The left side of the bracket<\/h3>\n\n- Participants:<\/strong>\u00a0Uruguay, Portugal, France, Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Belgium, Japan<\/li>\n
- Cumulative World Cup titles<\/strong>: 10 (Brazil 5, Argentina 2, Uruguay 2, France 1)<\/li>\n
- FIFA World Rankings average<\/strong>: 13.8 (five teams in the top 10)<\/li>\n
- Group stage record (W-L-D)<\/strong>: 15-3-6 (51 cumulative points)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Right Side of the bracket<\/h3>\n\n- Participants:<\/strong>\u00a0Spain, Russia, Croatia, Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, Colombia, England<\/li>\n
- Cumulative World Cup titles<\/strong>: 2 (England, Spain)<\/li>\n
- FIFA World Rankings average<\/strong>: 21.2 (two teams in the top 10)<\/li>\n
- Group stage record (W-L-D):\u00a0<\/strong>14-4-6 (48 cumulative points)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
The left side — in the purposes of the bracket image above — is the side of the powerhouses. There’s the classic favorite in Brazil, a Uruguay side that has yet to concede, a French team full of up-and-coming stars and the team with the two best players in the world in Argentina and Portugal. Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo make those teams particularly nerve-wracking to face off against.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n\n2. Breakdown by continent<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/24\/2018\/06\/world-cup-group-h-japan-vs-poland_8722d8f0-7af0-11e8-8d5f-3f0c905295d2-730x400.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Europe (UEFA)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 14<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 10<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Belgium, Croatia, Denmark, England, France, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland,<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Germany, Iceland, Poland, Serbia<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
South America (CONMEBOL)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 4<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Uruguay<\/li>\n
- Team eliminated<\/strong>: Peru<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Asia (AFC)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 1<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Japan<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Iran, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Australia (part of the Asian Football Confederation)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
North America (CONCACAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 3<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 1<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Mexico<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Costa Rica, Panama<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Africa (CAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Europe and South America are continuing their utter domination at the World Cup. There’s never been a World Cup participant that isn’t from one of these two continents, and barring an utter miracle from either Mexico or Japan, that doesn’t seem likely to change. South America sent four of its five participants past the group stage, whereas Europe sent 10 of its ridiculous 14 through. That only makes it more shocking that Germany wasn’t able to make it out.<\/p>\n
Compared to the 2014 World Cup, only six UEFA teams made it to the knockout stage. CONMEBOL had five, CONCACAF featured three and CAF featured two African teams.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
3. Head-to-head<\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/24\/2018\/06\/699925-fifa-collage-730x400.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
\n- Uruguay vs. Portugal:<\/strong>\u00a0First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- France vs. Argentina:<\/strong>\u00a02-0-0 Argentina (2-1 win in 1978 group stage; 1-0 win in 1930 group stage)<\/li>\n
- Brazil vs. Mexico<\/strong>: 3-0-1 Brazil (last meeting, 0-0 draw in 2014)<\/li>\n
- Belgium vs. Japan<\/strong>: 0-0-1 (2-2 draw in 2002)<\/li>\n
- Spain vs. Russia<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Croatia vs. Denmark<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Sweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- England vs. Colombia<\/strong>: 1-0-0 England (2-0 win in 1998)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
4. Key players<\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/24\/2018\/06\/fifa-world-cup-round-of-16-644x362.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Uruguay vs. Portugal<\/h3>\n
The players to look out for in this match aren’t any different than you would expect.\u00a0Luis Suarez<\/strong>\u00a0for Uruguay vs.\u00a0Cristiano Ronaldo<\/strong>\u00a0for Portugal. Ronaldo is looking to get his team out of the round of 16 for the first time since 2006, when Portugal finished in fourth place, and he’s in the Golden Boot race with four goals so far.\u00a0Edinson Cavani<\/strong>is a dark horse for the Uruguayan squad.<\/p>\nFrance vs. Argentina<\/h3>\n
France, with stars Paul Pogba and Antoine Griezmann, taking on Lionel Messi and Argentina seems like the obvious choice for most intriguing, as both teams had Finals ambitions heading into the tournament. But both\u00a0have struggled, leading to lackluster performances. For France,\u00a0Paul Pogba<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Kylian Mbappe<\/strong>\u00a0must play well against\u00a0Lionel Messi<\/strong>. Messi netted his first goal of the tournament on a gorgeous touch against Nigeria, and he’s looking to build on that success. Pogba has played a few phenomenal balls into Mbappe already, and France has two players more than capable of making a difference against a player with an argument for best in the world.<\/p>\n\n\nBrazil vs. Mexico<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nPhilippe Coutinho<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Neymar Jr.<\/strong>\u00a0are one of the deadliest tandems in the Cup, and they’re looking at\u00a0Carlos Vela<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez<\/strong>. Brazil, led by Neymar and\u00a0Philippe Coutinho, have improved every game. With Marcelo and Danilo nursing injuries, it lacks defensive reinforcements, but Brazil has the firepower to win this tournament. Coutinho has two goals in the group stage, while Neymar has one. Chicharito hasn’t had much impact for Mexico in the offensive department so far, but he’ll have to step it up to keep up with Brazil’s potent offensive arsenal.<\/p>\nSubsequently, Mexico played a large role in dismissing defending champion Germany from the group stage, playing an aggressive, up-tempo style. The attacking trio of Javier Hernandez, Carlos Vela and Hirving Lozano have meshed well, but the defense remains a concern following a 3-0 loss to Sweden.<\/p>\n
Belgium vs. Japan<\/h3>\n
Romelo Lukaku<\/strong>\u00a0is easily Belgium’s most prolific scorer, he has four goals thus far, and he’s going up against a Japan team that has very quiet talent.\u00a0Shinji Kagawa<\/strong>\u00a0is Japan’s best player, and he hasn’t scored since the sixth minute of the first match against Colombia. So you could say he’s “due.”<\/p>\nSpain vs. Russia<\/h3>\n
Diego Costa\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0Denis Cheryshev<\/strong>\u00a0have both made waves early in this tourney. Each has three goals, and Cheryshev is leading a Russia team that has put up video game numbers to this point.<\/p>\nCroatia vs. Denmark<\/h3>\n
Luka Modric<\/strong>\u00a0is playing in one of his last World Cups at 32, but he’s making it count in the Croatian midfield. He had a pair of goals in a dominant group stage.\u00a0Christian Eriksen<\/strong>\u00a0leads the way for Denmark, and he accounted for one of Denmark’s goals in the group stage.<\/p>\n\n\nSweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nAndreas Granqvist<\/strong>\u00a0has two goals for Sweden to this point, and he’s a huge part of them advancing out of the group stage amid a quiet showing from\u00a0Emil Forsberg<\/strong>. For Switzerland,\u00a0Xherdan Shaqiri<\/strong>\u00a0made his presence felt in the opening round, constantly staying involved in the action. Sweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\nSweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\n
England vs. Colombia<\/h3>\n
Harry Kane<\/strong>\u00a0will have to lead for England against Colombia.\u00a0James Rodriguez<\/strong>\u00a0is trying to fight off an injury, while\u00a0Yerry Mina<\/strong>\u00a0has become an integral part of Colombia’s team, scoring two goals to help Columbia advance.If James Rodriguez is unable to play after being forced from Thursday’s win over Senegal with an apparent calf injury, England will have a great chance to advance. Harry Kane would then be licking his chops at a long run on the weaker side of the bracket.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
5. The race for the Golden Boot<\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/24\/2018\/06\/ysuh3kmikrerpyvbddxd-730x400.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
England’s Harry Kane leads the chase with five goals \u2014 through one was a complete accident. Belgium’s Romelu Lukaku and Ronaldo each have four goals, while Russian midfielder\u00a0Denis Cheryshev and Spain’s Diego Costa both have three goals.<\/p>\n
It seems likely Kane, Lukaku, Ronaldo or Costa will claim top-scoring honours, but watch out for Belgium’s Eden Hazard, currently sitting at two goals.<\/p>\n
