5-1 Dutch Destruction! 🇳🇱🔥 + Undav's 96th-Min Germany Rescue & 15-Save Miracle | World Cup Daily #20

[00:00:00] The Netherlands just put 5 past Sweden in Houston. Germany needed a late bench rescue in Toronto to survive the elephants. And Japan is just about moving over Tunisia. If you thought the drama peaked, there's a lot more to come. Let's get into it.

[00:00:24] Welcome back to FUTIN REVIEW, World Cup Daily. Episode 20 is live today. I can't believe we've done 20 episodes so far, John. Looking forward to it. I mean, I should introduce my co-host today, John, before I even

[00:00:34] reference to him. How you doing, John? Thank you. Good morning. Well, I can't believe that we've done 20 episodes because I'm jet lagged without even traveling. Yeah, it has been fun though. The thing is, this particular World Cup, I think I've watched every single game. I've noted every single detail. It's just going to be etched in my memory thanks to this podcast. So that's the positive, I guess. That's the positive. Definitely. I'm just saying it's 6am UK time when we are recording this, right? That's a good dedication. Yeah. Listener, just letting you know,

[00:01:04] due to scheduling stuff, we're trying to record this while the Japan vs. Tunisia game is going on. But we know there's already been a lot of activity in that game. As we stand, the score is 2-0. But we'll see by the end of the show, the game should be done. Right, John, let's get into it. There's a lot of stuff that happened yesterday. So first things first, let's talk about the Mighty Orange. Well, as you can see, ladies and gentlemen, if you're watching this podcast on Spotify or a video source, you can see that I'm wearing an orange shirt. That's mainly because John and I had a friendly bet

[00:01:34] about who's going to win. I said Sweden was going to trash our Netherlands. Well, I was being a bit facetious. But, but, but, John convinced me and said that there was no way that Sweden was going to beat Netherlands. And he was right, wasn't he? And hence I have the orange on. John, over to you. How was the game? How did you feel?

[00:01:52] Well, first of all, thank you so much for holding your side of the bet. Actually, I was really happy with the match, not only because of the result, but I did a show yesterday with Chris where I did a tactical analysis and I said they should start with probably, well, I'm not going to go back, listen to yesterday's episode. And then the match, like an hour before the match, the lineups came out.

[00:02:17] And Kumon said the exact same thing I said on the podcast, which we just did a social media snippet about. So I was like, I don't want to be that guy. But I said that like 10 hours ago, exactly what he said here. And then everyone was like, where were you watching? Make sure that they need to win now, John, because else you make a double fool out of yourself. And we did 5-1, two times Broby, two times Chabko, which I said, if you give him a little bit of space, let, just check it out. He'll be flying.

[00:02:46] Somerville came in, scored the fifth goal. I think there's lessons to be learned from the match, but let's not be overly critical of getting a 5-1 win against the guys that won the first one 5-1. Against, I said it before, Tunisia, which didn't look very good, probably an overrated result. And I think this showed that.

[00:03:04] Yeah. Looking at the game, I think one of the things that really stood out to me was how poor Sweden were in the defensive end of the game. And one of the goals, if you remember, one of the goals literally came of Isak losing the ball in his, oh, in the opposition's half. And giving the ball away because of, I don't know if it was a, he just lost interest or he just lost it for a second. That's not normal. But Sweden was very poor today as well, for whatever reason.

[00:03:31] Well, I think it does help if he scores really early. Like I said yesterday, like they will be leaning back. There will be five at the back. And until the 22 minute when they're already two, when the hydration break started, they went to 4-3-3. They went four at the back. And then it's what I said. Then you'll get some space. They got some space as well. They didn't score from it. Luckily, this allowed the goal as well. But then after the break, the Netherlands adapted to their fourth at the back and just slammed it, right? Yeah.

