Suarez shows lack of bite as Uruguay flop
When football historians review this World Cup, it may well be remembered as the tournament that gave the last rites to a generation of players.
lionel messi’s fate remains unclear and here Uruguay’s luis Suarez, english anti-hero outside of liverpool, looked a player on his last legs.
his stats were zero shots, zero chances created, three touches in the opposition box and seven passes, one of which was the kick-off. he had 18 touches and won a single duel. he went off on 65 minutes to be replaced by edinson Cavani, who did not offer much more.
Suarez’s past iconic interventions include making the ‘save of the tournament’ in 2010 with a last-minute handball on the line against Ghana, taking a red card for the team to enable Uruguay to reach the semi-finals, beating england on one leg and taking a bite out of Giorgio Chiellini in 2014, and reaching the quarterfinals in 2018.
rarely is life dull when Suarez is around, except here in Doha. This is fast becoming the safety first World Cup. russia 2018 had one scoreless draw but this one made it four so far in Qatar, 25 per cent of the games.
In tight groups — and Group h looks the most well-matched of all — the law of lowest risk seems to prevail. Do not lose your opening match is the World Cup mantra ignored by Germany and Argentina but hard-wired into the mid-ranking teams.
Uruguay and South Korea had a fair smattering of superstars, including Son heung- min, complete with face mask after surgery for the fractures close to his eye, but he could do little to lift the mood.
his coach Paulo Bento said: ‘he’s been inactive for a considerable length of time and only reintegrated into our team in the last few days. After that injury, and then being exposed to a more aggressive match, it is natural it will take him some time to adapt.’
Uruguay started, on paper, with one of the most formidable front lines at the World Cup in Darwin nunez, luis Suarez and Facundo Pellistri. And yet between them they could not muster a single shot on target.
‘You can see the characteristics of the players,’ said Uruguay coach Diego Alonso, defending the performance. ‘ We had three attackers in Darwin, Suarez and Pellistri, three midfielders who are goalscorers and full backs who can go forward. But in the first 20 minutes we could not put good pressure on South Korea and we had to adjust and after that the second half changed. I like to defend high and in the first half we struggled to do that. The second half we dominated but then we lacked a little in our attacking.’
In fact, the quality was generally low, with the game characterised by nerves and lack of clinical delivery, be it in the final pass or the finishing. A rare beacon of excellence was the Jose Gimenez crossfield pass for Federico Valverde on 20 minutes, yet the real madrid midfielder sent his swerving i shot htj just t over. Th There was another superb Gimenez pass from defence on 23 minutes for Pellistri, who nodded it across goal yet nunez could not even make a connection, though he did receive a sly nudge off the ball from Kim min-jae.
Uruguay looked ready to open the scoring on 28 minutes when mathias olivera raced clear on the counter. Yet he then over-hit his pass so poorly for nunez that goalkeeper Kim Seung-gyu was able to block the shot.
There was even worse finishing from South Korea on 38 minutes, with hwang Ui-jo played in 10 yards from goal, yet he leaned back and lifted his shot well over.
Just before the break, Uruguay centre half Diego Godin almost showed them how it is done when he connected with Valverde’s corner with a towering header, but saw his effort rebound off the post.
nunez did have a powerful run down the left to beat the full back but then could not find the angle to find Suarez on 50 minutes.
right at the death, we had a moment of genuine world- class quality from Valverde when he sized up a strike from 20 yards and connected beautifully only to see it rattle off the upright. It was as though the goalpost had decided we do not deserve nice things. like goals.
URUGUAY (4-3-3): Rochet 6; Caceres 6, GIMENEZ 9, Godin 8, Olivera 6 (Vina 79min); Valverde 7, Vecino 5 (De La Cruz 79), Bentancur 6; Pellistri 5 (Varela 87), Suarez 4 (Cavani 65, 6), Nunez 5.
Booked: Caceres.
Manager: Diego Alonso 6.
SOUTH KOREA (4-2-3-1): Kim Seung-gyu 7; Kim Jin-su 6, Kim Young-gwon 6,
Kim Min-jae 6, Kim Moon-hwan 6; Hwang In-beom 5 Jung Woo-young 6; Son Heung-min 6, Lee Jae-sung 5
(Son Jun-ho 74, 6), Na Sang-ho 5 (Lee Kang-in 74, 6); Hwang Ui-jo 4 (Cho Gue-sung 74, 6). Booked: Cho Gue-sung, Bento.
Manager: Paulo Bento 6.
Referee: Clement Turpin (France). Attendance: 41,663.