Should England defeat Colombia, it has a nice road to the semifinals, giving Kane a couple chances to add more goals. But Ronaldo helped lead Portugal to a 2016 Euro win, and he could get hot this summer and scorch the nets enough to win the Golden Boot and lead Portugal on a run.<\/p>\n
The outsiders<\/strong><\/h4>\nDenis Cheryshev (3 goals)
\nPhilippe Coutinho (2 goals)
\nArtem Dzyuba (2 goals)
\nEden Hazard (2 goals)
\nLuis Suarez (2 goals)
\nLionel Messi (1 goal)
\nNeymar (1 goals)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The 2018 World Cup’s group stage concluded Thursday, ending a two-week whirlwind of goals, VAR and dashed dreams..Belgium defeated England 1-0 to win Group G, but both sides sent out their\u00a0B-squads with an eye already on the Round of 16. While the Red Devils won the group, they may have the more difficult road moving forward. With usual contending nations such as the Netherlands, USA, Chile and Italy at home watching, the group stage lacked intrigue at times as smaller nations didn’t always seem up to the challenge. However, the tournament should regain some drama in the Round of 16, as a couple of the matchups look like potential finals. … Continue reading “World Cup 2018: Round of 16 preview; The road to Glory and Agony”<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":1115,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[432,433,436,435,438,437,440,439,434,431],"class_list":["post-1114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-final-16-world-cup","tag-france-vs-argentina-10-a-m-et-kazan-fox-saturday","tag-july-1-croatia-vs-denmark-2-p-m-et-nizhny-novgorod-fox-monday","tag-july-1-spain-vs-russia-10-a-m-et-moscow-fox-sunday","tag-july-2-belgium-vs-japan-2-p-m-et-rostov-fox-tuesday","tag-july-2-brazil-vs-mexico-10-a-m-et-samara-fs1-monday","tag-july-3-colombia-vs-england","tag-july-3-sweden-vs-switzerland-10-a-m-et-saint-petersburg-fs1-tuesday","tag-june-30-uruguay-vs-portugal-2-p-m-et-sochi-fox-sunday","tag-world-cup-round-of-16"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Right Side of the bracket<\/h3>\n\n- Participants:<\/strong>\u00a0Spain, Russia, Croatia, Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, Colombia, England<\/li>\n
- Cumulative World Cup titles<\/strong>: 2 (England, Spain)<\/li>\n
- FIFA World Rankings average<\/strong>: 21.2 (two teams in the top 10)<\/li>\n
- Group stage record (W-L-D):\u00a0<\/strong>14-4-6 (48 cumulative points)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
The left side — in the purposes of the bracket image above — is the side of the powerhouses. There’s the classic favorite in Brazil, a Uruguay side that has yet to concede, a French team full of up-and-coming stars and the team with the two best players in the world in Argentina and Portugal. Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo make those teams particularly nerve-wracking to face off against.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n\n2. Breakdown by continent<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/p>\n
Europe (UEFA)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 14<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 10<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Belgium, Croatia, Denmark, England, France, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland,<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Germany, Iceland, Poland, Serbia<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
South America (CONMEBOL)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 4<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Uruguay<\/li>\n
- Team eliminated<\/strong>: Peru<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Asia (AFC)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 1<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Japan<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Iran, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Australia (part of the Asian Football Confederation)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
North America (CONCACAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 3<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 1<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Mexico<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Costa Rica, Panama<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Africa (CAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Europe and South America are continuing their utter domination at the World Cup. There’s never been a World Cup participant that isn’t from one of these two continents, and barring an utter miracle from either Mexico or Japan, that doesn’t seem likely to change. South America sent four of its five participants past the group stage, whereas Europe sent 10 of its ridiculous 14 through. That only makes it more shocking that Germany wasn’t able to make it out.<\/p>\n
Compared to the 2014 World Cup, only six UEFA teams made it to the knockout stage. CONMEBOL had five, CONCACAF featured three and CAF featured two African teams.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
3. Head-to-head<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
\n- Uruguay vs. Portugal:<\/strong>\u00a0First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- France vs. Argentina:<\/strong>\u00a02-0-0 Argentina (2-1 win in 1978 group stage; 1-0 win in 1930 group stage)<\/li>\n
- Brazil vs. Mexico<\/strong>: 3-0-1 Brazil (last meeting, 0-0 draw in 2014)<\/li>\n
- Belgium vs. Japan<\/strong>: 0-0-1 (2-2 draw in 2002)<\/li>\n
- Spain vs. Russia<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Croatia vs. Denmark<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Sweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- England vs. Colombia<\/strong>: 1-0-0 England (2-0 win in 1998)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
4. Key players<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
Uruguay vs. Portugal<\/h3>\n
The players to look out for in this match aren’t any different than you would expect.\u00a0Luis Suarez<\/strong>\u00a0for Uruguay vs.\u00a0Cristiano Ronaldo<\/strong>\u00a0for Portugal. Ronaldo is looking to get his team out of the round of 16 for the first time since 2006, when Portugal finished in fourth place, and he’s in the Golden Boot race with four goals so far.\u00a0Edinson Cavani<\/strong>is a dark horse for the Uruguayan squad.<\/p>\nFrance vs. Argentina<\/h3>\n
France, with stars Paul Pogba and Antoine Griezmann, taking on Lionel Messi and Argentina seems like the obvious choice for most intriguing, as both teams had Finals ambitions heading into the tournament. But both\u00a0have struggled, leading to lackluster performances. For France,\u00a0Paul Pogba<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Kylian Mbappe<\/strong>\u00a0must play well against\u00a0Lionel Messi<\/strong>. Messi netted his first goal of the tournament on a gorgeous touch against Nigeria, and he’s looking to build on that success. Pogba has played a few phenomenal balls into Mbappe already, and France has two players more than capable of making a difference against a player with an argument for best in the world.<\/p>\n\n\nBrazil vs. Mexico<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nPhilippe Coutinho<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Neymar Jr.<\/strong>\u00a0are one of the deadliest tandems in the Cup, and they’re looking at\u00a0Carlos Vela<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez<\/strong>. Brazil, led by Neymar and\u00a0Philippe Coutinho, have improved every game. With Marcelo and Danilo nursing injuries, it lacks defensive reinforcements, but Brazil has the firepower to win this tournament. Coutinho has two goals in the group stage, while Neymar has one. Chicharito hasn’t had much impact for Mexico in the offensive department so far, but he’ll have to step it up to keep up with Brazil’s potent offensive arsenal.<\/p>\nSubsequently, Mexico played a large role in dismissing defending champion Germany from the group stage, playing an aggressive, up-tempo style. The attacking trio of Javier Hernandez, Carlos Vela and Hirving Lozano have meshed well, but the defense remains a concern following a 3-0 loss to Sweden.<\/p>\n
Belgium vs. Japan<\/h3>\n
Romelo Lukaku<\/strong>\u00a0is easily Belgium’s most prolific scorer, he has four goals thus far, and he’s going up against a Japan team that has very quiet talent.\u00a0Shinji Kagawa<\/strong>\u00a0is Japan’s best player, and he hasn’t scored since the sixth minute of the first match against Colombia. So you could say he’s “due.”<\/p>\nSpain vs. Russia<\/h3>\n
Diego Costa\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0Denis Cheryshev<\/strong>\u00a0have both made waves early in this tourney. Each has three goals, and Cheryshev is leading a Russia team that has put up video game numbers to this point.<\/p>\nCroatia vs. Denmark<\/h3>\n
Luka Modric<\/strong>\u00a0is playing in one of his last World Cups at 32, but he’s making it count in the Croatian midfield. He had a pair of goals in a dominant group stage.\u00a0Christian Eriksen<\/strong>\u00a0leads the way for Denmark, and he accounted for one of Denmark’s goals in the group stage.<\/p>\n\n\nSweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nAndreas Granqvist<\/strong>\u00a0has two goals for Sweden to this point, and he’s a huge part of them advancing out of the group stage amid a quiet showing from\u00a0Emil Forsberg<\/strong>. For Switzerland,\u00a0Xherdan Shaqiri<\/strong>\u00a0made his presence felt in the opening round, constantly staying involved in the action. Sweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\nSweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\n
England vs. Colombia<\/h3>\n
