Senegal put an end to Alfaro’s dream of Ecuador, excluded from the Qatar 2022 World Cup due to a carom

At no time in the afternoon did the drumming from fans of Senegal at the Khalifa stadium. Even the players dressed in white haven’t stopped running. The party, in the end, was all theirs, as opposed to the sadness of Gustavo Alfarothe Argentinian coach who had made the South Americans believe that ‘yes, you can’.

Ecuador He arrived with his illusion and four points in Group A. A draw was enough for him to qualify and equal his best performance in the World Cup. For 44 minutes in the first half and three in the second he clung to that equality. But Senegal kept the ticket, e it was only 2-1.

Strong team, Senegal. Physical, fast, at times bordering on regulation. Hard on every split ball and almost always with numerical superiority. His figure is missing Sadio Mané, absent due to injury. He misses it because the former Liverpool striker, now at Bayern Munich, has in excess what the national team doesn’t have. Goal, no less.

Ecuador had a bad moment in the first half. Senegal won all the duels and the ball never got clear to the three forwards that Gustavo Alfaro, Gonzalo Plata, Michael Estrada and Enner Valencia put on.

Senegal had no choice but to win to qualify for the round of 16 and came out determined to earn credit. He immediately had a clear situation on the right foot of Idrissa Gana Gueye, Messi’s teammate in his first year at Paris Saint-Germain and today at Everton in England. Angelo Preciado failed to stop Watford striker Ismaila Sarr. Everything was white, but Mané was missing.

Until the end of that first phase Piero Hincapié committed a youthful sin, trying to solve what neither Preciado nor Torres could before a long pass from Diallo to Sarr. The former defender of Talleres, today at the German Bayer Leverkusen, is 20 years old and has a huge future, but he went to cross Sarr with his shoulder, gave him the lead and the French referee Clément Turpin had no doubts. Right, he was criminal.

Sarr He executed to the left of goalkeeper Hernán Galíndez, an Argentine (formerly of Rosario Central and Quilmes), who remained in the centre. The 1-0 equalized what both teams did.

Alfaro moved to the bench at halftime. Sarmiento and Cifuentes of Franco and Gruezo. Ecuador lost, was shut out and had to search. Senegal withdrew, with a 4-1-4-1, trusting in the security that starts from the first defensive triangle; goalkeeper Edouard Mendy (Chelsea) and central defenders Kalidou Koulibaly (ex Napoli, now at Chelsea) and Abdou Diallo (ex Dortmund and PSG, now at Leipzig). But it can and did fail, with all the Senegalese center of the area. corner from right, Header by Torres and touch on goal by Moisés Caicedo (another important promise from Ecuador), taking advantage of the fact that Youssouf Sabaly embraced the stick and enabled everyone.

Ecuador’s joy lasted less than three minutes. A free kick from Idrissa Gana Gueye, who this time hit the ball and not a rival, generated a bad clearance from Enner Valencia and a definition of the attacker by the defender and captain Koulibaly. Spectacular, volley and cross, at the first touch.

In those three minutes and 44 of the first half, Ecuador had the table in their pocket, with the draw they needed. He couldn’t take it. In the match he was a little further from deserving it to equal his best performance at the World Cup, that of 2006, the only time he managed to reach the round of 16, where he then lost 1-0 to England.

It couldn’t be. The party was from Senegal, which, beyond the continuous percussion, won it on the field.