World Cup 2018: Trending from Russia

Where's the pace and the individual brilliance?

This leads to the second point that comes to my mind. Why is it that a team full of stars failing to win after controlling the match? Some people will say that the weaker teams are defending with 9-10 players and so it’s difficult for the others to score goals. Very true – but are we not expecting this to happen? Did we not see this happening in other World Cups as well?

What is actually lacking from the stronger teams is the ability to pass and break the defense at a lightning speed when they are in the final third. They are going into the attack at quite a slow pace and then are lacking creativity once they have reached the penalty box. If a team is unable to break the defense of the opponents through the middle, then they should either go for extensive wing play with tall strikers in the middle or should try false dummy runs off the ball to try and create space. So far, we did not see that from the teams like Argentina, etc.

A classic example of how speedy counter-attacks can bring success in football is to study the performance of Iceland in the World Cup qualifiers. They topped the UEFA Group I which had a total of 6 teams consisting of Croatia, Ukraine, Turkey, Finland, Kosovo and of course, Iceland. In the 10 matches played, Iceland won 7 and lost just 2 matches. They topped the group ahead of teams like Croatia and Finland. However, if you analyze the data, you will find that they had an average of just 44% ball possession per match and yet scored 16 goals. This was possible only because while they defend most of the time to frustrate the opponents, they also rely on fast and quick counter attacks to catch their opponents off-guard and then score the goals they need. Unfortunately, we have not seen this kind of quick counter-attacking football from the so-called big footballing nations yet!

Also, apart from a few isolated incidents in dead ball situations, did we really see brilliance from the superstars in this World Cup? This leads to doubts on whether these big super-stars are only good in club football and not in World Cup matches? We are all hoping that at least in the knockout rounds, these players will rise to the occasion and mark their individual superiority on the outcome of the match.