Harry Kane<\/strong>\u00a0will have to lead for England against Colombia.\u00a0James Rodriguez<\/strong>\u00a0is trying to fight off an injury, while\u00a0Yerry Mina<\/strong>\u00a0has become an integral part of Colombia’s team, scoring two goals to help Columbia advance.If James Rodriguez is unable to play after being forced from Thursday’s win over Senegal with an apparent calf injury, England will have a great chance to advance. Harry Kane would then be licking his chops at a long run on the weaker side of the bracket.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
5. The race for the Golden Boot<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
England’s Harry Kane leads the chase with five goals \u2014 through one was a complete accident. Belgium’s Romelu Lukaku and Ronaldo each have four goals, while Russian midfielder\u00a0Denis Cheryshev and Spain’s Diego Costa both have three goals.<\/p>\n
It seems likely Kane, Lukaku, Ronaldo or Costa will claim top-scoring honours, but watch out for Belgium’s Eden Hazard, currently sitting at two goals.<\/p>\n
Should England defeat Colombia, it has a nice road to the semifinals, giving Kane a couple chances to add more goals. But Ronaldo helped lead Portugal to a 2016 Euro win, and he could get hot this summer and scorch the nets enough to win the Golden Boot and lead Portugal on a run.<\/p>\n
The outsiders<\/strong><\/h4>\nDenis Cheryshev (3 goals)
\nPhilippe Coutinho (2 goals)
\nArtem Dzyuba (2 goals)
\nEden Hazard (2 goals)
\nLuis Suarez (2 goals)
\nLionel Messi (1 goal)
\nNeymar (1 goals)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The 2018 World Cup’s group stage concluded Thursday, ending a two-week whirlwind of goals, VAR and dashed dreams..Belgium defeated England 1-0 to win Group G, but both sides sent out their\u00a0B-squads with an eye already on the Round of 16. While the Red Devils won the group, they may have the more difficult road moving forward. With usual contending nations such as the Netherlands, USA, Chile and Italy at home watching, the group stage lacked intrigue at times as smaller nations didn’t always seem up to the challenge. However, the tournament should regain some drama in the Round of 16, as a couple of the matchups look like potential finals. … Continue reading “World Cup 2018: Round of 16 preview; The road to Glory and Agony”<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":1115,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[432,433,436,435,438,437,440,439,434,431],"class_list":["post-1114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-final-16-world-cup","tag-france-vs-argentina-10-a-m-et-kazan-fox-saturday","tag-july-1-croatia-vs-denmark-2-p-m-et-nizhny-novgorod-fox-monday","tag-july-1-spain-vs-russia-10-a-m-et-moscow-fox-sunday","tag-july-2-belgium-vs-japan-2-p-m-et-rostov-fox-tuesday","tag-july-2-brazil-vs-mexico-10-a-m-et-samara-fs1-monday","tag-july-3-colombia-vs-england","tag-july-3-sweden-vs-switzerland-10-a-m-et-saint-petersburg-fs1-tuesday","tag-june-30-uruguay-vs-portugal-2-p-m-et-sochi-fox-sunday","tag-world-cup-round-of-16"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
The left side — in the purposes of the bracket image above — is the side of the powerhouses. There’s the classic favorite in Brazil, a Uruguay side that has yet to concede, a French team full of up-and-coming stars and the team with the two best players in the world in Argentina and Portugal. Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo make those teams particularly nerve-wracking to face off against.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Europe (UEFA)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 14<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 10<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Belgium, Croatia, Denmark, England, France, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland,<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Germany, Iceland, Poland, Serbia<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
South America (CONMEBOL)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 4<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Uruguay<\/li>\n
- Team eliminated<\/strong>: Peru<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Asia (AFC)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 1<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Japan<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Iran, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Australia (part of the Asian Football Confederation)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
North America (CONCACAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 3<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 1<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Mexico<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Costa Rica, Panama<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Africa (CAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Europe and South America are continuing their utter domination at the World Cup. There’s never been a World Cup participant that isn’t from one of these two continents, and barring an utter miracle from either Mexico or Japan, that doesn’t seem likely to change. South America sent four of its five participants past the group stage, whereas Europe sent 10 of its ridiculous 14 through. That only makes it more shocking that Germany wasn’t able to make it out.<\/p>\n
Compared to the 2014 World Cup, only six UEFA teams made it to the knockout stage. CONMEBOL had five, CONCACAF featured three and CAF featured two African teams.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
3. Head-to-head<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
\n- Uruguay vs. Portugal:<\/strong>\u00a0First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- France vs. Argentina:<\/strong>\u00a02-0-0 Argentina (2-1 win in 1978 group stage; 1-0 win in 1930 group stage)<\/li>\n
- Brazil vs. Mexico<\/strong>: 3-0-1 Brazil (last meeting, 0-0 draw in 2014)<\/li>\n
- Belgium vs. Japan<\/strong>: 0-0-1 (2-2 draw in 2002)<\/li>\n
- Spain vs. Russia<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Croatia vs. Denmark<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Sweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- England vs. Colombia<\/strong>: 1-0-0 England (2-0 win in 1998)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
4. Key players<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
Uruguay vs. Portugal<\/h3>\n
The players to look out for in this match aren’t any different than you would expect.\u00a0Luis Suarez<\/strong>\u00a0for Uruguay vs.\u00a0Cristiano Ronaldo<\/strong>\u00a0for Portugal. Ronaldo is looking to get his team out of the round of 16 for the first time since 2006, when Portugal finished in fourth place, and he’s in the Golden Boot race with four goals so far.\u00a0Edinson Cavani<\/strong>is a dark horse for the Uruguayan squad.<\/p>\nFrance vs. Argentina<\/h3>\n
France, with stars Paul Pogba and Antoine Griezmann, taking on Lionel Messi and Argentina seems like the obvious choice for most intriguing, as both teams had Finals ambitions heading into the tournament. But both\u00a0have struggled, leading to lackluster performances. For France,\u00a0Paul Pogba<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Kylian Mbappe<\/strong>\u00a0must play well against\u00a0Lionel Messi<\/strong>. Messi netted his first goal of the tournament on a gorgeous touch against Nigeria, and he’s looking to build on that success. Pogba has played a few phenomenal balls into Mbappe already, and France has two players more than capable of making a difference against a player with an argument for best in the world.<\/p>\n\n\nBrazil vs. Mexico<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nPhilippe Coutinho<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Neymar Jr.<\/strong>\u00a0are one of the deadliest tandems in the Cup, and they’re looking at\u00a0Carlos Vela<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez<\/strong>. Brazil, led by Neymar and\u00a0Philippe Coutinho, have improved every game. With Marcelo and Danilo nursing injuries, it lacks defensive reinforcements, but Brazil has the firepower to win this tournament. Coutinho has two goals in the group stage, while Neymar has one. Chicharito hasn’t had much impact for Mexico in the offensive department so far, but he’ll have to step it up to keep up with Brazil’s potent offensive arsenal.<\/p>\nSubsequently, Mexico played a large role in dismissing defending champion Germany from the group stage, playing an aggressive, up-tempo style. The attacking trio of Javier Hernandez, Carlos Vela and Hirving Lozano have meshed well, but the defense remains a concern following a 3-0 loss to Sweden.<\/p>\n
Belgium vs. Japan<\/h3>\n
Romelo Lukaku<\/strong>\u00a0is easily Belgium’s most prolific scorer, he has four goals thus far, and he’s going up against a Japan team that has very quiet talent.\u00a0Shinji Kagawa<\/strong>\u00a0is Japan’s best player, and he hasn’t scored since the sixth minute of the first match against Colombia. So you could say he’s “due.”<\/p>\nSpain vs. Russia<\/h3>\n
Diego Costa\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0Denis Cheryshev<\/strong>\u00a0have both made waves early in this tourney. Each has three goals, and Cheryshev is leading a Russia team that has put up video game numbers to this point.<\/p>\nCroatia vs. Denmark<\/h3>\n
