Qatar showed all its weaknesses but Ecuador just took advantage of them

One of the first mysteries of the World Cup revealed: what is Qatar as a team?

In a first version it exceeded negative expectations. Spaniard Félix Sánchez Bas’s team showed a very poor image, recognized by his own coach and an ingenuity that his own enthusiasm only highlighted even more.

Not three minutes had passed and their goalkeeper missed a free kick in the area, was unable to clear and the match ended with a header from Enner Valencia, canceled out in the first (historic) failure of the new semi-final. automatic offside.

But Alfaro must have scored. The goalkeeper confirmed his anxiety about making bad decisions by committing an avoidable penalty against Valencia themselves. The late 1-0 came in the 16th minute, but it couldn’t last.

The unsustainable gamble of the three central Qataris was an invitation that Ecuador would not have ignored. The usual 4-4-2 of the Giallorossi, with two tendentially cutting attacking midfielders (Gonzalo Plata and Romario Ibarra), immediately became a 4-2-4 ready to put pressure on and cause further mistakes in the local defence. Qatar was forced to defend with five and everything broke.

Thus the party was infected by the amateurism of the grenade team. Ecuador didn’t have the patience to develop a game, they preferred to do without the midfield and focus on direct play. At the balls he made it 2-0, with a Valencia header, at the age of 31, almost without breaking a sweat.

In the second stage, Alfaro must have ordered the strategy a bit and his team tried to associate as usual, from the sides, yet failed to increase the lead as expected. The two coaches bet on the nerves of the debut, even if not as an excuse. Félix Sánchez explained: “Our nerves let us down. We couldn’t make four passes in a row and we had a lot of defensive lapses.” Alfaro recalled the young players in his team and declared: “We’re calm because we won, but we’re not satisfied.”

Another theme concerned the impressive Al Bayt Stadium. comes the equator stained at the World Cup. The CAS ruling on the Byron Castillo case obscured more than it clarified, acknowledging some irregularities in the documentation of the party, which was disaffected from the definitive list by the Ecuadorian federation itself for fear of future claims.

But it all happened a few days before the start of the cup, making it unthinkable that Chile would take the place of Ecuador. Instead, the feeling is that Alfaro’s team still has something to pay and that they can collect it this month. It was almost inevitable to link this problem to the first goal, canceled out by an imperceptible offside.

Both teams will have to improve. Ecuador will have one measure when they face the Netherlands on Friday. Everything indicates that Qatar’s journey to their own World Cup will be short.