50 min Passing stats notwithstanding, Norway can’t seem to hold the ball against the Iraqi press. That could Bodø/Glimt, I mean, bode ill.
48 min Ryerson plays the ball out over the line. He continues playing it, as no official has made a signal. In fairness, I believe the AR was screened. Hate when that happens. But common sense and the laws of physics, along with the Laws of the Game, prevail, and it’s a goal kick.
47 min Iraq have ramped up the pressure. They had the momentum in the last 10-15 minutes of the first half (including stoppage time), and they’ll want to be sure the halftime break doesn’t interrupt it.
As stadium rock anthems go, the Wolfmother song Joker and the Thief is top-shelf.
We have resumed.
Last word from the mailbag, for now, goes to Martin Bolme:
What it feels like now:
It’s been so long now that every single Norwegian you meet will say the same thing.
It’s been 26 years
We name every player and their club in one of the top five leagues.
We talk with passion about Bodø/Glimt and the power of a collective.
We talk down the idiotic viking font on names and numbers.
We make you watch Ghostbusters 2 and Wilhelm von Hamburg.
I’d say the quest to make people watch Ghostbusters 2 was less effective than Norway’s attack.
Halftime mailbag II:
Kári Tulinius: “My preconception was that these two teams had competent, if not water-tight, defenses. I’m ostensibly a neutral, though I like both teams, and I’m stress-sweating every time either side tries to do the most basic of defensive tasks. Makes for an exciting match, though.”
That’s part of the dilemma in a lot of competitions now, isn’t it? World championship-level chess tends to be dull because everyone defends so well. MMA is less entertaining than it was back in the days in which a jiu-jitsu specialist could easily get a submission from someone who hadn’t learned to counter the arsenal of Gracie-tested maneuvers.
Similar thought from Casiano Martinez: “Two very flawed teams making for a fun game. How did no one pick up the crosser for Iraq’s goal, and then once he crossed, two of the three Norwegians didn’t even jump?”
Allan Castle: “I was going to switch off, but you know what they say, it’s a half of two quarters.”
Hey, that’s 50 cents. That’ll buy you … well, nothing.
Andrew Hawkins: “Hi Beau, just landed at LAX en route to Seattle for the Socceroos’ big match against the US on Friday. Left home in Sydney just after the full-time whistle yesterday in the Iran v New Zealand match - a long trip. The live blogs are brilliant to be able to see what I’ve missed while in the air, the team is doing a great job. In my (mercifully) short time at LAX arrivals, counted 13 different countries and their World Cup jerseys - among them a very vocal Uzbek group flying on to Mexico City for their match against Colombia. While there are plenty of well-documented problems with this World Cup, there are few events like it to connect people from all corners of the globe. Long may it continue!”
The international interactions are indeed winning over cynics like me. Granted, I’m not usually cynical.
Pete Leihy: “Which is more imperiously intimidating of FIFA - calling the Azteca ‘Mexico City Stadium’ or calling Erling Haaland ‘Erling Braut Haaland’?”
We’re watching a game in Foxborough in a stadium called “Boston Stadium.” That’s like placing “London Stadium” in Reading. Or Swindon. Or Dublin.
Halftime mailbag:
Tony Hughes: “It’s still odd - for me at least - to see Alexander Sørloth partnering Erling Haaland. He’s had such a peripatetic career, I don’t think of him in the same league as Haaland, let alone bracket.”
But is anyone in the same league as Haaland these days?
Roger Kirkby: “Foxborough must be a long way from Boston, the train fare is $100.”
How much to get from Cornwall to Glasgow? For the record, I can get from Washington to New York for less than that, though not on the Acela.
Christian Svanes Kolding: “Though he’s not THAT old, Solbakken is old-school. When he coached at Copenhagen, which is where I’m from (though I’m writing from Los Angeles), he knew how to stifle the game, making it as joyless for supporters as it was for his opponents. He’s a dour blunt tool kind of manager so how he orchestrates a side with so much attacking talent is a mystery to me.”
Maybe he focuses on tightening the defense (which, we’ve seen here, is a work in progress) and just lets the attacking talent attack?
Halftime: Iraq 1-2 Norway
As expected, Norway have the lead, but it’s only because a couple of Iraqi shots missed by inches and a goalkeeper with more than 100 caps switched off momentarily with the world’s best striker bearing down on him.
If you thought this one would be dull, you should doubt your judgment about all things. Maybe pull a George Costanza and start doing the opposite of your instincts.
45 min +5 ANOTHER CHANCE! It’s a through ball that cleanly beats the Norwegian back line, and Al-Hamadi goes 1v1 vs. the keeper. He waits a tick too long, though, and his shot is deflected for a corner.