Luka Modric<\/strong>\u00a0is playing in one of his last World Cups at 32, but he’s making it count in the Croatian midfield. He had a pair of goals in a dominant group stage.\u00a0Christian Eriksen<\/strong>\u00a0leads the way for Denmark, and he accounted for one of Denmark’s goals in the group stage.<\/p>\n\n\nSweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nAndreas Granqvist<\/strong>\u00a0has two goals for Sweden to this point, and he’s a huge part of them advancing out of the group stage amid a quiet showing from\u00a0Emil Forsberg<\/strong>. For Switzerland,\u00a0Xherdan Shaqiri<\/strong>\u00a0made his presence felt in the opening round, constantly staying involved in the action. Sweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\nSweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\n
England vs. Colombia<\/h3>\n
Harry Kane<\/strong>\u00a0will have to lead for England against Colombia.\u00a0James Rodriguez<\/strong>\u00a0is trying to fight off an injury, while\u00a0Yerry Mina<\/strong>\u00a0has become an integral part of Colombia’s team, scoring two goals to help Columbia advance.If James Rodriguez is unable to play after being forced from Thursday’s win over Senegal with an apparent calf injury, England will have a great chance to advance. Harry Kane would then be licking his chops at a long run on the weaker side of the bracket.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
5. The race for the Golden Boot<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
England’s Harry Kane leads the chase with five goals \u2014 through one was a complete accident. Belgium’s Romelu Lukaku and Ronaldo each have four goals, while Russian midfielder\u00a0Denis Cheryshev and Spain’s Diego Costa both have three goals.<\/p>\n
It seems likely Kane, Lukaku, Ronaldo or Costa will claim top-scoring honours, but watch out for Belgium’s Eden Hazard, currently sitting at two goals.<\/p>\n
Should England defeat Colombia, it has a nice road to the semifinals, giving Kane a couple chances to add more goals. But Ronaldo helped lead Portugal to a 2016 Euro win, and he could get hot this summer and scorch the nets enough to win the Golden Boot and lead Portugal on a run.<\/p>\n
The outsiders<\/strong><\/h4>\nDenis Cheryshev (3 goals)
\nPhilippe Coutinho (2 goals)
\nArtem Dzyuba (2 goals)
\nEden Hazard (2 goals)
\nLuis Suarez (2 goals)
\nLionel Messi (1 goal)
\nNeymar (1 goals)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The 2018 World Cup’s group stage concluded Thursday, ending a two-week whirlwind of goals, VAR and dashed dreams..Belgium defeated England 1-0 to win Group G, but both sides sent out their\u00a0B-squads with an eye already on the Round of 16. While the Red Devils won the group, they may have the more difficult road moving forward. With usual contending nations such as the Netherlands, USA, Chile and Italy at home watching, the group stage lacked intrigue at times as smaller nations didn’t always seem up to the challenge. However, the tournament should regain some drama in the Round of 16, as a couple of the matchups look like potential finals. … Continue reading “World Cup 2018: Round of 16 preview; The road to Glory and Agony”<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":1115,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[432,433,436,435,438,437,440,439,434,431],"class_list":["post-1114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-final-16-world-cup","tag-france-vs-argentina-10-a-m-et-kazan-fox-saturday","tag-july-1-croatia-vs-denmark-2-p-m-et-nizhny-novgorod-fox-monday","tag-july-1-spain-vs-russia-10-a-m-et-moscow-fox-sunday","tag-july-2-belgium-vs-japan-2-p-m-et-rostov-fox-tuesday","tag-july-2-brazil-vs-mexico-10-a-m-et-samara-fs1-monday","tag-july-3-colombia-vs-england","tag-july-3-sweden-vs-switzerland-10-a-m-et-saint-petersburg-fs1-tuesday","tag-june-30-uruguay-vs-portugal-2-p-m-et-sochi-fox-sunday","tag-world-cup-round-of-16"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
South America (CONMEBOL)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 4<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Uruguay<\/li>\n
- Team eliminated<\/strong>: Peru<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Asia (AFC)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 1<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Japan<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Iran, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Australia (part of the Asian Football Confederation)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
North America (CONCACAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 3<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 1<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Mexico<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Costa Rica, Panama<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Africa (CAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Europe and South America are continuing their utter domination at the World Cup. There’s never been a World Cup participant that isn’t from one of these two continents, and barring an utter miracle from either Mexico or Japan, that doesn’t seem likely to change. South America sent four of its five participants past the group stage, whereas Europe sent 10 of its ridiculous 14 through. That only makes it more shocking that Germany wasn’t able to make it out.<\/p>\n
Compared to the 2014 World Cup, only six UEFA teams made it to the knockout stage. CONMEBOL had five, CONCACAF featured three and CAF featured two African teams.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
3. Head-to-head<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
\n- Uruguay vs. Portugal:<\/strong>\u00a0First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- France vs. Argentina:<\/strong>\u00a02-0-0 Argentina (2-1 win in 1978 group stage; 1-0 win in 1930 group stage)<\/li>\n
- Brazil vs. Mexico<\/strong>: 3-0-1 Brazil (last meeting, 0-0 draw in 2014)<\/li>\n
- Belgium vs. Japan<\/strong>: 0-0-1 (2-2 draw in 2002)<\/li>\n
- Spain vs. Russia<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Croatia vs. Denmark<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Sweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- England vs. Colombia<\/strong>: 1-0-0 England (2-0 win in 1998)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
4. Key players<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
Uruguay vs. Portugal<\/h3>\n
The players to look out for in this match aren’t any different than you would expect.\u00a0Luis Suarez<\/strong>\u00a0for Uruguay vs.\u00a0Cristiano Ronaldo<\/strong>\u00a0for Portugal. Ronaldo is looking to get his team out of the round of 16 for the first time since 2006, when Portugal finished in fourth place, and he’s in the Golden Boot race with four goals so far.\u00a0Edinson Cavani<\/strong>is a dark horse for the Uruguayan squad.<\/p>\nFrance vs. Argentina<\/h3>\n
France, with stars Paul Pogba and Antoine Griezmann, taking on Lionel Messi and Argentina seems like the obvious choice for most intriguing, as both teams had Finals ambitions heading into the tournament. But both\u00a0have struggled, leading to lackluster performances. For France,\u00a0Paul Pogba<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Kylian Mbappe<\/strong>\u00a0must play well against\u00a0Lionel Messi<\/strong>. Messi netted his first goal of the tournament on a gorgeous touch against Nigeria, and he’s looking to build on that success. Pogba has played a few phenomenal balls into Mbappe already, and France has two players more than capable of making a difference against a player with an argument for best in the world.<\/p>\n\n\nBrazil vs. Mexico<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nPhilippe Coutinho<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Neymar Jr.<\/strong>\u00a0are one of the deadliest tandems in the Cup, and they’re looking at\u00a0Carlos Vela<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez<\/strong>. Brazil, led by Neymar and\u00a0Philippe Coutinho, have improved every game. With Marcelo and Danilo nursing injuries, it lacks defensive reinforcements, but Brazil has the firepower to win this tournament. Coutinho has two goals in the group stage, while Neymar has one. Chicharito hasn’t had much impact for Mexico in the offensive department so far, but he’ll have to step it up to keep up with Brazil’s potent offensive arsenal.<\/p>\nSubsequently, Mexico played a large role in dismissing defending champion Germany from the group stage, playing an aggressive, up-tempo style. The attacking trio of Javier Hernandez, Carlos Vela and Hirving Lozano have meshed well, but the defense remains a concern following a 3-0 loss to Sweden.<\/p>\n
Belgium vs. Japan<\/h3>\n
Romelo Lukaku<\/strong>\u00a0is easily Belgium’s most prolific scorer, he has four goals thus far, and he’s going up against a Japan team that has very quiet talent.\u00a0Shinji Kagawa<\/strong>\u00a0is Japan’s best player, and he hasn’t scored since the sixth minute of the first match against Colombia. So you could say he’s “due.”<\/p>\nSpain vs. Russia<\/h3>\n
Diego Costa\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0Denis Cheryshev<\/strong>\u00a0have both made waves early in this tourney. Each has three goals, and Cheryshev is leading a Russia team that has put up video game numbers to this point.<\/p>\nCroatia vs. Denmark<\/h3>\n
Luka Modric<\/strong>\u00a0is playing in one of his last World Cups at 32, but he’s making it count in the Croatian midfield. He had a pair of goals in a dominant group stage.\u00a0Christian Eriksen<\/strong>\u00a0leads the way for Denmark, and he accounted for one of Denmark’s goals in the group stage.<\/p>\n\n\nSweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nAndreas Granqvist<\/strong>\u00a0has two goals for Sweden to this point, and he’s a huge part of them advancing out of the group stage amid a quiet showing from\u00a0Emil Forsberg<\/strong>. For Switzerland,\u00a0Xherdan Shaqiri<\/strong>\u00a0made his presence felt in the opening round, constantly staying involved in the action. Sweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\nSweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\n
