Summary of today's events in sports, 24.11 (Sport1)
The Spanish team should not get euphoric after yesterday's exciting 0:7 performance against Costa Rica, because very high results against very weak opponents can sometimes be misleading.
Take, for example, Hungary - the only team ever to score double-digit goals at the World Cup.
It was in her first match in 1982, when she humiliated the unfortunate El Salvador 1:10.
Laszlo Kisch then went down in history as the only player to score a hat-trick in the World Cup after coming on as a substitute - and that record still stands.
In short, it was a particularly fun evening, but in the final table of the house, the Hungarians were ranked third after Belgium and Argentina - and were eliminated.
Take, for example, Erling Holland's ninth in the World Cup under the age of 20 in the summer of 2019. Norway dismantled Honduras 0:12 then, but it really didn't help them, because in the first two games they lost to Uruguay and New Zealand, and therefore they said goodbye to the tournament early - also If the conquests of her scorer were enough to win the title of top scorer.
In short, astronomical results do not guarantee anything, and so the performance of the group in red should also be seen against what can be defined as a type of cones.
The challenges are still ahead.
Luis Enrique and Busquets (Photo: Reuters)
Costa Rica, and especially its superstar Keylor Navas, has a great name in world football since the 2014 World Cup.
So this special and charismatic team finished in first place in the house that included Uruguay, Italy and England, made sure to send the two European teams home, and continued on their own until the quarter-finals where they lost to the Netherlands only on penalties.
Navas conceded in the tournament in question only twice in 510 minutes on the grass, including two overtimes, and established his status as one of the best goalkeepers in the world.
Real Madrid signed him, and his name goes before him after 5 great years at the Santiago Bernabeu.
The Central American team also enjoy a very positive reputation following that cautionary campaign, and their performance was certainly of high quality in Russia in 2018 as well, although this time they went home with one point at the end of the group stage.
Brazil, for example, was stopped until the 90th minute, even if they eventually lost 2:0.
Navas conceded only twice in 2014, and 5 more times in 2018.
And here you have an amazing, almost unimaginable statistic - yesterday the number of balls he took out of the net in the World Cup doubled in one evening, and he has a considerable amount of blame in a large part of the situations.
It was a very sad evening for the goalkeeper who is spending the season on the bench in Paris Saint-Germain, and also for his team, which does not even slightly resemble the organized and cohesive group from the previous tournaments.
Costa Rica in its new state is a broken vessel.
The old stars, like Celso Borges and Oscar Duarte, are far past their prime.
The new youngsters are not good enough to properly replace the old ones.
All the excellent image Costa Rica came with has disappeared somewhere in the desert, and in its current situation it might have been better for it not to qualify for Qatar at all.
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Holland scored nine, Norway won 0:12 and still did not advance from the early stage (Photo: GettyImages)
So 0:7 may be misleading, but Spain can draw a lot of encouragement from the way they crushed the opponent.
The seventh will give her a lot of self-confidence for the rest, and may be critical in the final table as well, because Japan's sensational victory over Germany devoured the cards.
In FIFA's institutions, goal difference is simply the determining parameter in the event of equal points, so the number of goals scored against Costa Rica also has meaning. If Spain loses to Germany, and all teams beat the underdog from Central America, then all 3 teams can finish with 6 points - then the results against Costa Rica will be of paramount importance. Luis Enrique knows this well, the players were instructed to press the pedal until the final whistle, and so they did - the last two goals were scored in injury time. In principle, it can be said that a win over Japan will now secure the ticket to the round of 16, regardless of the result of the game against the Germans.
The biggest praise for yesterday's performance goes to Gabi.
At just 18 years old, on his debut at a major tournament, the Barcelona prodigy became the youngest World Cup scorer since Pele, and he did it with a spectacular and unstoppable free kick.
This performance highlights only a small part of the extraordinary talent of the phenomenon.
He has a fantastic kicking technique, special dribbling, spectacular game vision thanks to which he participated in the construction of the goals yesterday - and also cooked directly for Danny Olmo who started the celebration.
Equally important - Gabi is an engine that never stops moving, offering himself for delivery, and is extremely effective even in a game without the ball.
His activity knows no bounds, and it has been a long time since Barça has had a pure fighter like him.
The combination of technical control of the ball, the ability to pass from any range and a very high work ethic make Gabi a leader in the center of the field, and he was really not moved by the position - just like Freddie was not emotional a year and a half ago at Euro 2020. Now Freddie is a "veteran", and the victory over Costa Rica is A great gift for him for his 20th birthday tomorrow.
Together with the truly veteran Sergio Busquets, they form a well-coordinated midfield trio at the Blaugrana, and yesterday it worked phenomenally, even considering the level of the opposition.
This momentum will be very important on Sunday against the Germans, in a fight that will be dozens of times more difficult.
In one word: phenomenon.
Gabi (Photo: Reuters)
In general, Luis Enrique's program went exactly as planned.
Rodri, who started as a stopper but was completely unemployed in terms of defensive tasks, acted as a navigator and touched the ball 91 times in the first half.
Jordi Alba, who received quite a bit of criticism recently, was excellent offensively and squeezed a penalty, among other things.
Fran Torres and Dani Olmo played excellently on the wings in a very distinct 3-3-4, and also cut wide to score.
Nico Williams was very impressive as a substitute and added a dimension of speed and breaking power that may be important later on.
Marco Asensio was a mobile and efficient simulated nine.
Albero Morata was included in the second half, was an uncharacteristic nine and found the net - and the goals are very critical for his momentum going forward.
Most of the time it looks like a very fine training game, and the goal is now twofold - to keep the smile, but not to listen too much to the media compliments.
It can be the opening shot for a phenomenal tournament, but also a negligible footnote if the players lose touch with reality and fail really tough challenges.
It will also provide Luis Enrique with excellent material for conversations with the fans on the special video channel he has opened in order to make direct contact with the audience.
It's much more fun to pass reports and provide explanations after such a positive game, and the game schedule definitely benefited the Reds.
And on Sunday, Gabi, Pedri and their friends will go on the big mission.
FIFA World Cup
Tags
Spain team
Keylor Navas
Gabi