The corner bounds out, and Hashim hits a scorcher from 25 yards that rips into the back supports of the goal. The shot was so convincing that the score bug on the broadcast momentarily switched from 1 to 2 for Iraq.
45 min +3 CHANCE FOR IRAQ! Hussein flicks on for Al-Hamadi, it’s played back, there’s a shot that HITS THE FAR POST and caroms out for another shot. There’s a shout for a handball at close range, but replays shows it hit a knee, not an arm.
Corner kick to Iraq, and it’s not a bad effort.
We’ll have five minutes of stoppage time.
GOAL! Iraq 1-2 Norway (Haaland 43)
It’s a lazy backpass to the keeper, Hassan hesitates and then watches in horror as the onrushing Haaland taps the ball past him into the net.
Worst defensive calamity in the matches I’ve seen, which is about two-thirds of them.
Updated
43 min Things were all smiles earlier, but as Ryerson tries to shield the ball out of play, Doski bundles into him … hold that thought …
That was a thing of beauty. Jasim squares up one-on-one against Ryerson, then spots Al-Ammari dashing toward the end line. He lofts it in the air, and Hussein rises to head it past Nyland.
One scoring champion answers another.
GOAL! Iraq 1-1 Norway (Hussein 39)
Game on!!!
Updated
The referee forum I frequent was amused by the referee’s insistence on placing the ball a few millimeters away from where it was on a free kick earlier in the game.
They also would like to pass along that their view of the no-call in the France-Senegal match turned out not to be unanimous.
(I’m still saying no-call, which I say with a modicum of fear.)
37 min Norway win possession with their press, but Ødegaard drags a shot wide.
36 min Phew! We have a few moments of short passes oh never mind Norway just went long again. But it’s out of play.
34 min Foul is given on the corner kick – looks like someone has a grasp on the goalkeeper’s jersey. For the moment, that’s still not allowed on corner kicks. Everything else seems to be just fine these days.
33 min While awaiting a corner kick, Haaland puts an arm around an Iraqi player – pity I can’t see who it is – and they have a good conversation while laughing about something. Maybe the rowing thing amused them.
Updated
31 min A bright response from Iraq, with a couple of angles opening neatly in the retreating Norwegian defense, but the chance is squandered.
And then immediately, the ball goes back up to Haaland, who dinks it aside to a teammate whose shot is blocked.
GOAL! Iraq 0-1 Norway (Haaland 29)
Who else? It’s a quick sequence of passes up the field, Møller Wolfe crosses, and the Manchester City man slides to escort the ball into the net.
Updated
28 min Norway have allegedly completed 130 of 148 passes.
Hydration break mailbag:
Justin Kavanagh: “I’m now old enough and far enough away in exile to make the following confession on this MBM, Beau: I had a ticket for that famously sweltering goalless draw against Jack Charlton’s team at Giants Stadium in 1994 that you mentioned. And, shamefully, for an Irishman, I sold it. I reckoned it’d be a dreadful vollleyball-like imitation of a football match. And it was. So I went to see Brazil instead. I have never regretted that youthful decision.”
Bon Jovi’s Living on a Prayer is blasting through the stadium during the break.
Everybody hydrate!
Updated
23 min Free kick to Norway from an angle about 25 yards from the end line. Ryerson fusses with the referee about the placement of the ball. His delivery finds Sørloth, but his tame header is easily saved.
22 min We have our first keeper-to-keeper play in this battle of teams that aren’t afraid to go direct. Nyland overhits his teammates to send it straight to Hassan.
21 min Haaland gets a head to the corner kick, but it bounds harmlessly up and over.
The possession stats are weighed heavily in Norway’s favor, but it doesn’t seem that way.
20 min As our team guide predicted, Norwegian supporters are rowing in the stands. Appropriate for the Boston region, which has a lot of colleges known to lift an oar or two.
Yes, I’m aware that Spinal Tap manager Ian Faith referred to Boston as “not a big college town.”
Updated
19 min To the consternation of many in the crowd, Iraq continue to play the ball while Aursnes is down. Possible foul there but not seen as such by the man in green. (Norway’s in red. Iraq is sort of an off-white.)
18 min Harsh tackle from Tahseen on Berge – far too late, smashing into the Norwegian’s leg. And yet it’s Tahseen who comes away from the incident in some pain. Free kick to Norway at midfield, but again, it’s remarkably ineffective.
15 min Now it’s Norway’s turn to slow things down at the back, but Iraq won’t let them do that for long. They press ahead and win it back.
Which team’s starting lineup is composed almost entirely of players in elite European clubs?