England vs. Colombia<\/h3>\n
Harry Kane<\/strong>\u00a0will have to lead for England against Colombia.\u00a0James Rodriguez<\/strong>\u00a0is trying to fight off an injury, while\u00a0Yerry Mina<\/strong>\u00a0has become an integral part of Colombia’s team, scoring two goals to help Columbia advance.If James Rodriguez is unable to play after being forced from Thursday’s win over Senegal with an apparent calf injury, England will have a great chance to advance. Harry Kane would then be licking his chops at a long run on the weaker side of the bracket.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
5. The race for the Golden Boot<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
England’s Harry Kane leads the chase with five goals \u2014 through one was a complete accident. Belgium’s Romelu Lukaku and Ronaldo each have four goals, while Russian midfielder\u00a0Denis Cheryshev and Spain’s Diego Costa both have three goals.<\/p>\n
It seems likely Kane, Lukaku, Ronaldo or Costa will claim top-scoring honours, but watch out for Belgium’s Eden Hazard, currently sitting at two goals.<\/p>\n
Should England defeat Colombia, it has a nice road to the semifinals, giving Kane a couple chances to add more goals. But Ronaldo helped lead Portugal to a 2016 Euro win, and he could get hot this summer and scorch the nets enough to win the Golden Boot and lead Portugal on a run.<\/p>\n
The outsiders<\/strong><\/h4>\nDenis Cheryshev (3 goals)
\nPhilippe Coutinho (2 goals)
\nArtem Dzyuba (2 goals)
\nEden Hazard (2 goals)
\nLuis Suarez (2 goals)
\nLionel Messi (1 goal)
\nNeymar (1 goals)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The 2018 World Cup’s group stage concluded Thursday, ending a two-week whirlwind of goals, VAR and dashed dreams..Belgium defeated England 1-0 to win Group G, but both sides sent out their\u00a0B-squads with an eye already on the Round of 16. While the Red Devils won the group, they may have the more difficult road moving forward. With usual contending nations such as the Netherlands, USA, Chile and Italy at home watching, the group stage lacked intrigue at times as smaller nations didn’t always seem up to the challenge. However, the tournament should regain some drama in the Round of 16, as a couple of the matchups look like potential finals. … Continue reading “World Cup 2018: Round of 16 preview; The road to Glory and Agony”<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":1115,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[432,433,436,435,438,437,440,439,434,431],"class_list":["post-1114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-final-16-world-cup","tag-france-vs-argentina-10-a-m-et-kazan-fox-saturday","tag-july-1-croatia-vs-denmark-2-p-m-et-nizhny-novgorod-fox-monday","tag-july-1-spain-vs-russia-10-a-m-et-moscow-fox-sunday","tag-july-2-belgium-vs-japan-2-p-m-et-rostov-fox-tuesday","tag-july-2-brazil-vs-mexico-10-a-m-et-samara-fs1-monday","tag-july-3-colombia-vs-england","tag-july-3-sweden-vs-switzerland-10-a-m-et-saint-petersburg-fs1-tuesday","tag-june-30-uruguay-vs-portugal-2-p-m-et-sochi-fox-sunday","tag-world-cup-round-of-16"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Asia (AFC)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 1<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Japan<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Iran, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Australia (part of the Asian Football Confederation)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
North America (CONCACAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 3<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 1<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Mexico<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Costa Rica, Panama<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Africa (CAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Europe and South America are continuing their utter domination at the World Cup. There’s never been a World Cup participant that isn’t from one of these two continents, and barring an utter miracle from either Mexico or Japan, that doesn’t seem likely to change. South America sent four of its five participants past the group stage, whereas Europe sent 10 of its ridiculous 14 through. That only makes it more shocking that Germany wasn’t able to make it out.<\/p>\n
Compared to the 2014 World Cup, only six UEFA teams made it to the knockout stage. CONMEBOL had five, CONCACAF featured three and CAF featured two African teams.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
3. Head-to-head<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
\n- Uruguay vs. Portugal:<\/strong>\u00a0First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- France vs. Argentina:<\/strong>\u00a02-0-0 Argentina (2-1 win in 1978 group stage; 1-0 win in 1930 group stage)<\/li>\n
- Brazil vs. Mexico<\/strong>: 3-0-1 Brazil (last meeting, 0-0 draw in 2014)<\/li>\n
- Belgium vs. Japan<\/strong>: 0-0-1 (2-2 draw in 2002)<\/li>\n
- Spain vs. Russia<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Croatia vs. Denmark<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Sweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- England vs. Colombia<\/strong>: 1-0-0 England (2-0 win in 1998)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
4. Key players<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
Uruguay vs. Portugal<\/h3>\n
The players to look out for in this match aren’t any different than you would expect.\u00a0Luis Suarez<\/strong>\u00a0for Uruguay vs.\u00a0Cristiano Ronaldo<\/strong>\u00a0for Portugal. Ronaldo is looking to get his team out of the round of 16 for the first time since 2006, when Portugal finished in fourth place, and he’s in the Golden Boot race with four goals so far.\u00a0Edinson Cavani<\/strong>is a dark horse for the Uruguayan squad.<\/p>\nFrance vs. Argentina<\/h3>\n
France, with stars Paul Pogba and Antoine Griezmann, taking on Lionel Messi and Argentina seems like the obvious choice for most intriguing, as both teams had Finals ambitions heading into the tournament. But both\u00a0have struggled, leading to lackluster performances. For France,\u00a0Paul Pogba<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Kylian Mbappe<\/strong>\u00a0must play well against\u00a0Lionel Messi<\/strong>. Messi netted his first goal of the tournament on a gorgeous touch against Nigeria, and he’s looking to build on that success. Pogba has played a few phenomenal balls into Mbappe already, and France has two players more than capable of making a difference against a player with an argument for best in the world.<\/p>\n\n\nBrazil vs. Mexico<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nPhilippe Coutinho<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Neymar Jr.<\/strong>\u00a0are one of the deadliest tandems in the Cup, and they’re looking at\u00a0Carlos Vela<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez<\/strong>. Brazil, led by Neymar and\u00a0Philippe Coutinho, have improved every game. With Marcelo and Danilo nursing injuries, it lacks defensive reinforcements, but Brazil has the firepower to win this tournament. Coutinho has two goals in the group stage, while Neymar has one. Chicharito hasn’t had much impact for Mexico in the offensive department so far, but he’ll have to step it up to keep up with Brazil’s potent offensive arsenal.<\/p>\nSubsequently, Mexico played a large role in dismissing defending champion Germany from the group stage, playing an aggressive, up-tempo style. The attacking trio of Javier Hernandez, Carlos Vela and Hirving Lozano have meshed well, but the defense remains a concern following a 3-0 loss to Sweden.<\/p>\n
Belgium vs. Japan<\/h3>\n
Romelo Lukaku<\/strong>\u00a0is easily Belgium’s most prolific scorer, he has four goals thus far, and he’s going up against a Japan team that has very quiet talent.\u00a0Shinji Kagawa<\/strong>\u00a0is Japan’s best player, and he hasn’t scored since the sixth minute of the first match against Colombia. So you could say he’s “due.”<\/p>\nSpain vs. Russia<\/h3>\n
Diego Costa\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0Denis Cheryshev<\/strong>\u00a0have both made waves early in this tourney. Each has three goals, and Cheryshev is leading a Russia team that has put up video game numbers to this point.<\/p>\nCroatia vs. Denmark<\/h3>\n
Luka Modric<\/strong>\u00a0is playing in one of his last World Cups at 32, but he’s making it count in the Croatian midfield. He had a pair of goals in a dominant group stage.\u00a0Christian Eriksen<\/strong>\u00a0leads the way for Denmark, and he accounted for one of Denmark’s goals in the group stage.<\/p>\n\n\nSweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nAndreas Granqvist<\/strong>\u00a0has two goals for Sweden to this point, and he’s a huge part of them advancing out of the group stage amid a quiet showing from\u00a0Emil Forsberg<\/strong>. For Switzerland,\u00a0Xherdan Shaqiri<\/strong>\u00a0made his presence felt in the opening round, constantly staying involved in the action. Sweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\nSweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\n
England vs. Colombia<\/h3>\n
Harry Kane<\/strong>\u00a0will have to lead for England against Colombia.\u00a0James Rodriguez<\/strong>\u00a0is trying to fight off an injury, while\u00a0Yerry Mina<\/strong>\u00a0has become an integral part of Colombia’s team, scoring two goals to help Columbia advance.If James Rodriguez is unable to play after being forced from Thursday’s win over Senegal with an apparent calf injury, England will have a great chance to advance. Harry Kane would then be licking his chops at a long run on the weaker side of the bracket.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