[00:03:57] I don't necessarily think the defense was so poor. I think the Netherlands finally just knew where to apply pressure this time around. Yeah, I think so. And probably, like you see the strength, Chris said it on the earlier show, you see a strength of a good number nine moving into the box. I think that's a massive difference between what the Netherlands did versus Japan and now. We had speed going behind lines. And now we had strength going into the box with moving players.

[00:04:25] And the first two goals were goals to just make sure you make it as busy as possible. And you give as much power as possible to get the ball in. And then hopefully you get a big striker like Broby who just walks into the ball and scores. And that happened twice in 20 minutes. So I think you can't have a much better start than that. That helps.

[00:04:45] Yeah, no, I completely agree. I think there was a combination. Personally, I think there was a combination of everything just clicking perfectly for the Netherlands having an output like having Broby up front, which is a common theme. I think we'll get to another team that we will discuss shortly. Having a striker up front has literally changed the way they played. And I think Spain will go through the same sort of situation. But unfortunately, the difference between Spain, Netherlands and the other team, Germany, that we're going to talk about is that Spain, I don't think, have a natural number nine in their ranks, whereas Netherlands and Germany were lucky too.

[00:05:15] So I think overall, a good result for Netherlands. And do you see them going far? Or do you think this was an anomaly? No, I think I said yesterday as well. I sound like a broken record. I know. But I think when they get space to move in, I think this team is pretty good. There's things to work on. But a semifinal should definitely be possible now.

[00:05:38] Oh, that's it. I think that's a very positive way to look at it. I think that's a success in itself, reaching the semifinal with the squad that you have with what's the writing right now. I think semifinals are really good results. The thing is, anyone that meets France is done. So that's what I'm currently facing. So you need a bit of luck. Yeah. But if you play in other respects, let's say you play Scotland or let's say you can play Brazil. I'm pretty confident you can get another round in.

[00:06:05] I like how you just combine Scotland or Brazil as the same equals. And that's a... I just don't want to face Morocco, mate. Yeah, fair enough. Fair enough. Well, moving over to Toronto for a massive groupie clash. We saw Germany coming in from a 7-1 win over Curaçao. But Cote d'Avon gave them everything they could handle. Frank Cressy opened the scoring at halftime, a half-hour mark for the Elephants. And overall, I think it looked like this game was going to end one way. And then things changed. Hey, John.

[00:06:36] I think the Germans let them be surprised by the Elephants or Ivory Coast is probably better. But I think they played really strong. I saw a lot of comments saying Germany should have won this easily already. But I think, of course, the goal from Cassier came out of the blue. But they didn't give that much away in the first half at all. Second half, Germany was better, of course. But lots of chances for Ivory Coast as well.

[00:07:06] I don't know. I saw people sending me messages like Germany should have already had this. But there were like two big chances in the second half as well from Ivory Coast. They could have easily be 3-4-1 ahead if they just pushed through. But it lags with the finishing there, I think. I mean, Cassier is probably the most dangerous player yesterday. That says it all. There was one player which really stood out for me. I need to find his name because else I'll mess that up. From Ivory Coast? It was Diomande. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, Diomande.

[00:07:35] He really stood out for me. But Diallo made so many chances, you know. And I think, yeah. Unfortunately, Ivory Coast deserved better. Of course, Ivory Coast will go through. They had one match won already. To be good. But, yeah. Yeah. I love this match. I think a 1-0 probably would be the best result. Would be deserved. I think Undav clearly showed the reason why he was there.

[00:08:02] Because the way he actually took the chance that came through. He just got a pass. He controlled it. Set himself up. And banged it all within a flash of a second. And scored the winner for Germany. That was just perfect. It was a fantastic goal, in my opinion. With all I was writing on it. Yeah, definitely. And, well, it says that depth of the squad does really matter. And, yeah. I mean, Germany is true. In an interesting group phase, I think. Especially what happened in the other match.

