World Cup gets rest day by proxy as Canada provide perfect bridge to the knockout stage | OneFootball

A theme of this World Cup has been this World Cup getting away with itself despite everything.

On the back of a group stage that everyone appears to have agreed quite reasonably went better than anyone could have expected and was broadly fine despite featuring only one meaningful shock (Cape Verde qualifying at Uruguay’s expense) and Portugal the only ‘true’ seed not to win their group.

And somehow, despite almost everyone ending up precisely where they should have done after rattling through 72 games to eliminate 16 largely predictable teams, we’ve still managed to end up abiding by World Cup tradition that one half of the draw must look much tougher than the other.

There was also one true dud among the last-32 ties. Only one tie that looked completely out of place as a World Cup knockout game.

And because this tournament gets away with everything, that game ended up being the filler on what should by all right and logic have been a rest day. None of us needed a game today, did we? There’s been six games every day for the last four days, and it was hardly a famine of football before that.

Instead of a rest day, we got the next best thing. South Africa v Canada. Sure, it’s a game that mattered a great deal if you are South African or Canadian, and we’re not suggesting otherwise. A huge opportunity for sure.

But there is absolutely nothing to exercise the neutral here and that is both absolutely fine and, frankly, at this point a relief. Just a pleasant game of football played pleasantly enough between two teams who aren’t dark horses or particularly capable of going any further in the tournament (it’s Netherlands or Morocco next and indeed last for Canada). There isn’t even one that presents a more compellingly interesting underdog narrative than the other.

Not even a ‘nice for the hosts to stay in, for the vibes’ given Canada aren’t even hosting any more of their own games having finished second in their group.

A game that would’ve been a real tough task for the neutral if served among the choicer cuts of the last-32 draw instead became the perfect palate cleanser before the truly vital action gets back under way tomorrow.

It was the only tie that could fulfil this role, and the only role this tie could fulfil.

There were obvious limits on what game could go here anyway. Clearly, nothing involving a third-place side could be staged only 15 hours after the final qualification picture was decided. And it couldn’t be anything involving anyone from the later groups.

Runners up from Groups A and B it would have to be, and they did the job perfectly. We ended up with kind of a rest day anyway, but a rest day that had some football in it. Get in. What a result that is for everyone. Apart from South Africa, in the end.

Everything had a curiously low-key vibe. Low-key Mexican Waves. Oh, no! That lady dropped her phone! Low-key penalty controversy that turns out to have just been a good decision because the defender got a touch. A goalline clearance that looked more dramatic in real-time than it did on the replay.

Oh look, there’s Jessica Alba. Oh look, there’s Paul Stalteri. Remembering about 74 minutes in that despite being South Africa v Canada this really was in fact a World Cup knockout match and thus there’s extra-time and penalties to come here if we all behave.

Oh wait, hang on, there’s an injury-time winner! For Canada! That’s… fine! Rarely had a game appeared more determined to meander towards extra-time than this one until Stephen Eustaquio upended the script by producing The One Moment Of Real Quality.

We’ll holds our hands up, in a game that had clearly long since accepted its fate to be settled only by that or A Mistake, our money was not on One Moment Of Real Quality.

Canada go through. Canada deserved to go through. They were the better and more ambitious of the two, the more willing to grab the huge opportunity that had been placed in front of them, and you could see what it meant at the final whistle after what was some undeniable late drama.

And they will now always have their place in history and pub quizzes as the first ever team to win a World Cup last-32 game.

Brazil against Japan first up tomorrow. That’s going to be excellent, isn’t it? Then it’s Germany v Paraguay. And Netherlands v Morocco. And we’re all far more ready for all of that good stuff now than we were yesterday. Job done. Well done, Canada. Well done, FIFA. Well done, everyone.