By David Owen
July 6 – There is World Cup history attached to both of Friday’s quarter-final match-ups in Russia. In the case of France versus Uruguay in Nizhny Novgorod, I do not see it having any particular bearing on this week’s outcome; in that of Belgium versus Brazil, it very well might.
Sixteen years ago, the Red Devils took on Ronaldo, Rivaldo et al at the Last 16 stage of the 2002 tournament. Brazil won 2-0 and went on to lift the World Cup trophy. But that is not the whole story.
The Belgians, though nowhere near as star-studded as Roberto Martínez’s exciting and eclectic squad, might easily have won – and gone on to face England in a game decided notoriously by Ronaldinho’s wicked lofted free-kick.
I was in the Kobe Wing Stadium in southern Japan that evening and the result flattered Brazil. Marc Wilmots, then Belgium’s burly, inspirational captain, later Martínez’s predecessor as national manager, could have had a hat-trick.
He was particularly unlucky when an apparently legal 35th-minute header was disallowed. “We were all sure it was a valid goal,” said Robert Waseige, the Belgian coach, afterwards. “That goal could have changed the situation of the match. This match could have ended in a very great surprise.”
Besides frustrating Waseige, I imagine this match would have broken the hearts of some members of the current Belgian squad watching on as kids thousands of miles away, though probably not the Spaniard Martínez, then a midfielder with the likes of Motherwell and Walsall.
Friday’s game in Kazan provides an opportunity for a squad which undoubtedly has the talent to win to lay that memory to rest – although it will probably need more than the barrage of crosses with which they ultimately subdued Japan to do so.
Belgium’s diverse squad has started to draw comparisons with the similarly diverse French outfit that lifted the trophy in 1998, the last team to win the World Cup on home soil.
If they are to progress to the semi-finals in Russia, however, 1998 captain-turned-manager Didier Deschamps’ men will have to overcome a World Cup bogey team.
In 1966, 2002 and 2010, France and Uruguay were bracketed in the same World Cup groups, the first time alongside eventual winners England. Not only did France fail to win against their South American rivals on any of those three occasions, registering a defeat and two goalless draws, they did not once succeed in making it through to the knockout stages.
Uruguay were not directly responsible for their elimination in the way that Brazil knocked out Belgium 16 years ago, however. So whether France or Uruguay emerge victorious today, I doubt that the legacy of those three previous games will have much to do with it.
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