Czesław Michniewicz is 52 years old, but looks 70. Dressed in a suit and tie on the sidelines of Al Thumama or any other Qatari stadium, the coach looks like a curmudgeonly grandfather, pointing with a pen in his hand and a scowl at any mistake made by the “White Eagles”. However, something stands out about the Pole’s staging: he never yells at his forwards, but vents his fury backwards, towards the defensive wall that he has built in front of Wojciech Szczesny, the best goalkeeper in the world.
This cannot surprise us. The Special One Michniewicz or the “Polish Mourinho”, as many know him, was a goalkeeper -not very distinguished- in various clubs in his country for 22 years, and spent a good part of his career correcting his defenders, almost imploring to avoid neglect that they left him alone in front of the opposing battering rams. That’s why, when he was given command of the Polish national team months ago, he decided that he should set up a front in order to protect Szczesny.
Michniewicz, who has an open criminal case in Poland for game fixing with mobster Ryszard Forbrich, is not embarrassed by his style. On the contrary, the burly tactician understands that the last line trenches are vital to staying alive in Qatar. “Those who did not play defensively during the World Cup are already at home and watching the games on television,” he said before facing France in the round of 16, a decisive test after beating a group that included Argentina as second. , Mexico and Saudi Arabia.
Precisely, his success in that phase was based on an ultra-conservative idea: lock himself back and wait for some opportunity to counterattack at the feet of Zielinski and Lewandowski. The plan was a fiasco against Mexico and Arabia, although incredibly they rescued four points from those clashes to advance to the round of 16 with the albiceleste, who did not thrash them thanks to an imperial Szczesny.
But the life and death crosses are another story. Michniewicz, now without an emergency network, had to risk to at least give the impression that he did not play to tie or lose, and thus not add another cause to his fixing and betting problems. “We want to do something different,” he had warned, although his change in strategy did not go beyond moving Zielinski to the creation zone and giving Frankowski and Matty Cash some air on the wings. Upstairs, Lewandowski was as lonely as ever.
The plan did not give him results beyond two occasions that Hugo Lloris and Rafa Varane were in charge of destroying to make way for the recital of Rabiot and Griezmann in the midfield, and the offensive feast of Kylian Mbappé, the diamond that Tamin bin Hamad boasts of Al Thani, owner of PSG, Qatar and the World Cup. The emir, not in vain, never considered the departure of the crack headed for Real Madrid; he was convinced that the boy would be the perfect face to raise the image of the Cup and the Qatari show to the skies
Mbappé has fulfilled his part of the deal on the pitch. His strides, his power, his impressive change of pace, his capacity for association and his enormous ability to define have made him the figure of the World Cup. His impact has been so devastating that he is already the top scorer (five goals) of the tournament and has participated directly (marking or assisting) in the last seven French goals. According to Mister Chip, this streak is the best of all time (equaled by Gerd Muller, Oleg Salenko and David Villa) and can continue in the quarter-finals.
Against Poland, France’s 10 was a whirlwind. From the outset, he assisted Oliver Giroud, who became the all-time leader of French scorers (52 goals), ahead of Thierry Henry (51). Both celebrated the event in the Al Thumama band, aware that Mbappé is going to beat that mark. It’s a matter of time…
To leave no doubt, “Donatello” scored two impressive bombings against Szczesny and approached Giroud with 33 goals wearing the elastic gala. At the gates of turning 24, the genius of Bondy is the youngest player to achieve nine goals in World Cups, which invites us to think that in the coming years he may become the first to achieve 20 goals in these events. Don’t be surprised, Mbappé seems to have no ceiling and his ambition knows no limits either.
“This World Cup is my obsession, it is the competition of my dreams. I have built my entire season around this competition, I have prepared myself to the fullest both physically and mentally to win it, which is the goal I have set for myself, although it is still a long way off. The only goal is to win the World Cup, the rest is secondary,” said Mbappé after defeating Poland and putting the current monarchs back among the eight best teams in the Cup.
“We knew how to try to stop them, but there is no valid recipe to stop a player like Mbappé or a team like France. (…) Kylian Mbappé’s thing was incredible, from the way he played, to the kind of goals he scored”, said Czesław Michniewicz, resigned after being eliminated in a game that opened up completely, although in the end the Poles counted on an opportunity to close the gap.
In the epilogue, when everyone was ready to go to the showers, to celebrate or to the airport, Poland found themselves with a penalty courtesy of the VAR, which does not rest even if there are seconds left. A priori, it is never too late to apply justice, but it will be necessary to see if they are just as rigorous in the video arbitration in a 0-0 game in the 97th minute. Lewandowski, who had missed his last two penalties (one with Barca and another in the group stage of the Cup) made a mistake again, but the play had to be repeated because a Frenchman entered the area prematurely.
In the end, that was just an anecdote. France qualified for the quarterfinals with the solidity of a champion, the same as England, their next rival. The boys of the three lions overwhelmed Senegal in a duel without mysteries. The African eleven tried to surprise and was about to succeed, but goalkeeper Jordan Pickford was in charge of drowning out the goal cry with a wonderful save that almost upset his perfect hairspray and glitter.
After that action, there was not a trace of suspense. Jude Bellingham, a young man with a special talent, almost incomprehensible for his 19 years, took command of the clash, recovered, controlled the times, distributed and led the combinations that led to the first goals by Jordan Henderson and Harry Kane. After decades of disappointment, it’s only natural for English fans, from London to Qatar, to be thrilled when the Dortmund midfielder receives the ball, raises his head and pulls a rabbit out of his hat.
Bellingham brings a lot of freshness to Gareth Southgate’s team, especially when his partnership with Phil Foden, another jewel in the crown, comes into operation. The Manchester City attacker, who interprets space and time so well, gave two assists (to Kane and Bukayo Saka) against Senegal, something that, according to Mister Chip, no Englishman had achieved in World Cup knockout matches since David Beckham in 2002, 20 years ago and four World Cups. Almost nothing…
With these weapons, plus Kane, Rashford and company, the English want to scare the champion.
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