5. The race for the Golden Boot<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
England’s Harry Kane leads the chase with five goals \u2014 through one was a complete accident. Belgium’s Romelu Lukaku and Ronaldo each have four goals, while Russian midfielder\u00a0Denis Cheryshev and Spain’s Diego Costa both have three goals.<\/p>\n
It seems likely Kane, Lukaku, Ronaldo or Costa will claim top-scoring honours, but watch out for Belgium’s Eden Hazard, currently sitting at two goals.<\/p>\n
Should England defeat Colombia, it has a nice road to the semifinals, giving Kane a couple chances to add more goals. But Ronaldo helped lead Portugal to a 2016 Euro win, and he could get hot this summer and scorch the nets enough to win the Golden Boot and lead Portugal on a run.<\/p>\n
The outsiders<\/strong><\/h4>\nDenis Cheryshev (3 goals)
\nPhilippe Coutinho (2 goals)
\nArtem Dzyuba (2 goals)
\nEden Hazard (2 goals)
\nLuis Suarez (2 goals)
\nLionel Messi (1 goal)
\nNeymar (1 goals)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The 2018 World Cup’s group stage concluded Thursday, ending a two-week whirlwind of goals, VAR and dashed dreams..Belgium defeated England 1-0 to win Group G, but both sides sent out their\u00a0B-squads with an eye already on the Round of 16. While the Red Devils won the group, they may have the more difficult road moving forward. With usual contending nations such as the Netherlands, USA, Chile and Italy at home watching, the group stage lacked intrigue at times as smaller nations didn’t always seem up to the challenge. However, the tournament should regain some drama in the Round of 16, as a couple of the matchups look like potential finals. … Continue reading “World Cup 2018: Round of 16 preview; The road to Glory and Agony”<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":1115,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[432,433,436,435,438,437,440,439,434,431],"class_list":["post-1114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-final-16-world-cup","tag-france-vs-argentina-10-a-m-et-kazan-fox-saturday","tag-july-1-croatia-vs-denmark-2-p-m-et-nizhny-novgorod-fox-monday","tag-july-1-spain-vs-russia-10-a-m-et-moscow-fox-sunday","tag-july-2-belgium-vs-japan-2-p-m-et-rostov-fox-tuesday","tag-july-2-brazil-vs-mexico-10-a-m-et-samara-fs1-monday","tag-july-3-colombia-vs-england","tag-july-3-sweden-vs-switzerland-10-a-m-et-saint-petersburg-fs1-tuesday","tag-june-30-uruguay-vs-portugal-2-p-m-et-sochi-fox-sunday","tag-world-cup-round-of-16"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
North America (CONCACAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 3<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 1<\/li>\n
- Round of 16 participants<\/strong>: Mexico<\/li>\n
- Teams eliminated<\/strong>: Costa Rica, Panama<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Africa (CAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Europe and South America are continuing their utter domination at the World Cup. There’s never been a World Cup participant that isn’t from one of these two continents, and barring an utter miracle from either Mexico or Japan, that doesn’t seem likely to change. South America sent four of its five participants past the group stage, whereas Europe sent 10 of its ridiculous 14 through. That only makes it more shocking that Germany wasn’t able to make it out.<\/p>\n
Compared to the 2014 World Cup, only six UEFA teams made it to the knockout stage. CONMEBOL had five, CONCACAF featured three and CAF featured two African teams.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
3. Head-to-head<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
\n- Uruguay vs. Portugal:<\/strong>\u00a0First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- France vs. Argentina:<\/strong>\u00a02-0-0 Argentina (2-1 win in 1978 group stage; 1-0 win in 1930 group stage)<\/li>\n
- Brazil vs. Mexico<\/strong>: 3-0-1 Brazil (last meeting, 0-0 draw in 2014)<\/li>\n
- Belgium vs. Japan<\/strong>: 0-0-1 (2-2 draw in 2002)<\/li>\n
- Spain vs. Russia<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Croatia vs. Denmark<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Sweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- England vs. Colombia<\/strong>: 1-0-0 England (2-0 win in 1998)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
4. Key players<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
Uruguay vs. Portugal<\/h3>\n
The players to look out for in this match aren’t any different than you would expect.\u00a0Luis Suarez<\/strong>\u00a0for Uruguay vs.\u00a0Cristiano Ronaldo<\/strong>\u00a0for Portugal. Ronaldo is looking to get his team out of the round of 16 for the first time since 2006, when Portugal finished in fourth place, and he’s in the Golden Boot race with four goals so far.\u00a0Edinson Cavani<\/strong>is a dark horse for the Uruguayan squad.<\/p>\nFrance vs. Argentina<\/h3>\n
France, with stars Paul Pogba and Antoine Griezmann, taking on Lionel Messi and Argentina seems like the obvious choice for most intriguing, as both teams had Finals ambitions heading into the tournament. But both\u00a0have struggled, leading to lackluster performances. For France,\u00a0Paul Pogba<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Kylian Mbappe<\/strong>\u00a0must play well against\u00a0Lionel Messi<\/strong>. Messi netted his first goal of the tournament on a gorgeous touch against Nigeria, and he’s looking to build on that success. Pogba has played a few phenomenal balls into Mbappe already, and France has two players more than capable of making a difference against a player with an argument for best in the world.<\/p>\n\n\nBrazil vs. Mexico<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nPhilippe Coutinho<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Neymar Jr.<\/strong>\u00a0are one of the deadliest tandems in the Cup, and they’re looking at\u00a0Carlos Vela<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez<\/strong>. Brazil, led by Neymar and\u00a0Philippe Coutinho, have improved every game. With Marcelo and Danilo nursing injuries, it lacks defensive reinforcements, but Brazil has the firepower to win this tournament. Coutinho has two goals in the group stage, while Neymar has one. Chicharito hasn’t had much impact for Mexico in the offensive department so far, but he’ll have to step it up to keep up with Brazil’s potent offensive arsenal.<\/p>\nSubsequently, Mexico played a large role in dismissing defending champion Germany from the group stage, playing an aggressive, up-tempo style. The attacking trio of Javier Hernandez, Carlos Vela and Hirving Lozano have meshed well, but the defense remains a concern following a 3-0 loss to Sweden.<\/p>\n
Belgium vs. Japan<\/h3>\n
Romelo Lukaku<\/strong>\u00a0is easily Belgium’s most prolific scorer, he has four goals thus far, and he’s going up against a Japan team that has very quiet talent.\u00a0Shinji Kagawa<\/strong>\u00a0is Japan’s best player, and he hasn’t scored since the sixth minute of the first match against Colombia. So you could say he’s “due.”<\/p>\nSpain vs. Russia<\/h3>\n
Diego Costa\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0Denis Cheryshev<\/strong>\u00a0have both made waves early in this tourney. Each has three goals, and Cheryshev is leading a Russia team that has put up video game numbers to this point.<\/p>\nCroatia vs. Denmark<\/h3>\n
Luka Modric<\/strong>\u00a0is playing in one of his last World Cups at 32, but he’s making it count in the Croatian midfield. He had a pair of goals in a dominant group stage.\u00a0Christian Eriksen<\/strong>\u00a0leads the way for Denmark, and he accounted for one of Denmark’s goals in the group stage.<\/p>\n\n\nSweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nAndreas Granqvist<\/strong>\u00a0has two goals for Sweden to this point, and he’s a huge part of them advancing out of the group stage amid a quiet showing from\u00a0Emil Forsberg<\/strong>. For Switzerland,\u00a0Xherdan Shaqiri<\/strong>\u00a0made his presence felt in the opening round, constantly staying involved in the action. Sweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\nSweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\n
England vs. Colombia<\/h3>\n
Harry Kane<\/strong>\u00a0will have to lead for England against Colombia.\u00a0James Rodriguez<\/strong>\u00a0is trying to fight off an injury, while\u00a0Yerry Mina<\/strong>\u00a0has become an integral part of Colombia’s team, scoring two goals to help Columbia advance.If James Rodriguez is unable to play after being forced from Thursday’s win over Senegal with an apparent calf injury, England will have a great chance to advance. Harry Kane would then be licking his chops at a long run on the weaker side of the bracket.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
5. The race for the Golden Boot<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
England’s Harry Kane leads the chase with five goals \u2014 through one was a complete accident. Belgium’s Romelu Lukaku and Ronaldo each have four goals, while Russian midfielder\u00a0Denis Cheryshev and Spain’s Diego Costa both have three goals.<\/p>\n
It seems likely Kane, Lukaku, Ronaldo or Costa will claim top-scoring honours, but watch out for Belgium’s Eden Hazard, currently sitting at two goals.<\/p>\n
