalans with the decisions of Lahoz, with a Real Madrid tendency. El Clásico is sometimes played in the most unexpected scenarios…
Before and after that play, the Teranga Lions prevailed with more enthusiasm than football, although not that they needed much to topple the Qatari resistance at the Khalifa International Stadium. Without stepping on the accelerator, they reached the Meshaal Barsham area and had their nets removed three times.
As an anecdotal detail, Mohammed Muntari scored the first Qatari goal —and perhaps the last— in World Cup history.
The victory of Senegal, combined with the draw between the Netherlands and Ecuador, leaves the definition of the qualifiers for the last day of Group A. South Americans and Africans will play a defining duel in which the Lions will have more urgency, while the Dutch must certify his pass to the second round against Qatar.
However, Louis van Gaal’s oranges are stuck in a deep creative crisis that can lead them to the abyss in the next round of the World Cup. Against Ecuador, for example, they only bothered with the internships of the talented Cody Gakpo, who scored a great goal as soon as the duel began. But that was just a mirage, because then those from half the world devastated…
Ecuador is no longer a band of strongmen who mostly throw themselves to the sides to hit their rivals. Although they still retain that capacity thanks to the power of Pervis Estupiñán, Ángelo Preciado and Enner Valencia, their arsenal now has Moisés Caicedo, Jhegson Méndez and Gonzalo Plata, who bring freshness and clear ideas to a midfield that knows how to exploit the inside game.
This new squad —one of the youngest in the Cup—, led by the Argentine Gustavo Alfaro, is heading to the round of 16 and promises to be a stone in the shoe for anyone who crosses its path. Of course, they will need their scorer Enner Valencia to recover, who retired with discomfort and bad signs for the second game in a row.
The attacker scored the equalizer against the Netherlands and was placed as top scorer (three goals) in the World Cup. In addition, he has scored the last six Ecuadorian goals in the Cup, something that, according to Mister Chipthey had only done three other players in the history of the tournament: Eusebio (Portugal-1966), Paolo Rossi (Italy-1982) and Oleg Salenko (Russia-1994).
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