Six on the Mundial: 32 Teams Entered, 16 Remain. Your Ultimate Guide to the World Cup Knockout Stage; Night and Day on Nikols
philip panaritis
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"Son Heung-Min’s empty net goal, sealing a 2-0 South Korea win over Germany, was the exclamation mark on both South Korea’s upset of the champs (who needed a win to get out of Group F) and a tournament filled with new difficulties at the top. Perhaps the qualifying failures of such front-runners as Italy and Chile were precursors to a World Cup of this nature. Brazil needed a result against Serbia to get out of its group on the same day that their 2014 semifinal foe, Germany, was eliminated. Both Spain and Portugal struggled with upstart Morocco and came dangerously close to conceding one of the two knockout spots in Group B to Iran. Argentina, home to the best soccer player in the world, is a whole different case entirely.
Brazil may still be the best of them, but France and Spain have fatal flaws, and that leaves the World Cup as open and unpredictable as ever. Here are three countries that might end up outperforming the biggest in the world."
"The state-run TASS news agency said Friday that Russian players had taken over 300 anti-doping tests, all of them clean, in 2018 alone.
Russia’s Football Union (RFU) rejected Tygart’s demand, and called the allegations of doping “simple bitterness.” Its honorary president Vyacheslav Koloskov said players were “repeatedly” subjected to doping tests at their training base north of Moscow before the championship, along with post-match testing.
“All of this irritates them,” Koloskov told the RBC business portal, referring to the American and British sports authorities attitude towards the Russian team's victories. The statements are part of an effort to undermine Russia’s “success in hosting the tournament,” he said."
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