Should England defeat Colombia, it has a nice road to the semifinals, giving Kane a couple chances to add more goals. But Ronaldo helped lead Portugal to a 2016 Euro win, and he could get hot this summer and scorch the nets enough to win the Golden Boot and lead Portugal on a run.<\/p>\n
The outsiders<\/strong><\/h4>\nDenis Cheryshev (3 goals)
\nPhilippe Coutinho (2 goals)
\nArtem Dzyuba (2 goals)
\nEden Hazard (2 goals)
\nLuis Suarez (2 goals)
\nLionel Messi (1 goal)
\nNeymar (1 goals)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The 2018 World Cup’s group stage concluded Thursday, ending a two-week whirlwind of goals, VAR and dashed dreams..Belgium defeated England 1-0 to win Group G, but both sides sent out their\u00a0B-squads with an eye already on the Round of 16. While the Red Devils won the group, they may have the more difficult road moving forward. With usual contending nations such as the Netherlands, USA, Chile and Italy at home watching, the group stage lacked intrigue at times as smaller nations didn’t always seem up to the challenge. However, the tournament should regain some drama in the Round of 16, as a couple of the matchups look like potential finals. … Continue reading “World Cup 2018: Round of 16 preview; The road to Glory and Agony”<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":1115,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[432,433,436,435,438,437,440,439,434,431],"class_list":["post-1114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-final-16-world-cup","tag-france-vs-argentina-10-a-m-et-kazan-fox-saturday","tag-july-1-croatia-vs-denmark-2-p-m-et-nizhny-novgorod-fox-monday","tag-july-1-spain-vs-russia-10-a-m-et-moscow-fox-sunday","tag-july-2-belgium-vs-japan-2-p-m-et-rostov-fox-tuesday","tag-july-2-brazil-vs-mexico-10-a-m-et-samara-fs1-monday","tag-july-3-colombia-vs-england","tag-july-3-sweden-vs-switzerland-10-a-m-et-saint-petersburg-fs1-tuesday","tag-june-30-uruguay-vs-portugal-2-p-m-et-sochi-fox-sunday","tag-world-cup-round-of-16"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Africa (CAF)<\/h3>\n\n- Teams qualified<\/strong>: 5<\/li>\n
- Teams advanced<\/strong>: 0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Europe and South America are continuing their utter domination at the World Cup. There’s never been a World Cup participant that isn’t from one of these two continents, and barring an utter miracle from either Mexico or Japan, that doesn’t seem likely to change. South America sent four of its five participants past the group stage, whereas Europe sent 10 of its ridiculous 14 through. That only makes it more shocking that Germany wasn’t able to make it out.<\/p>\n
Compared to the 2014 World Cup, only six UEFA teams made it to the knockout stage. CONMEBOL had five, CONCACAF featured three and CAF featured two African teams.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
3. Head-to-head<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
\n- Uruguay vs. Portugal:<\/strong>\u00a0First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- France vs. Argentina:<\/strong>\u00a02-0-0 Argentina (2-1 win in 1978 group stage; 1-0 win in 1930 group stage)<\/li>\n
- Brazil vs. Mexico<\/strong>: 3-0-1 Brazil (last meeting, 0-0 draw in 2014)<\/li>\n
- Belgium vs. Japan<\/strong>: 0-0-1 (2-2 draw in 2002)<\/li>\n
- Spain vs. Russia<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Croatia vs. Denmark<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Sweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- England vs. Colombia<\/strong>: 1-0-0 England (2-0 win in 1998)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
4. Key players<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
Uruguay vs. Portugal<\/h3>\n
The players to look out for in this match aren’t any different than you would expect.\u00a0Luis Suarez<\/strong>\u00a0for Uruguay vs.\u00a0Cristiano Ronaldo<\/strong>\u00a0for Portugal. Ronaldo is looking to get his team out of the round of 16 for the first time since 2006, when Portugal finished in fourth place, and he’s in the Golden Boot race with four goals so far.\u00a0Edinson Cavani<\/strong>is a dark horse for the Uruguayan squad.<\/p>\nFrance vs. Argentina<\/h3>\n
France, with stars Paul Pogba and Antoine Griezmann, taking on Lionel Messi and Argentina seems like the obvious choice for most intriguing, as both teams had Finals ambitions heading into the tournament. But both\u00a0have struggled, leading to lackluster performances. For France,\u00a0Paul Pogba<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Kylian Mbappe<\/strong>\u00a0must play well against\u00a0Lionel Messi<\/strong>. Messi netted his first goal of the tournament on a gorgeous touch against Nigeria, and he’s looking to build on that success. Pogba has played a few phenomenal balls into Mbappe already, and France has two players more than capable of making a difference against a player with an argument for best in the world.<\/p>\n\n\nBrazil vs. Mexico<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nPhilippe Coutinho<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Neymar Jr.<\/strong>\u00a0are one of the deadliest tandems in the Cup, and they’re looking at\u00a0Carlos Vela<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez<\/strong>. Brazil, led by Neymar and\u00a0Philippe Coutinho, have improved every game. With Marcelo and Danilo nursing injuries, it lacks defensive reinforcements, but Brazil has the firepower to win this tournament. Coutinho has two goals in the group stage, while Neymar has one. Chicharito hasn’t had much impact for Mexico in the offensive department so far, but he’ll have to step it up to keep up with Brazil’s potent offensive arsenal.<\/p>\nSubsequently, Mexico played a large role in dismissing defending champion Germany from the group stage, playing an aggressive, up-tempo style. The attacking trio of Javier Hernandez, Carlos Vela and Hirving Lozano have meshed well, but the defense remains a concern following a 3-0 loss to Sweden.<\/p>\n
Belgium vs. Japan<\/h3>\n
Romelo Lukaku<\/strong>\u00a0is easily Belgium’s most prolific scorer, he has four goals thus far, and he’s going up against a Japan team that has very quiet talent.\u00a0Shinji Kagawa<\/strong>\u00a0is Japan’s best player, and he hasn’t scored since the sixth minute of the first match against Colombia. So you could say he’s “due.”<\/p>\nSpain vs. Russia<\/h3>\n
Diego Costa\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0Denis Cheryshev<\/strong>\u00a0have both made waves early in this tourney. Each has three goals, and Cheryshev is leading a Russia team that has put up video game numbers to this point.<\/p>\nCroatia vs. Denmark<\/h3>\n
Luka Modric<\/strong>\u00a0is playing in one of his last World Cups at 32, but he’s making it count in the Croatian midfield. He had a pair of goals in a dominant group stage.\u00a0Christian Eriksen<\/strong>\u00a0leads the way for Denmark, and he accounted for one of Denmark’s goals in the group stage.<\/p>\n\n\nSweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nAndreas Granqvist<\/strong>\u00a0has two goals for Sweden to this point, and he’s a huge part of them advancing out of the group stage amid a quiet showing from\u00a0Emil Forsberg<\/strong>. For Switzerland,\u00a0Xherdan Shaqiri<\/strong>\u00a0made his presence felt in the opening round, constantly staying involved in the action. Sweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\nSweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\n
England vs. Colombia<\/h3>\n
Harry Kane<\/strong>\u00a0will have to lead for England against Colombia.\u00a0James Rodriguez<\/strong>\u00a0is trying to fight off an injury, while\u00a0Yerry Mina<\/strong>\u00a0has become an integral part of Colombia’s team, scoring two goals to help Columbia advance.If James Rodriguez is unable to play after being forced from Thursday’s win over Senegal with an apparent calf injury, England will have a great chance to advance. Harry Kane would then be licking his chops at a long run on the weaker side of the bracket.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
5. The race for the Golden Boot<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
England’s Harry Kane leads the chase with five goals \u2014 through one was a complete accident. Belgium’s Romelu Lukaku and Ronaldo each have four goals, while Russian midfielder\u00a0Denis Cheryshev and Spain’s Diego Costa both have three goals.<\/p>\n
It seems likely Kane, Lukaku, Ronaldo or Costa will claim top-scoring honours, but watch out for Belgium’s Eden Hazard, currently sitting at two goals.<\/p>\n
Should England defeat Colombia, it has a nice road to the semifinals, giving Kane a couple chances to add more goals. But Ronaldo helped lead Portugal to a 2016 Euro win, and he could get hot this summer and scorch the nets enough to win the Golden Boot and lead Portugal on a run.<\/p>\n
The outsiders<\/strong><\/h4>\nDenis Cheryshev (3 goals)
\nPhilippe Coutinho (2 goals)
\nArtem Dzyuba (2 goals)
\nEden Hazard (2 goals)
\nLuis Suarez (2 goals)
\nLionel Messi (1 goal)
