C-RON’S HAT-TRICK!
Kieran Trippier was England’s key creator while Spain’s Nacho and Benjamin Pavard of France zinged in two goals of the tournament! Belgium overturning a two-goal deficit to beat Japan was one of the games of the tournament – shortly followed by France blowing away Argentina! With great football comes great football kits. None in Russia were better than this sick Super Eagles strip. Belter! It took 38 games to produce a 0-0 stalemate, and that was when France and Denmark had already made it to the knockouts. There wasn’t a single goalless draw in 1954, but the entire tournament had just 26 games!
The England lads have been LOL kings online during the tourney. Their meme game has been strong! No footy festival is complete without fans coming in full fancy dress. Shout out to Croatia’s followers for having the patience to do all those squares!
Germany out in the groups, then Spain, Portugal and Argentina out in the last 16. You couldn’t have written that script! Mexico’s Jesus Gallardo wasted no time in getting a yellow card against Sweden. It took him only 15 seconds – a World Cup record. Calm it down, lad! We saw just four red cards in the entire tournament up to the final – and none were for horror tackles. Great to see! More last-gasp goals were scored in this year’s group stages than in the past three World Cups combined!
You’d have said we were barking mad if we predicted that South Korea would beat Germany and that Russia would knock out Spain – but both happened!
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How do you prepare for the World Cup? If you’re England, you jump into the pool and hop onto your inflatable unicorn – one of the many mad training sessions Gareth Southgate came up with! At 45 years and 161 days old, Egypt keeper Essam El-hadary became the oldest ever World Cup player against Saudi Arabia. He even saved a pen! Despite being pretty bad for years, the host nation found form in front of home fans. It kept interest going and made for an exciting tournament!
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Summer hasn’t been this summery for years. A huge heatwave took over Europe, which made enjoying the footy with a family BBQ even more enjoyable! Of the 28 awarded, 21 penalties were scored as part of a tournament record. Amazingly, five were awarded across four games on matchday three! We've heard that Jordan Pickford already knew where Colombia would hit their pens – because he had reminders w written on his water bottle! Regardless of how they did, the stars seemed to enjoy the tournament as much as the fans. Non-stop bants!