My absolute first takeaway from watching these opening group stage games is clear: outside of South Africa and Tunisia, the average level of African teams has skyrocketed. Let’s see if tactical mastermind Hervé Renard can turn things around for Tunisia after Sabri Lamouchi’s firing, but the rest of the continent is buzzing.
Morocco’s elite level
Morocco completely controlled the first half against Brazil. As I predicted before the tournament, this shouldn’t surprise anyone considering Achraf Hakimi and his team made the Semifinals just three and a half years ago.
But it’s not just Morocco. We have to talk about Senegal, who gave France serious fits in the first half and came way closer to scoring than Didier Deschamps’s squad. Then there’s Algeria, who only bent the knee to Lionel Messi but still looked great. Egypt felt completely even to Belgium (with Kevin De Bruyne and Romelu Lukaku nonetheless). And how about Congo and Cape Verde holding Cristiano Ronaldo and Lamine Yamal to draws?
Debuts are hard. Unless you’re Team USA
That’s the first big takeaway. The second is that you can only judge the opening matchday so much because even the heavy hitters suffer from debut jitters. Brazil and France looked sluggish for a half, and the same went for Spain and England. Across the board, the body language of the top managers was identical: pure frustration over sloppy technical errors, zero chemistry, and endless turnovers.
Plus, with the current format allowing eight of the twelve third-place teams to advance to the knockout stage, a single opening-match slip-up isn’t a disaster. That cushion is probably why a lot of the giants didn’t start the tournament with the gas pedal floored.
Among the three host countries, Mauricio Pochettino’s squad was the only one that actually lived up to expectations. The United States played with insane energy and clear tactical smarts. Weston McKennie was the ultimate wild card, completely tilting the field. It was obvious for all 90 minutes that Paraguay had absolutely no answer for his signature “organized chaos” style. Christian Pulisic also looked like a much sharper, upgraded version of the player we saw in Milan over the last few months.
On the flip side, Jonathan David carried over his cold streak from the end of the Italian club season. Canada played scared, showing all the fear that the USA managed to block out. Watching them struggle against Bosnia only makes the pain worse for Italian fans, knowing the Azzurri missed out on this tournament.
Somewhere in the middle is Mexico. Sure, they grabbed a win against South Africa, who might genuinely be the worst team in this 48-squad tournament, but the performance on the field was mediocre. It definitely wasn’t worthy of the Estadio Azteca, which looked absolutely magnificent.
The new breakout stars
Speaking of magnificent, we have to shout out two players from completely different generations. First is Morocco’s 19-year-old phenom, Ayyoub Bouaddi. Juventus fans already knew about his talent from the Champions League two seasons ago against Lille, the night Jonathan David and Edon Zhegrova gave Thiago Motta’s defense nightmares.
The Moroccan prodigy completely ran the midfield for a solid 50 minutes. His positioning, pace, and high soccer IQ while going up against Casemiro and Bruno Guimarães was unreal. Funnily enough, he put on this masterclass right in front of the guy rumored to be his next club coach, Davide Ancelotti. Keeping him at Lille is going to be an impossible task for Carlo’s son.
The other name you need to know is Vozinha. Cape Verde’s 40-year-old goalkeeper couldn’t hold back tears of emotion after the final whistle. His seven massive saves completely shut down Spain. The rest of the magic came from CazeTV, the Brazilian broadcaster. Following a viral trend started by Tim Payne, they launched a massive social media call-to-action for the keeper.
The result? Cape Verde’s number one went from 50,000 Instagram followers before kickoff to nearly 2 million by the 90th minute. As I write this, his follower count has exploded to nearly 14 million.
Sent to the principal’s office
On the flop side, Spain takes the prize for the biggest collective disappointment relative to expectations. Their performance was bland and monotonous, a bitter reminder of that outdated, slow tiki-taka style from years ago.
Bringing on Lamine Yamal changed the energy, which was expected, but a team trying to win a World Cup has to show way more than that, with or without their teenage star. The reality is that since 2010, Spain has only won 3 out of 12 World Cup matches (beating only Australia, Iran, and Costa Rica). That stat alone earns them their failing grade.
Speaking of stars, Cristiano Ronaldo was easily the biggest letdown. CR7 took the pitch right after Erling Haaland and Kylian Mbappé scored braces, and Lionel Messi dropped a hat-trick. Everyone expected a statement response.
Instead, the Portuguese legend put up a total disaster class, drawing heavy criticism from former players worldwide. Thierry Henry publicly called out Ronaldo’s selfishness in front of the net. Against Congo, CR7 finished with zero shots on goal, zero successful dribbles, and zero key passes. The key completely broke off in the lock.