\nNeymar (1 goals)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The 2018 World Cup’s group stage concluded Thursday, ending a two-week whirlwind of goals, VAR and dashed dreams..Belgium defeated England 1-0 to win Group G, but both sides sent out their\u00a0B-squads with an eye already on the Round of 16. While the Red Devils won the group, they may have the more difficult road moving forward. With usual contending nations such as the Netherlands, USA, Chile and Italy at home watching, the group stage lacked intrigue at times as smaller nations didn’t always seem up to the challenge. However, the tournament should regain some drama in the Round of 16, as a couple of the matchups look like potential finals. … Continue reading “World Cup 2018: Round of 16 preview; The road to Glory and Agony”<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":1115,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[432,433,436,435,438,437,440,439,434,431],"class_list":["post-1114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-final-16-world-cup","tag-france-vs-argentina-10-a-m-et-kazan-fox-saturday","tag-july-1-croatia-vs-denmark-2-p-m-et-nizhny-novgorod-fox-monday","tag-july-1-spain-vs-russia-10-a-m-et-moscow-fox-sunday","tag-july-2-belgium-vs-japan-2-p-m-et-rostov-fox-tuesday","tag-july-2-brazil-vs-mexico-10-a-m-et-samara-fs1-monday","tag-july-3-colombia-vs-england","tag-july-3-sweden-vs-switzerland-10-a-m-et-saint-petersburg-fs1-tuesday","tag-june-30-uruguay-vs-portugal-2-p-m-et-sochi-fox-sunday","tag-world-cup-round-of-16"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Europe and South America are continuing their utter domination at the World Cup. There’s never been a World Cup participant that isn’t from one of these two continents, and barring an utter miracle from either Mexico or Japan, that doesn’t seem likely to change. South America sent four of its five participants past the group stage, whereas Europe sent 10 of its ridiculous 14 through. That only makes it more shocking that Germany wasn’t able to make it out.<\/p>\n
Compared to the 2014 World Cup, only six UEFA teams made it to the knockout stage. CONMEBOL had five, CONCACAF featured three and CAF featured two African teams.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
3. Head-to-head<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n
- \n
- Uruguay vs. Portugal:<\/strong>\u00a0First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- France vs. Argentina:<\/strong>\u00a02-0-0 Argentina (2-1 win in 1978 group stage; 1-0 win in 1930 group stage)<\/li>\n
- Brazil vs. Mexico<\/strong>: 3-0-1 Brazil (last meeting, 0-0 draw in 2014)<\/li>\n
- Belgium vs. Japan<\/strong>: 0-0-1 (2-2 draw in 2002)<\/li>\n
- Spain vs. Russia<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Croatia vs. Denmark<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- Sweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong>: First World Cup matchup<\/li>\n
- England vs. Colombia<\/strong>: 1-0-0 England (2-0 win in 1998)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
4. Key players<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\nUruguay vs. Portugal<\/h3>\n
The players to look out for in this match aren’t any different than you would expect.\u00a0Luis Suarez<\/strong>\u00a0for Uruguay vs.\u00a0Cristiano Ronaldo<\/strong>\u00a0for Portugal. Ronaldo is looking to get his team out of the round of 16 for the first time since 2006, when Portugal finished in fourth place, and he’s in the Golden Boot race with four goals so far.\u00a0Edinson Cavani<\/strong>is a dark horse for the Uruguayan squad.<\/p>\n
France vs. Argentina<\/h3>\n
France, with stars Paul Pogba and Antoine Griezmann, taking on Lionel Messi and Argentina seems like the obvious choice for most intriguing, as both teams had Finals ambitions heading into the tournament. But both\u00a0have struggled, leading to lackluster performances. For France,\u00a0Paul Pogba<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Kylian Mbappe<\/strong>\u00a0must play well against\u00a0Lionel Messi<\/strong>. Messi netted his first goal of the tournament on a gorgeous touch against Nigeria, and he’s looking to build on that success. Pogba has played a few phenomenal balls into Mbappe already, and France has two players more than capable of making a difference against a player with an argument for best in the world.<\/p>\n
\n\nBrazil vs. Mexico<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nPhilippe Coutinho<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Neymar Jr.<\/strong>\u00a0are one of the deadliest tandems in the Cup, and they’re looking at\u00a0Carlos Vela<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez<\/strong>. Brazil, led by Neymar and\u00a0Philippe Coutinho, have improved every game. With Marcelo and Danilo nursing injuries, it lacks defensive reinforcements, but Brazil has the firepower to win this tournament. Coutinho has two goals in the group stage, while Neymar has one. Chicharito hasn’t had much impact for Mexico in the offensive department so far, but he’ll have to step it up to keep up with Brazil’s potent offensive arsenal.<\/p>\n
Subsequently, Mexico played a large role in dismissing defending champion Germany from the group stage, playing an aggressive, up-tempo style. The attacking trio of Javier Hernandez, Carlos Vela and Hirving Lozano have meshed well, but the defense remains a concern following a 3-0 loss to Sweden.<\/p>\n
Belgium vs. Japan<\/h3>\n
Romelo Lukaku<\/strong>\u00a0is easily Belgium’s most prolific scorer, he has four goals thus far, and he’s going up against a Japan team that has very quiet talent.\u00a0Shinji Kagawa<\/strong>\u00a0is Japan’s best player, and he hasn’t scored since the sixth minute of the first match against Colombia. So you could say he’s “due.”<\/p>\n
Spain vs. Russia<\/h3>\n
Diego Costa\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0Denis Cheryshev<\/strong>\u00a0have both made waves early in this tourney. Each has three goals, and Cheryshev is leading a Russia team that has put up video game numbers to this point.<\/p>\n
Croatia vs. Denmark<\/h3>\n
Luka Modric<\/strong>\u00a0is playing in one of his last World Cups at 32, but he’s making it count in the Croatian midfield. He had a pair of goals in a dominant group stage.\u00a0Christian Eriksen<\/strong>\u00a0leads the way for Denmark, and he accounted for one of Denmark’s goals in the group stage.<\/p>\n
\n\nSweden vs. Switzerland<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nAndreas Granqvist<\/strong>\u00a0has two goals for Sweden to this point, and he’s a huge part of them advancing out of the group stage amid a quiet showing from\u00a0Emil Forsberg<\/strong>. For Switzerland,\u00a0Xherdan Shaqiri<\/strong>\u00a0made his presence felt in the opening round, constantly staying involved in the action. Sweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\n
Sweden may not have famous striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic\u00a0on the squad, but this chippy, well-organized unit has given opposing teams fits. Starting with a hard-fought upset over Italy in a playoff to get into the tournament, Sweden has looked tough in must-win games.<\/p>\n
England vs. Colombia<\/h3>\n
Harry Kane<\/strong>\u00a0will have to lead for England against Colombia.\u00a0James Rodriguez<\/strong>\u00a0is trying to fight off an injury, while\u00a0Yerry Mina<\/strong>\u00a0has become an integral part of Colombia’s team, scoring two goals to help Columbia advance.If James Rodriguez is unable to play after being forced from Thursday’s win over Senegal with an apparent calf injury, England will have a great chance to advance. Harry Kane would then be licking his chops at a long run on the weaker side of the bracket.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
5. The race for the Golden Boot<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
England’s Harry Kane leads the chase with five goals \u2014 through one was a complete accident. Belgium’s Romelu Lukaku and Ronaldo each have four goals, while Russian midfielder\u00a0Denis Cheryshev and Spain’s Diego Costa both have three goals.<\/p>\n
It seems likely Kane, Lukaku, Ronaldo or Costa will claim top-scoring honours, but watch out for Belgium’s Eden Hazard, currently sitting at two goals.<\/p>\n
Should England defeat Colombia, it has a nice road to the semifinals, giving Kane a couple chances to add more goals. But Ronaldo helped lead Portugal to a 2016 Euro win, and he could get hot this summer and scorch the nets enough to win the Golden Boot and lead Portugal on a run.<\/p>\n
The outsiders<\/strong><\/h4>\n
Denis Cheryshev (3 goals)
\nPhilippe Coutinho (2 goals)
\nArtem Dzyuba (2 goals)
\nEden Hazard (2 goals)
\nLuis Suarez (2 goals)
\nLionel Messi (1 goal)
\nNeymar (1 goals)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 2018 World Cup’s group stage concluded Thursday, ending a two-week whirlwind of goals, VAR and dashed dreams..Belgium defeated England 1-0 to win Group G, but both sides sent out their\u00a0B-squads with an eye already on the Round of 16. While the Red Devils won the group, they may have the more difficult road moving forward. With usual contending nations such as the Netherlands, USA, Chile and Italy at home watching, the group stage lacked intrigue at times as smaller nations didn’t always seem up to the challenge. However, the tournament should regain some drama in the Round of 16, as a couple of the matchups look like potential finals. … Continue reading “World Cup 2018: Round of 16 preview; The road to Glory and Agony”<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":1115,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[432,433,436,435,438,437,440,439,434,431],"class_list":["post-1114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-final-16-world-cup","tag-france-vs-argentina-10-a-m-et-kazan-fox-saturday","tag-july-1-croatia-vs-denmark-2-p-m-et-nizhny-novgorod-fox-monday","tag-july-1-spain-vs-russia-10-a-m-et-moscow-fox-sunday","tag-july-2-belgium-vs-japan-2-p-m-et-rostov-fox-tuesday","tag-july-2-brazil-vs-mexico-10-a-m-et-samara-fs1-monday","tag-july-3-colombia-vs-england","tag-july-3-sweden-vs-switzerland-10-a-m-et-saint-petersburg-fs1-tuesday","tag-june-30-uruguay-vs-portugal-2-p-m-et-sochi-fox-sunday","tag-world-cup-round-of-16"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
- France vs. Argentina:<\/strong>\u00a02-0-0 Argentina (2-1 win in 1978 group stage; 1-0 win in 1930 group stage)<\/li>\n