Friday, June 11, 2021
Africa's Pioneers, Part 2
The opening match of the 1978 World Cup was a sluggish, uninspiring 0-0 draw between the defending champions West Germany and Poland. Neither side looked remotely as good as they had in 1974; the Germans were now without the likes of (Gerd) Muller, Hoeness, Breitner, Overath, Grabowski and, of course, Franz Beckenbauer, while many of the Poles were now pushing 30, and it showed.
It seemed that whichever side could take the points in the other first-up match in the group would give themselves a decent chance of progressing, with the two group favourites looking so mediocre. Most pundits thought it could be Mexico's chance to finally progress past the first round on foreign turf. Instead, it turned out to be the tournament's first real surprise, and a landmark in Africa's participation at the event.
Mexico fielded two young strikers in Victor Rangel and Hugo Sanchez, with the experienced Antonio De La Torre expected to direct operations in midfield. Abdelmajid Chetali had been impressed enough with young Mokhtar Naili to start him in goal in the cauldron of a World Cup, and gave a start to another youngster, the sweeper Amor Jebali, in place of the injured Khalid Gasmi.
The first half of the match was, perhaps unexpectedly, fairly even. True, the Mexicans often bossed the midfield through De La Torre and the unmistakable figure of Leonardo Cuellar, but the Tunisians gave as good as they got, with Tarek Dhiab's left foot regularly finding openings and the fullbacks providing sufficient width.
Just before half-time, however, came a dreadful blow. De La Torre, on the left, jabbed a fairly innocuous ball into the box; it struck the arm of the unfortunate Jebali and a penalty was given. The handball could hardly have been considered intentional, but such decisions were often given, even in those rather less stringent days. Vasquez-Ayala's weak spot-kick crept in, although Naili very nearly reached it.
It was a tribute to Chetali's benign influence that the team came out after half-time as positive and composed as before, and an equalizer came soon after the break. Perhaps fittingly, it was Ali Kaabi, whose left-wing excursions had provided a useful outlet throughout the game, who scored: after Dhiab had cleverly drawn several Mexican defenders to him, the midfielder Mohammed Agrebi was able to cross from the right to the advancing Kaabi, whose less-than-formidable shot skidded through a forest of legs in the box to beat the Mexican keeper Jose Pillar-Reyes, who may well have been unsighted.
It was no less than Tunisia deserved, but Mexico were now on the warpath. Only a couple of minutes after the goal, Naili proved his worth when a lazy back-pass from Kaabi forced him to plunge at the feet of Rangel. As the half wore on, Mexico began to look the more likely winners: a substitute, Gerardo Lugo, added fresh ideas and bite to their attack, and it seemed that the predictions of many experts, that the Tunisian part-timers might be vulnerable to tiredness in the latter stages of games, might come true.
The key moment of the game arrived on 76 minutes.
Lugo prodded the ball forward, and it reached De La Torre via a deflection; for once, the Tunisian offside trap was well and truly breached, and the Mexican midfield general was clear through on goal. Naili did what he could to narrow the angle, but it looked a straightforward finish. De La Torre sliced the ball wide.
Had he scored, it is doubtful that the Tunisians would have recovered; the momentum was against them, and they may have lost faith in their offside tactic. Instead, the miss gave them a second wind, and within less than two minutes, they went ahead. With several Mexicans caught upfield, the Tunisian captain Lahzami neatly found Dhiab, whose superbly-weighted pass fell into the path of the holding midfielder Nejib Ghommidh. A nicely-placed right-footed shot from the edge of the six-yard box, and the score was 2-1.
Tunisia's third goal, the finest of the night, was reminiscent of Brazil's magnificent final flourish at the 1970 tournament. Again Ghommidh received the ball in an advanced position, and this time spotted the other fullback, Mokhtar Dhouib, on a rampaging run down the right. No-one was tracking him, and Ghommidh, Pelé-like, slid the ball expertly into his path. Dhouib, in turn, gave his best Carlos Alberto impression, finishing crisply from a narrow angle.
For the first time in a World Cup, an African team had won. The Tunisian players acknowledged the crowd on all sides of the Estadio Rosario, who had given them generous support; in their two subsequent games, the Carthage Eagles would become even firmer crowd favourites.
Against all expectations, qualification for the next round was now within reach for the 1000-1 outsiders. But two European giants, Poland and Germany, were to come.
To be continued...