13 min CHANCE FOR IRAQ! Al-Hamadi turns on Heggem, but the Norwegian defender applies enough pressure to make him rush the shot and send it high.
Still – the balance of play so far would slightly favor the team that was last here 40 years ago over the team that was last here 28 years ago.
11 min Ryerson takes the ball far down the right flank. The referee is unsympathetic as he writhes on the ground, but Norway have a throw-in deep. Not much comes of it, though.
9 min The ball is tangled in Al-Hamadi’s feet and goes out for a goal kick.
Norwegian defenders are keeping strong hands on the Iraqi attackers, which may be a bad idea against a team that has already shown a propensity for hitting the ground and drawing a call.
8 min Now Norway call off the press and let Iraq knock the ball about a bit. Iraq draw another foul at midfield, and that may have been dramatized.
6 min Sørloth, the Atlético Madrid man with the stylish line through the number 7 on his back, has a few words with the AR after being whistled for pushing an Iraqi defender. On the bench, his coach goes apoplectic. Hate to see what’ll happen on a call of any consequence.
Updated
5 min A long free kick for Iraq leads to a bit of head tennis in the penalty area. Norway may be a bit lucky there.
4 min It’s a deceptive and effective Norwegian press here. They give goalkeeper Hassan time to stand with the ball at his feet, and it’s only a half-hearted few steps forward to press him into passing the ball. But once he dumps it to the defender on his left, Norwegian forwards spring to life, and Iraq turn it ove.
3 min Haaland has his first touch on the ball and doesn’t score. Slacker.
2 min And another long ball – Iraq are making no secret of their intent here.
1 min Iraq go direct to start, with Amir Al-Ammari hammering a ball from midfield, but his target is surrounded by Norwegian defenders, and Nyland easily collects.
Peep!
Atcho blows his whistle, and there’s a sea of red in the stands.
Updated
The on-field officials are from Gabon.
Referee: Pierre Ghislain Atcho (Gabon)
Assistant Referee 1: Boris Ditsoga (Gabon)
Assistant Referee 2: Amos Abeigne Ndong (Gabon)
Fourth Official: Amin Mohamed (Egypt)
Fifth Official: Mahmoud Abouelregal (Egypt)
VAR: Guillermo Pacheco (Mexico)
AVAR: Hamza El Fariq (Morocco)
SVAR: Jarred Gillett (Australia)
You have just a few minutes before kickoff to read this piece about coach Graham Arnold and Iraq’s journey to this stage. Well worth it.
Daniel Stauss is first in the inbox for this session: “Join me in dying on that hill - the World Cup does in fact include the qualifiers, we’re currently watching the finals of the World Cup, thank you for giving voice to my silent screams.”
Speaking of screams, if you’re watching in the USA, be prepared for multiple references to the fact that Tom Brady played football in this stadium. It’s in Boston. Well, not really. Foxborough, site of this stadium, is somewhere in the vicinity of Boston in the same sense that Cornwall is somewhere in the vicinity of Glasgow.
Updated
Norway guide and starting lineup
Our guide to Norway starts as follows:
Ståle Solbakken’s journey to becoming Norway manager arguably started at the 1998 World Cup when he sat as an unused substitute shouting suggestions to the coach, Egil Olsen, when Norway turned a 1-0 deficit into a 2-1 victory against Brazil. Like his mentor Olsen, Solbakken has never been a naive or particularly romantic manager. He is a product of the northern European football school, where the result always holds the most weight. His style largely consists of tight zonal defending and aggressive attacking play focused on breaking through the lines – football that is as effective as possible.
My love of romantic soccer has dimmed through the years. If you can effectively bang the ball 50 yards up the field, go for it. Maybe it’s just because US youth development philosophy for a while shunned any kick of the ball longer than five yards.
Worth noting on Solbakken: His playing career ended when he collapsed on the field during a training session with Copenhagen in 2001 and was clinically dead for seven minutes.
On the field, Haaland is far from the only player who’ll be familiar to Premier League viewers. There’s captain Martin Ødegaard (Arsenal), fellow midfielder Sander Berge (Fulham) and defenders David Møller Wolfe (Wolves) and Kristoffer Vassbakk Ajer (Brentford). Goalkeeper Ørjan Nyland plays with Sevilla. The other clubs represented: Bologna, Borussia Dortmund, Benfica, RB Leipzig and Atlético Madrid.
Starters are:
Nyland; Møller Wolfe, Heggem, Vassbakk Ajer, Ryerson; Aursnes, Berge, Ødegaard; Nusa, Haaland, Sørloth.
