Argentina Earns World Cup Spot
The country most often mentioned along with France as a favorite to win next year’s World Cup has booked its ticket to the tournament.
Argentina clinched its place in Korea-Japan 2002 by traveling to Quito, Ecuador, and shutting out the hosts, 2-0, Wednesday night at sold-out Atahualpa Stadium on goals by Juan Veron and Hernan Crespo.
The victory means Coach Marcelo Bielsa’s first-place team cannot finish lower than fourth in South America’s 10-nation qualifying group, assuring its qualification.
Although it was only third-place Ecuador’s first home loss in this World Cup qualifying campaign, it could signal the start of the country’s gradual slide out of contention.
Brazil, playing well only sporadically but scoring the goals it needed, closed to within a point of the top three later Wednesday when it defeated second-place Paraguay, 2-0, in Porto Alegre, Brazil.
Marcelinho scored in the fifth minute and Rivaldo sealed the victory in the 70th off a pass from Denilson while Paraguay’s players appealed in vain for an offside call.
Sixth-place Colombia plays Bolivia in Bogota tonight knowing that a victory will move it ahead of Uruguay, which doesn’t deserve to go anywhere near the World Cup after losing to lowly Venezuela, 2-0, Tuesday.
Amazon.con
Brazil’s coach, Luiz Felipe “Mouth of the Amazon” Scolari, was at it again before the match against Paraguay.
The outspoken Scolari was overheard at training yelling at his players to “Shoot, shoot, Chilavert has 400 kilos of fat!”
He was referring to Paraguay’s, shall-we-say, large goalkeeper and captain, Jose Luis Chilavert.
And Chilavert wasn’t slow to fire back at the Brazilians and the media, which categorized the game almost like a war.
“If we’re going to talk about war, let’s hope that Brazil returns the lands it took from Paraguay [in an 1865-1870 border dispute],” Chilavert said.
At least Sergio Makarian, Paraguay’s Uruguayan coach, made some sense.
“There are much more important things to talk about in Latin America, such as hungry children, lack of justice and corruption,” he said.
Meanwhile, in Europe
Wednesday night’s slate of international friendlies in Europe was supposed to provide teams the opportunity to fine-tune themselves for the heavy schedule of World Cup qualifying matches in early September.
The Netherlands did, England didn’t.
The Dutch, who trail Ireland and Portugal in their qualifying group and who face the Irish in Dublin on Sept. 1 in a must-win game for both teams, scored an encouraging 2-0 victory over England in London.
First-half goals one minute apart by Mark van Bommel and Ruud van Nistelrooy were enough to silence the crowd of 35,238 and hand Sweden’s Sven Goran Eriksson his first defeat in six matches as England’s coach.
“You don’t like losing but you have to accept it,” Eriksson said. “In the first half, Holland were much better. I think we showed them too much respect and played very deep. They created a lot of trouble for us.”
Dutch Coach Louis van Gaal concurred.
“England did not know how to play us in the first half,” he said. “We dominated and controlled the game.”
Ireland surrendered a late goal and was tied by Coratia, 2-2, in Dublin, and Portugal defeated Moldova, 3-0, as Luis Figo scored a hat trick in Lisbon.
Portugal’s next two qualifying games are against minnows Cyprus and Andorra, and Coach Toni Oliveira is expecting to win both.
“We are 270 minutes away from qualifying, and that includes the final game with Estonia on Oct. 10,” he said.
No Champagne, Thanks
Hungary’s soccer association decided to celebrate its centenary by staging a game against old foe Germany in Budapest.
Big mistake.
The Germans rolled to a 5-2 victory on goals by Jurgen Bohme, Sebastian Kehl, Carsten Jancker, Frank Baumann and Oliver Bierhoff.
Still, it didn’t satisfy Coach Rudi Voeller.
“We deserved to win but the mistakes we made in the second half could prove lethal in a serious match,” the former striker said.
Germany’s firepower will not have gone unnoticed by England, which needs to defeat the Germans in Munich on Sept. 1 to have any chance of qualifying directly for the World Cup rather than going through a potentially tricky playoff.
Looking Ahead
Four teams that already have secured World Cup berths played Wednesday.
World champion France had little difficulty in edging Denmark, 1-0, on a Robert Pires goal in Nantes. It was Pires’ 50th game for France and his ninth goal.
World Cup co-host Japan continues to grow under French Coach Philippe Troussier. It defeated Australia, 3-0, in Fukuroi, Japan, on goals by Atsushi Yanagisawa, Toshihiro Hattori and Masashi Nakayama.
Things did not go as smoothly for South Korea or South Africa.
The Koreans were thrashed, 5-0, in Drnovice by the host Czech Republic and South Africa suffered a 3-0 setback against Sweden in Stockholm.
The Swedes lead their qualifying group over Turkey, which needed a 78th-minute goal by Hakan Sukur to tie Norway, 1-1, in a friendly at Oslo.
Quick Passes
Yugoslavia shut out the Faroe Islands, 2-0, in Belgrade in the only World Cup qualifying game that mattered in Europe on Wednesday. The third-place Yugoslavs stayed in touch with first-place Russia, which tied Greece, 0-0, in a friendly at Moscow. The other qualifier saw Estonia and Cyprus tie, 2-2.
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World Cup 2002 Qualifying
South American Standings
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W L T GF GA Pts Argentina 11 1 2 35 11 35 Paraguay 8 4 2 21 13 26 Ecuador 8 5 1 17 18 25 Brazil 7 4 3 24 12 24 Uruguay 6 5 3 14 10 21 Colombia 4 5 4 12 12 19 Bolivia 3 6 5 15 21 14 Peru 3 7 3 12 17 12 Chile 3 9 2 14 20 11 Venezuela 2 11 1 10 40 7
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Note: The top four teams qualify for the World Cup while the fifth-place finisher plays Australia in a two-game series for a World Cup berth. Argentina has already qualified for the World Cup, Venezuela is out of contention.
