First night nerves for Brazil in stalemate with gritty Swiss
SHAKY BEGINNING Fivetime champions pay for their inability to finish off the game ROSTOV-ON-DON:
Coach Tite blamed first night nerves after Brazil’s bid for a sixth World Cup got off to a rocky start as Switzerland withstood an early onslaught to snatch a 1-1 draw in Rostov-on-Don on Sunday. On the day when holders Germany were shocked 1-0 by Mexico, Brazil’s tag as pre-tournament favourites looked justified in a dominant first-half capped by Philippe Coutinho’s wonder strike to open the scoring.
However, Brazil paid for their failure to kill the game off when Steven Zuber powered home an equaliser from Xherdan Shaqiri’s corner five minutes after the break.
The pressure will now be on Brazil to kickstart their campaign when they face Costa Rica on Friday.
The stalemate left Tite unimpressed. “I’m not happy with this result. Our finishing wasn’t good. We had 20 chances, but too many shots were off target. We should have made their keeper work harder than that.
“I put it down to stress, first match nerves, that’s true for me too,” the Brazil boss said. He added: “Up to their goal, I was satisfied. We were moving well. Then they raised their game, and it took us 10 minutes to regain our rhythm. But once again, our finishing wasn’t good.”
Tite said his side suffered from anxiety during the game, the first time Brazil have not won a World Cup opener since 1978, urging them to keep their heads when they got into shooting positions.
“We need to stay cool when we shoot and be more precise,” he told reporters.
A lot of the focus after the game was on whether Brazil defender Joao Miranda had been fouled by Steven Zuber when he headed in Switzerland’s 50th minute equaliser, while a decision to deny Gabriel Jesus a penalty was also heavily scrutinised.
An equally big problem for Brazil was coping with frequent tactical fouls meted out by the Swiss, particularly on Neymar, which interrupted their attempts to create attacks.
SWISS COACH WANTS MORE RECOGNITION
Switzerland coach Vladimir Petkovic said his team deserved more recognition after they held five-times champions Brazil to a draw in their opening match. I hope they start looking up and taking notice of us and taking us seriously,” said Petkovic, whose side held Spain to the same score in a warm-up friendly.
“Sometimes, there is a lack of recognition and that is a pity.
“Playing against Brazil and Spain, we demonstrated we could react, that this team always believes in itself and can get results. We will continue to play with this consistency.”
Switzerland have lost only one out of 12 competitive matches since Euro 2016 - a World Cup qualifier away to Portugal.
“I hoped that we would do what we didn’t against Portugal, that we would play our game and try to impose our way of playing,” he said.
“I think the team has shown great determination and I’m very, very happy.”