[00:08:31] But, yeah. I think Ivory Coast probably will go through as well. And it's probably a tough opponent to beat, though. These guys are strong and... Physical. Physical. And maybe... The only thing is they're maybe not the most technical team. But they were very compact as well yesterday. Tactically, they were good. They know how to hit Germany on the counters, I think. And, yeah. And they missed Slotterbeck as well now, right? Germany. Yeah. That definitely hurt them. No disrespect for Rudiger.

[00:09:00] But I think Slotterbeck has definitely surpassed him there. Yeah. So, interesting watch. It was a really cool match. After these all these long nights and long days, I thought I might have trouble staying awake for this one. But it didn't happen. Finished it. Then I did fall asleep, though, until the next match started. But, yeah. It was, yeah. It was a fun game. It ended really well as well. So, yeah. I think Germany just your class and just had the extra bit of quality. But Ivory Coast, definitely on their day, they can be a hard team to beat.

[00:09:30] Yes. One little detail. You know, I'm sometimes for details. And I know I mentioned pink shoes at the start of the match. Yes, you did. At the start of the tournament. Yeah. Which became a lot bigger thing later on. I want to highlight the Ivory Coast's goalkeeper outfit. That's the best outfit of the whole tournament. Which color is it? Yellow? It is bright. Super bright yellow. Yellow? Like, if you wear that in the middle of the night, people will easily see you, right? But that's...

[00:09:59] We see a lot of goalkeepers this year that have a green kit. The Netherlands have the brightest orange kit ever produced in the world. Yes. And then they put a bland green goalkeeper kit that's camouflage. Yeah. It's like, yeah. And this one is bright. Bright. So, like, properly bright. And I quite like that. So, applaud to him as well. Yeah. Well, moving on. We had another tense game in Group B.

[00:10:27] It's like, please just move on from your kids, mate. No, no. I get it. I think a lot of people have commented on the Netherlands kit being extra orange this time around. Which I think it didn't really hit me first. But if you look at it, it is extra orange. It's like brighter than bright orange. So, it's just a weird... You see the difference when you're standing in a crowd of Dutchies yesterday. And I've got the previous kit on. Because, hey, sometimes I need to wash the shirts as well. So, I got the previous kits on, which is pretty orange.

[00:10:53] But then everyone around you is like, ooh, this is bright. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. That's right. Well, also in Group B, we had a tense battle between Ecuador and Curaçao. After the first outing for Curaçao, you'd expect them to come back with at least to try and do the best they can. Not have another 7-1. And Ecuador needed to really win this game to show everyone that this is the team that a lot of people had pegged their hopes on to be the underdogs.

[00:11:22] But this game ended in a 0-0. It was a thrilling 0-0. As thrilling as they come. And we'll talk about one of the specialist players later on in another segment. But this is a fantastic game to watch. I couldn't believe the number of shots Ecuador was taking on the goal. And just the ball just wouldn't cross the line. Yeah. It's another one of those matches where we saw it with Turkey. We saw it with Cabo Verde last week as well. Goalkeepers make a massive difference in this tournament.

[00:11:52] I think they're underestimated all the time. But in this tournament, some of the goalkeepers put in performances that actually turn the matches around. And it happens more than I think usually, maybe. But yeah. Curaçao needed some luck. Curaçao definitely didn't need some spirit. They've got that in spades. But Eoroi Rome just saved everything. The most safe of a World Cup match since 1966, I think. So, yeah.

[00:12:21] He was incredible. He was incredible. And I think Curaçao as a whole tried to defend as well as they could, but it just was getting through. I think shout out to Tahit Chee-Yong from X-Men United. He actually carried the ball forward every single time Curaçao went forward. He was the main fulcrum of trying to carry the ball forward. And he had a brilliant game. And they got chances in. They did. I saw people saying, well, it's a good thing that I've got the goalkeeper. Definitely. But they got some chances in this time around as well.

