Underdogs Algeria have the chance to settle a 32-year-old FIFA World Cup score and cause the tournament’s greatest upset so far if they manage to knock Germany out by winning their last-16 clash today.
The sides meet at Porto Alegre’s Estadio Beira-Rio in a rematch of their faceoff in the 1982 World Cup in Spain, which remains a sore point in Algeria, where it is known as “the shame of Gijon,” after the Spanish city where the teams played.
In that infamous tournament, Algeria beat West Germany 2-1 in their group game, but were eliminated after the West German squad played out a mutually beneficial 1-0 win over Austria in what many say was one of the worst cases of match-fixing in the sport’s history.
Photo: AFP
Despite this backdrop, Germany coach Joachim Loew has played down any talk of revenge being a factor in Porto Alegre.
“Why should players who weren’t even born then want revenge? I can’t understand that,” he said.
However, counterpart Vahid Halilhodzic has said Algeria have “not forgotten” and has spoken at length about the 1982 factor since reaching the last 16, with Algeria midfielder Hassan Yebda saying the squad are equally interested in claiming a major scalp.
Photo: AFP
“We are a little bit optimistic,” the Udinese midfielder said cautiously. “Germany are the best team here, we need the perfect game and it would be a sensation if we can reach the quarter-finals.”
For his part, Loew has warned his side against complacency or looking beyond their clash with the Desert Foxes to a possible quarter-final against France or Nigeria in Rio de Janeiro on Friday.
“Anyone who thinks that an easy opponent is waiting for us in the next round is making an enormous mistake,” Loew said after the Mannschaft came first in Group G.
Today’s match is the second in which Germany have to deal with specters from the past. Their 1-0 win over the US silenced any suggestions that Loew had struck a pre-match deal with Stars and Stripes coach and compatriot Jurgen Klinsmann to draw the game end and guarantee both teams safe passage to the last 16.
More pressingly, Loew is under pressure to end Germany’s 24-year wait for a World Cup title since they won in Italy in 1990.
Bayern Munich striker Thomas Mueller’s second-half thunderbolt gave Germany a 1-0 win over the US in their final group match, but Thursday’s victory in Recife came at a price. Arsenal forward Lukas Podolski is to sit out the Algeria match after a scan on Saturday showed a small tear in his thigh.
“Lukas needs two or three days break, but should we progress it will be no problem for him to play again,” Loew said, with Mario Goetze set to deputize on the left wing.
Loew says his side are “on fire,” but Germany failed to dazzle in both their 2-2 draw with Ghana and win over the US, after having hammered Portugal 4-0 in their opening game.
Mueller is their stand-out performer and joint top-scorer of the tournament with four goals, matching those of Brazil’s Neymar and Argentina’s Lionel Messi.
Loew has hinted that he will continue to rely on a Bayern-based triumvirate of Philip Lahm, Toni Kroos and Bastian Schweinsteiger, with the latter forcing his way back into the starting line-up at the expense of Real Madrid man Sami Khedira.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier