France were put through a wringer by Paraguay in their Round of 16, but emerged winning and laughing.
Despite the cynical, crude defending, with many episodes of Paraguay skulduggery, this became the first World Cup game in which no Paraguay player received a yellow card since 1998. The only yellow pointed its way was to an assistant coach after the final whistle. The official record read 11 fouls by Paraguay, compared to 13 for France – but this needed the referee to blow the whistle to register a foul.
Bruised but undeterred in their campaign. But they took some mighty hits and Paraguay’s list of dirty dozen tricks reads something like this:
* Doue was felled in the box, leading to the winning penalty.
* River Plate medio Matias Galarza, who plays in Argentina, kept recycling his cynical dirty tricks on right wing, striking Mbappe on the arm to take him off the ball.
* A case could be made for two clear red cards against Galarza through the match. His second : Smacked his palm in Jules Kounde’s face. Kounde took an arm twice in the match.
* Galarza then collapsed to the floor holding his face in agony, despite there being no contact – after Michael Olise had pulled his jersey. The clueless Uzbekistani referee Ilgiz Tantashev pulled out a yellow card for Olise.
* Gustavo Velazquez, the Paraguayan defender, kicked the penalty spot to scuff it up, while Ousmane Dembele stood with the ball in his hands as decoy. Dembele laughed it off. Mbappe scored.
* Paraguayan substitutes kept rushing towards refs appealing for free kicks and cards for even simple French challenges.
* Words were spoken and Deschamps later said he “could’ve done without insults from the Paraguay bench.” What was said wasn’t elaborated, but Paraguay coach defended his hyena pack saying “They wouldn’t stoop so low.”
* When Mbappe ignored Paraguay goalkeeper Orlando Gill’s handshake, Gill threw the ball against Mbappe’s back in response.
* Dayot Upamecano had an elbow shoved in the ribs.
* Andres Cubas ran through Adrien Rabiot as if he didn’t exist with a nasty tacle.
* Stoppages were deliberately prolonged and chances to waste time aplenty. A Paraguay defender kicked the ball into the second tier of the stadium, hoping to eat seconds.
* A Paraguayan player took 18 seconds to take a throw-in.
The reactions from the French team and pundits in TV studios reflected how ugly the game had been.
France24 English posted a bunch of interviews from the mixed zone, while TV shows around the world gulped down the terrible quality football game.
A sample of reactions:
* Bradley Barcola to France24 English:
“I’d never played a match like that before with so many blows. You could even say some were ugly nasty hits, with pushes in the back. It was tough because after my yellow card, I had to be careful when defending, especially with all the hits I was taking. I couldn’t respond or fall into that kind of game. So it was really difficult.”
* William Saliba to France24:
“They were going to come at us hard, commit fouls, and try to provoke us. We had to stay in the game, because if we started wasting energy, getting into arguments, and losing our focus, things wouldn’t go well. So, we stayed focused. It’s not easy, but sometimes it feels good to win a tough match like this, because since the start of the tournament, we’ve been used to scoring three goals. Today, it was a 1-0 win, but it’s just as valuable.”
“I think the referee could have shown a few yellow cards. That might have calmed things down a bit. We knew they were going to try to take us out of our game, because the coach had prepared us for that two or three days earlier”
* Rayan Cherki to France24:
“We knew it was going to be a fiercely contested match. But it was important to us to play a game like this during the World Cup – to remind everyone that the French team can play beautiful football, but can also go to war.”
“The refereeing I’ve got nothing to say. You saw it for yourself. How many fouls were there? 30? 40? And no yellow cards. But it doesn’t matter. We’re in the quarterfinals.
* Kylian Mbappe:
“We showed that we are not only a team who plays flashy attacking football. If we have to put our hands in the s**, we will put our hands in the s**. They thought we’d show up in tuxedos, make some fancy moves, but football’s not just that. We did it today. We were better than them.”