Iraq guide and starting lineup
In the year of the Geopolitical Cup, which includes one country’s team playing within the borders of a country with which it’s at war, Iraq’s road has been difficult. The U.S. military action of the 2000s is a not-too-distant memory, and the combat next door in Iran affected their final steps in a long journey back to the Big Dance, as explained in our team guide (“Arnold” is Graham Arnold, the team’s Australian head coach):
Iraq were a game away from qualifying for their first World Cup in 40 years, with a final against Bolivia in Monterrey, their 21st qualifier, but things didn’t go smoothly. War broke out in the Middle East, with airspace closed and flights grounded. Unable to gather his squad, Arnold, stuck in a hotel in the UAE, demanded Fifa postpone the playoff, but the clouds cleared and after a 12-hour drive from Baghdad to Amman and a 17-hour flight to Mexico, Iraq reached their destination, 10 days before the game.
The teams were tied at the half, but Aymen Hussein (most definitely not related to Saddam or Uday) became his country’s answer to Paul Caligiuri, scoring the goal that ended his country’s 40-year wait in the wilderness.
Hussein (Al-Karma, Iraq), by far the leading scorer on the team, starts up front alongside Ipswich Town’s Ali Al-Hamadi. Three other players, including goalkeeper and captain Jalal Hassan, play domestically. The other starters play in the Czech Republic, Uzbekistan, Poland (2), Saudi Arabia and the UAE. On the bench is Ahmed Qasam, who plays in the USA with Nashville SC.
Starters are:
Hassan; Doski, Tahseen, Hashim, Ali; Jasim, Ismail, Al-Ammari, Bayesh; Al-Hamadi, Hussein.
Preamble
My, that was an action-packed conclusion to France v Senegal, wasn’t it? We can only hope for half the excitement in the other half of Group I between two teams that have not played in the World Cup* this century.
Norway last played in the World Cup* in 1998 and upset Brazil to reach the knockout rounds. They also appeared the last time the Cup was held in the USA in 1994, missing out on the knockout rounds in peculiar fashion – four teams tied with four points and an even goal difference. Norway only scored once; therefore, they were the odd team out. Italy opened that group with a loss to Ireland and scraped into the knockout rounds as one of the third-place teams. Heard they made a bit of a run after that.
Iraq last played in the World Cup* in 1986, before any of the current players were born. (I was a rising senior in high school, but it’s safe to say their appearance isn’t something I recall, as I was mostly fretting about calculus and my lack of dating options.) They’re seeking their first World Cup point, having dropped all three matches in 1986, though only by one goal each. They’ve fared relatively well in Asian Cup play since the unlamented demise of the Hussein family, including the 2007 championship.
(* – technically, at least in ancient parlance, the “World Cup” includes the qualifiers, and the final 32, er, 48 teams are participating in the “World Cup finals.” So it’s not quite correct to say they haven’t played in the World Cup recently. I pledge to be less pedantic the rest of this session.)
Hello all, and I hope you’re all enjoying the debate over the no-call in the France-Senegal match (unanimous view in the referees’ message board I frequent: correct no-call) and also the goal that followed.
Follow along with Daniel Harris, and I’ll be back with a proper preamble when that one has ended.
Beau will be here shortly. In the meantime, here’s Nick Ames on Norway’s return to the World Cup:
If Norway’s highly fancied generation need a warning from history they need only look back 32 years and study the lessons from another searing, suspenseful American summer. They had raced through qualifying at England’s expense to reach their first World Cup since 1938; their top players were starting to make it in the Premier League and through the euphoria shone a confidence that a place in the knockout stage, at least, was there to be seized.
“When we got there we didn’t manage to even get close to the quality of play we had produced in qualification,” remembers Lars Bohinen, one of the silkier elements in a side that, under Egil Olsen, became renowned for an uncompromising and no-frills approach. “That’s the biggest disappointment when I talk now to my old teammates. We never got near to performing at the level we needed.”
In fact Norway were a shade unfortunate. Planted in a strength-sapping group alongside Mexico, Republic of Ireland and Italy, they finished fourth despite the teams finishing level on points and goal difference. Their failure came in attack; Olsen’s side were eliminated because they only scored once, beating Mexico before ultimately running aground in a famously sweltering goalless draw against Jack Charlton’s team at Giants Stadium.
This year’s Group I does not look much easier. But the dynamic of Norwegian football is different now; the not entirely inaccurate picture of burly Vikings replaced by elite, technically supreme talents in the moulds of Martin Ødegaard and Antonio Nusa. There is an Erling Haaland-shaped spearhead to convert chances that flow more frequently in Ståle Solbakken’s fast, flexible set-up.
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