[00:12:50] It's not like they didn't have any chance to score this match. Sure, the other ones were better, but it's not like they were just leaning back all the time. No, I completely agree. They had some really good chances. They did the best they could to actually go ahead and put up a show. And look, they've gained a point for a nation of 156,000 people. Gaining a point at the World Cup is a massive achievement. To be there itself is a massive achievement.

[00:13:13] But then after the first game of 7-1, you look back and think against a mighty Ecuador to draw a brilliant result. Good result for them. Ecuador, John, what do you think? Do you think they can do more or they did everything they could to progress and it's just one of those days? What are your thoughts? Yeah, the latter probably, right? They were so into let's get that goal going that they sometimes forgot about their rest defense, which led to chances for Curaçao.

[00:13:40] But they hit the bar 15 shots on target, which was saved. I mean, sometimes it's just also not your day. I think they did everything they could. It's a really good team though. I mean, they played Germany in the last game, right? Yes. Or is that... No, sorry. No, no, sorry. They... I don't know. Yeah, that's correct. Yeah. Ecuador plays Germany next round. Yeah. I wouldn't put it behind that. They just beat Germany.

[00:14:10] Honestly. I think it's a really good team with a bit of luck. I mean, some of these saves Roi made were like from one meter away in the rebound. Take it on your shin. Take it another one. It's like sometimes it just doesn't go your way, right? So, yeah. I wouldn't rule them out yet. And they've got three points in the... One point in the back now. So, yeah. A bit of luck so far. I think this is one of the under... You know when they say... You also have a...

[00:14:39] When you see the leaks, they have like an... Not an XG, but estimated point or average point you should have gotten. Based on your performances. Yeah. These guys are underperforming where they currently are. So, it should be fine. Should be fine. Hopefully they... I'm really hoping that they get through because it would be a shame to lose them so quickly. I mean, the chance of them not going through a very, very, very marginal. But fingers crossed they go on to the next stage because it would be fun to see them. Because they do have a lot of talent on display.

[00:15:09] So, it's just a matter of things. Just clicking in. Right. Moving on. We have another game which, listen up, we just mentioned that this game is still going on right now live. As it stands, Japan is 2-0 ahead of Tunisia. Tunisia, they just didn't show up. And Japan's just put them to the sword. Literally, for the first couple of minutes, they scored a goal with Kamada. And then Oeda scored a goal in the 31st minute. Both goals were cleanly awarded. Japan's playing a fluid 3-4-3 as it stands.

[00:15:36] And they look like they're going on the top of Group F alongside the Dutch. Yeah, alongside. Definitely alongside. Yeah. I think now this was one of those matches which you knew Japan would probably just win. Although, I thought that from Curacao as well. So, you can never know. But like I said, Tunisia looked really, really poor against Sweden. They changed the manager. Honestly, what can you change as a manager in like four days? Correct. It's marginal.

[00:16:04] So, they're a little bit more compact. You saw that when they started the match. But then it took them four minutes to concede a goal. Yeah. So, that didn't matter much. Then you're sort of in the limbo because you don't want to concede too much. But you also know that if you don't score, this is the end of your tournament. And Japan scored the second one with Dueda, who also got a chance before that actually. And then it's game over. It's 2-0. Japan is actually cruising now. So, I just looked. They haven't substituted yet.

[00:16:34] We're an hour in. It's 2-0. But you can see there's no pressure from Tunisia. They'll probably get one goal more. You know, it's one of those matches where you score one. Might get the second goal in. It's going to be 3-0, 4-0. And this game will bleed out. So, that's why I thought it was also safe to just record as well. It's been played. Yeah. It's not going to be changing. Yeah. Salafi for Tunisia, I guess. Unfortunately. I mean, sacking your manager, you can't really expect that new manager, even though it's

[00:17:04] Havreyn Art, who can pull off some historic wins in the past. It's not something you can change overnight and expect a result. So, Tunisia, as you said, Salafi, hopefully they have a good last game for the World Cup and then off they go on their own merry way. Right. Listen, we go back to our regular programming and we talk about baller, bottler and drama for today. And obviously, it's easy said than done. The baller for today is Eloy Ruhm, the goalkeeper for Kurosawa. 15 saves.

