It should no longer be a surprise, but Costa Rica converted a few more people into believers after beating Italy, leaving all the “giants” in Group D behind to secure qualification. The victory also means that England are out of the World Cup, although it also had something to do with Uruguay and Luis Suarez, which is obviously noted by the memes and joke makers.
One happy soul might be Queen Elizabeth who no longer has to think about Mario Balotelli kissing her. Who knows, maybe she was looking forward to it, but in any case, Balotelli’s promise to help England imploded and resulted in an awful performance from the Italian team.
Costa Rica don’t attack with many players, but they play the right kind of football and do some excellent tactical work before matches. They give up on dominating possession, but their offside trap is perfect and playing with a goalkeeper as a libero allows them to attack with their full backs from the wings.
So while Costa Rica are in the next round and Italy or Uruguay will be joining England on their trip back home, this was another demonstration of something that’s been a trend in this tournament, unless you include Honduras into it: The American teams are doing well, even better than anyone expected.
