Qatar has been billed as the last dance for Belgium’s golden generation but they were almost swept off their feet by a relentless, remorseless team of Canadian World Cup tyros 🟢 MsiDouglas
Canada have never scored a goal in the World Cup finals and oh how this team deserved to end that run. Davies was the talisman, setting the tone for their high press with intelligent arcing runs that Belgium didn’t seem able to compute. It felt cruel that he shouldered responsibility for missing the penalty that would have etched him into his nation’s sporting history but it was a poor effort, allowing Thibaut Courtois to palm the ball away.
If he felt the weight of destiny on his shoulders afterwards he didn’t show it. Davies is a blue riband player, summoned from theto represent his country. But what of Kamal Miller, who was playing for Reading United in the fourth tier of the American soccer system when the last World Cup was being staged in 2018?
He was the lionheart at the centre of Canada’s defence, shutting out nearly everything Belgium and the surprisingly anonymous Kevin De Bruyne tried to conjure. The one moment of indecision – hesitation at a raking long ball from Toby Alderweireld – was punished brutally by a lethal Michy Batshuayi finish.
Still, the performances feel like a feather in the cap for John Herdman, whose courageous philosophy was for his team to press, press and press again.who freely admits he has a chip on his shoulder – justifiably so when he was told by an ex-England international during his days working at Sunderland’s academy that he would never make it as a manager because he hadn’t played at the top level.
He pulled his team into a tight circle at the end and delivered a stirring consolation address to his devastated players. Herdman has built a formidable unit to represent his adopted nation and you suspect this tournament will not be the last we see of him at football’s top table.
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