[00:17:32] The most in a single World Cup match ever recorded in history. Ecuador threw everything at him. Shots, header, one-on-ones, and he stopped all of it. And he's 82nd ranked Kurosawa in that World Cup campaign in one man. He's 82nd ranked. Kurosawa's 82nd ranked in the world. Absolutely generational performance. It's just a brilliant performance to watch. And I think it was that game, even though it ended in 0-0, just the drama of watching

[00:18:00] him save, make save after save was phenomenal. Yeah. Yeah. And you saw the frustration to take Kudor as well. But some of these saves were technically just extremely good. But you saw these. Apparently, Advocat said after the match that he was in a fight or he was angry before the match started with someone else. Okay. And Ruhm didn't want to comment on it yet.

[00:18:29] So we'll figure that out in the next coming days, I'm pretty sure. And then they asked, is he angry with you? And Advocat said, no, no, not at me, but someone else. But it's not my place to tell. Yeah. But Advocat did say, like, if he's angry and he plays like this, I'm going to make sure he's really angry next match. Yeah. Yeah. This is, I mean, he had a decent game against Germany and conceded seven. So, you know, it's just life of a goalkeeper. But sometimes it just all goes your way.

[00:18:57] But standout save for Valencia, the one-on-one. So that was confidence. You saw confidence in the way he came out of the goal there. Yeah. Yeah. It's happy for him. I think he's a good guy. He played a lot of games, of course, in the Netherlands. Near Divisie at Vitesse. I think he played six or seven, I think seven games for base value as well. Yeah. 37 years old, right? Already. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But good for him. Yeah. Good for him. Absolutely. Absolutely amazing. Love it.

[00:19:27] Yeah. Kudos. Kudos. I think Undov could have had the baller as well if that match didn't work out this way. He probably would have. We'll talk about Undov again in a short period of time. So we move on to the bottler. We have two options for the bottler. Number one, it could be in Valencia, as you just mentioned, with missing the shots. He's missed quite a few shots on today's game. But I think we should go back to the Netherlands versus Sweden game and talk about the Swedish defense being the bottlers. They entered the group on top of Group F with four goal difference.

[00:19:56] Ninety minutes later, the Dutch made sure that advantage was gone. They completely lost their shape and after the first goal, it looked like things were just never going to come back. They tried to play an aggressive game and it just didn't work and they left massive channels for Broby and Marlon to exploit. And I think to concede five goals in a single World Cup match, you're supposed to be commanding. When you're supposed to be commanding the group, it's a big defensive collapse. Hey.

[00:20:21] Yeah, I don't know if I necessarily agree here because I said the first match was so out of proportion. Does that make sense? I don't think the first match was... They won 5-1 against a team that just completely lost it. They started off attacking one striker with three defenders and then, of course, everything else breaks open.

[00:20:47] I don't think there were many defensive mistakes on its own yesterday. It's like I said, once they break up to 2-0 front, they need to go forward to back. And it took the Netherlands 25 minutes to adjust to that and they had no answer when they adjusted. So after the second half started, it was an easy walk-off. I think this is also just difference in quality with all due respect. I don't necessarily... Like, normally...

[00:21:11] Don't forget, this Sweden team performed so poor that they fired their manager and they used the Nation League to actually get in the World Cup because they didn't make it out of the group stages. I think Monday, when they beat Tunisia, it was just a poor Tunisia and it was an outlier game. Yeah, I think that's quite right. It seemed... I think, from my perspective, looking at them play, looking at the game against Tunisia, everything just seemed to click for them.

[00:21:38] Where Giochris and Izak were just smashing through Tunisia, but looking at Tunisia playing against Japan right now, you realize, yeah, Tunisia hasn't rocked up. Sweden just had a really lucky day that day. And yeah, it's just the dust settled and the scoreline was the scoreline today. Definitely. I think if there's someone you should call bottlers, it might be high free coast in the end. Could be. Could be. Well... Giving a lead away in the 96 minutes. Probably... Throw away 96 minutes. They would have been through if they drew.

