Germany 1 Paraguay 1(aet, 3-4 pens)
Shock of the tournament so far? It would be hard to argue against it as Paraguay win a knockout game in the World Cup for the first time in their history, the first half was one in which Germany dominated possession wise but created very little to trouble Orlando Gill in the Paraguay net. Paraguay had very few opportunities going forward but did spring forward on the counter as the first half was drawing to an end with Almrion playing the ball out to Galarza on the right who crossed the ball to an onrushing Julio Enciso who scored a bullet header to give Paraguay a very unlikely lead in the 42nd minute, something had to change for Germany in the second half with Nagelsmann bringing on Goretzka for Nmecha at half-time to try and freshen up the midfield. Germany did then equalise early in the second half as Floarian Wirtz put a cross in that was deftly flicked on by Kai Havertz to get Germany back on level terms in the 54th minute, from there you would think that it was only a matter of time before Germany went on to score 2 or 3 but that wasn’t the case as Paraguay defended with their lives which brought us to extra-time. Germany continued to dominate and did eventually take the lead in extra-time as Nathaniel Brown’s corner was swung to the back-post and met by Jonothan Tah who put Germany in front, or so they thought as the goal was ruled out for blocking on the goalkeeper by Anton. This then brought us to penalties which after some ridiculous dramatics was eventually won by Paraguay after Jose Canale’s penalty, what a day for Paraguayan football.
Who saw that result coming for Paraguay? I think just about everyone including me saw Germany beating Paraguay in this game but I simply cannot help but be so impressed by how Paraguay defended today, you could make the argument that this is their greatest ever result in the World Cup but they did make the quarter-finals in 2010 so I’ll leave that to the Paraguayans who will know better than me. The defence today was spearheaded by the two centre-backs Jose Canale and Gustavo Gomez who blocked quite literally everything that came their way today with Canale then scoring the winning penalty at the end of it all, going forward obviously there was very little but they made it count in the first half as Galarza put a brilliant cross in which was met perfectly by Julio Enciso. Their heads could have dropped after Havertz scored the equaliser but they stayed resolute and Orlando Gill made sure they weren’t going to concede again in the net, the penalty shootout almost ended in complete disaster after they missed twice in a row to win the game but it was third times a charm for Paraguay who setup a date with France or Sweden in the next round.
A complete disaster for Germany. I think Germany were lulled into a false sense of security in the group stage after smashing Curacao and scraping a win against Ivory Coast in a game they really should have lost, Ecuador got the better of them in the last group game but they had already topped the group so I guess people brushed that performance aside as Germany didn’t really care about that last game. Where do you even start with this German performance? First of all I was pleasantly surprised to see Deniz Undav start after scoring three goals from off the bench in the group stage but he was so poor today and got hooked off in the 63rd minute unsurprisingly, Leroy Sane and Floarian Wirtz have had terrible tournaments and provided very little throughout the game in terms of creativity for Germany. Then you have the midfield with Pavlovich and Nmecha again contributing to such a sloppy performance giving the ball away over and over again which was so unlike Germany in the group stage, I said after the game against the Ivory Coast that the Schlotterbeck injury would be devastating and we saw that again today as Rudiger just isn’t at the level anymore despite having very little defending to do. Overall it’s just can absolutely disastrous way to exit the World Cup for Germany, will Nagelsmann stay on as manager? We’ll have to wait and see.
Where does German football go from here? I think it’s safe to say that post the 2014 World Cup win Germany have been a disaster at major international tournaments, the World Cup in particular has just been underperformance after underperformance getting grouped in 2018 and 2022 and now going out in the Round of 32 to Paraguay. When you think of Germany at the World Cup there is a generation coming up that has never seen the Germans reach the Round of 16 which is absolutely crazy to think about as in the past Germany where always there or there abouts when it comes to winning the tournament, there was optimism going into this World Cup after a strong showing in Euro 2024 but it just hasn’t come together for one reason or another which leaves Germany disappointed yet again at the World Cup. I wonder how strong the reception from the German public will be after this result? I can’t imagine it’ll be too pretty.
Who will Paraguay be facing in the next round? Up next for Paraguay it will be either France or Sweden in the Round of 16 as they look to make the quarter-finals like they did back in 2010, I think I’m safe to say that I think they will be taking on France in the next round who in my opinion are probably the current favourites for the tournament. I don’t know if this is an unpopular opinion but I actually think France will have greater trouble against Paraguay than they would have had against Germany, obviously Germany are a stronger team but Paraguay are going to sit deep similar to today and make the game absolutely horrible for France whereas I think the Germans would have actually come out and tried to match Frances which most likely would have ended in disaster with the form the likes of Mbappe, Olise and Dembele are in at the minute. Can Paraguay stage another upset in the next round? Surely not?