Tweet me!Slovenia Take Charge in World Cup Group C, Defeat Algeria. The game was played at Peter Mokaba Stadium in Polokwane. It was attended by just over 30,000, which is about 75 percent full. Former France superstar Zinedine Zidane was in attendance watching over Algeria.
The desert foxes against the green dragons. a 90 minutes of a very stressful game to both team fans. Let's look a little bit at the overall game. It was a game largely bereft of real chances, and the few enterprising moves generally fizzled out with poor execution. It seemed like the most common expression from players on both sides were the patronizing thumbs-up (international symbol for "nice idea -- a little more skill next time, please") and the palms-up ("Dude, what the heck?").
Algeria's Nadir Belhadj had the first scoring chance of the match inside three minutes off a free kick, but his dipping shot was touched over the crossbar by Slovenia goalie Samir Handanovic.
Although Algeria had more possession over the following 35 minutes it managed just one more good look on goal in the 36th minute when Rafik Halliche headed wide of the right post from seven yards.
Valter Birsa ended the half with Slovenia's only solid chance in the 43rd, but his dipping 30-yard shot was directed over the bar by Chaouchi.
Slovenia and Algeria traded chances in the opening 25 minutes after the break, with Slovenia's Andraz Kirm shooting into Chaouchi's arms in the 60th minute and Algeria's Abdelkader Ghezzal heading just high of the top right corner in the 70th.
Ghezzal changed the match three minutes later when he played the ball down off his arm in the box to earn his second yellow card and an ejection, and Slovenia was able to take advantage in the closing stages.
Just after Slovenia avoided a disaster in the 78th minute, when Algeria's Karim Ziani stole a pass from Handanovic only for the Slovenia goalie to recover and smother the loose ball, Koren delivered the game-winner.
Bojan Jokic passed from the left sideline to Koren in the middle of the field and the Slovenia captain turned in open space and hit a shot toward the bottom-right corner.
Chaouchi was in great position to make the save, but instead of playing it safe and pushing the ball wide, he tried to control the ball and it bounced off his left arm and inside the right post.
Slovenia, which lost all three of its group games in its only other World Cup, held on over the final 10 minutes. Algeria has not won a World Cup match since 1982, when it beat West Germany and Chile in the group stage, but still failed to advance.
What are the two most memorable moments to keep from this game?
Ghezzal (bad) behavior and Chaouchi's (bad) technical reaction.
Algeria was reduced to 10 men after striker Abdelkader Ghezzal picked up his second yellow card in 14 minutes in the 73rd minute. Ghezzal stupidly stuck his arm up to control a high pass he had no chance of snagging. And, quite correctly, the referee showed him his second yellow.
Six minutes later, Koren did what he had to do. At the top of the 18-yard box, he found a little bit of space to release a well-placed right-footed shot toward the far side of the net. Chaouchi should save this type of 90 percent of the time. As a result, another goalkeeping blunder is the story of Group C after Robert Green’s far worse mistake against the USA yesterday.
With the result, Slovenia moved into first place ahead of England and USA, who drew 1–1 on Saturday in Rustenburg. Slovenia qualified for the World Cup by beating Russia in a European playoff late last year.
Algeria next opponents are UK and USA. If the Algerian team could win these two comings games like they did against Egypt in the qualifications, that will be great. Those will - then - be the two most memorable moments of this first round. If not, then we will all keep Ghezzal and Chaouchi in mind till the next world cup.
AlgerianAmericans.com June 13th 2010
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