[00:22:07] Interesting you mentioned that because that's the drama. The drama for today is Dennis Undav. And the reason for that is Germany were losing 12 years without a knockout stage appearance, was about to become more. Then Undav came on as a sub, killed it stone dead at stoppage time. Five goal contributions in just 56 minutes for the World Cup across two games. Well, Nagelsmann's got a selection headache now. Does the super sub become the starter or does he still stay as a super sub? What do you think?

[00:22:37] Probably just stays in a super sub. Do you? Yeah, because I think if you have that weapon from the bench, it's probably better to bring it from the bench, right? Yeah. It's like I said, the Dutch dilemma yesterday. If you start him, you don't have much backup. You don't have a backup plan anymore. Yeah. And if you don't start him, you know they can... I mean, we saw Mecha scoring as well in the first match. And Mecha wasn't that poor yesterday either.

[00:23:05] So let him start, bring him in if needed. Sucks for him. But he still, he will have a terrific world championship with half of the effort. Yeah. I don't think Nagelsmann will change it. But for the third match, which doesn't have any impact for it, of course, he might just try it. Yeah. He might just try it just to see how it moves. But I do agree with you sometimes. Having a super sub who comes on and scores is very effective. It's extremely effective, especially in a tournament like the World Cup where if it's working, why change it when it's working really well?

[00:23:34] But again, if you look at the first half that Germany played, it just... The lack of penetration kept happening because Havertz was the only one up front who just kept coming from the wing and just... Ivory Coast played really well, though. I mean, I saw people saying it was like the German board and they should easily beat this five. Come on. That wasn't realistic. Ivory Coast played really well in the midfield. Was in top tier shape. They hardly lost any two. This referee also, he doesn't mind a little bit of roughing around in the midfield. Yeah.

[00:24:03] And you're not going to body them out of the game. So if you have a referee that will blow for falls whenever you get hit a little bit, Germany would have easily beat this. But once they allow the midfield battle to be physical... I saw Chris saying, for example, I like the Germans short passing and playing in midfield. Definitely, definitely commendable. But against these beasts of men just bullying you around the midfield, what are you going to do? Yeah. And it took Germany way too long to find an outlet for that, to skip that midfield passing

[00:24:33] over there. And once they did in the second half, they got way better. That's true. They could basically run over them. That's true. That's true. Well, moving along quickly, just to give you a recap of the games that we will cover tomorrow. So firstly, we have Spain versus Saudi Arabia. Belgium, Iran. Uruguay, Cabo Verde. New Zealand and Egypt. I think we'll just stick to Spain versus Saudi Arabia. Any thoughts on whether Spain will have another hiccup against Saudi Arabia? Nah, it should be it on the order. Yeah. I think. First one was an outlier and also...

[00:25:02] I don't... Saudi Arabia's a cool team, to be fair. But I don't... Like, Spain must have learned a lesson. They will play... They will try to find a number nine and it will get a little bit more pressure in that. That should be fine. Well, that's a wrap for a wild day of football, ladies and gentlemen. We will come back again tomorrow and walk you through the other games. Germany is through. Japan is taking care of business. Before you head out... Already now. Oh, three-year. There you go. Before you head out, just follow us on our socials at Foot & Review. On Instagram, at Foot & Review Podcast.

[00:25:33] On TikTok. Leave a five-star review on Spotify or Apple Podcast. It takes 10 seconds and helps us immensely. Sign up for the newsletter. And yeah, we would love to hear your feedback. And if you do like what you're listening to, please do jump on to Buy Me A Coffee. So it's buymeacoffee.com slash Foot & Review. And we'll be back tomorrow and we will dissect everything tomorrow for you. All right. Have a good one. See ya.