Canceled goal, penalty and Qatar’s failure: how Ecuador won the opening match of the World Cup Qatar became the first host country to lose the opening match of the World Cup 20.11.2022, 22:15

The opening match of the already scandalous 2022 World Cup sparked a wave of controversy just days before the World Cup kicked off. On the evening of 17 November, journalist Amjad Taha made a sensational and scandalous statement on social networks that Qatar had bribed several Ecuadorian players to win the first match definitively.

Qatar paid $7.4 million to eight Ecuadorian players for losing their opening game (0-1, second half goal). Five Qatari and Ecuadorian insiders confirmed this. We hope this is not true. We hope that the dissemination of information will affect the outcome. “The world has an obligation to resist FIFA’s corruption,” Taha wrote.

But the message appeared to be fake information, almost none of the leading media quoted it. At the same time, the journalist tagged the Daily Mail after his message, but he himself has nothing to do with it and does not work there. Initially, neither the Qatari team nor the Ecuadorian team reacted to this information, just less than a day before the fight, Felix Sanchez, the coach of the Qatar team, spoke.

“I think there’s a lot of misinformation out there. The Internet is a great tool, but I also think it’s very dangerous. We’ve been preparing and training for many years. We’re together, we’re strong, we’re one, and no one can destabilize us with this criticism, so it won’t affect us in any way.

We are very excited, motivated and happy to play in our first World Cup. We are focused on how to prepare for the game, how to control your emotions, and we do not take into account anything else,” ESPN quotes the expert.

There was no talk of bribery anymore and everything continued as usual in the opening match of the World Cup, which was entrusted to Italian referee Daniele Orsato. The lineups for the match were as follows:

Qatar: Saad Al-Shib, Abdelkarim Hassan, Bualem Khuhi, Basim Al-Rawi, Homam Ahmed, Ro-Ro, Abdulaziz Hatem, Karim Boudiaf, Akram Afif, Almoez Ali, Hassan Al-Haydos.

Ecuador: Hernan Galindez, Purvis Estupiñan, Piero Incapie, Felix Torres, Angelo Preciado, Romario Ibarra, Moises Caicedo, Jegson Mendez, Gonzalo Plata, Mikael Estrada, Enner Valencia.

The match started brilliantly and worthy of World Cup drama. Unable to reach the ball after two attempts, Al-Sheba’s first shot into the penalty area resulted in an unsuccessful game. Torres sent a shot into the middle of the penalty area to Valencia, who was shooting from a few meters into the empty net. However, the confirmation of the goal immediately began, Orsato, with hints from his assistants, stated that the goal was from offside. As a result, the account was not opened, but there were already reasons for discussion.

The first minutes of the match were in full control of the Ecuadorian national team. In one of the episodes, the Qataris broke the rules in Valencia and Orsato signaled a free kick, but nothing dangerous came out of it, but the rebound is supposedly for the visiting team. Ecuador did not let Qatar out of their half. The Ecuadorians could not take corners for a long time, a strong serve eventually went to the far post, the Qatari defense coped.

After Al-Sheeb, who showed the first yellow card in the 15th minute of the match, knocked Valencia down in the penalty area, Orsato pointed to the 11-meter point without thinking for a long time.

Valencia’s first goal was cancelled, but the second was clean, beautiful and confident. Enner continued to open the score in the first game of the World Cup by turning a penalty.

Qatar responded almost immediately by attacking more or less sharply, almost for the first time in the game, but only ending up in an offside position. The Qataris were unhappy, hoping for a corner kick, but Orsato signaled the goal kick. The Ecuadorians immediately took the ball to themselves and confidently continued to control the course of the game. This led to another dangerous moment at the Qatar gates where an offside position was called. Another unpleasant collision occurred: Estrada crashed into Al-Sheba. No one needed help, and the duel quickly resumed.

Valencia was hit again in one of the divisions, they fouled him a lot today, Ali was shown a yellow card for this violation because he had no time to protect his opponent and played rudely.

The first half of the first half was almost entirely in control of the Ecuadorian national team, Qatar achieved almost nothing, the hosts made many simple mistakes, failed to catch up with their opponent, fouled and could not catch up with someone else’s penalty, at least in the field to carry out something similar to an attack. At the same time, it is worth remembering that Qatar is a player who participated in the world championships for the first time, before that the team did not participate in the world championships. At the same time, there was no rush after scoring in Ecuador, the players played the ball slowly and controlled the course of the match.

But the rules in this game were violated not only by the players of the Qatar national team. Caicedo also managed to foul and was shown the yellow card, cutting Pedra, who was escaping from the right, as the home team tried to improve on the offense.

Valencia scored a double in the 30th minute. The great advantage of the Ecuadorian national team was on the “second floor”. From the right, Preciado calmly sent a pass to Valencia, which then bounced the ball into the goal – the goalkeeper wasn’t long enough to reach the ball and save his team.

Moments later, Hassan nevertheless struck Qatar’s first blow at the door: far, far higher than outside the penalty area and higher than the crossbar. Ecuador again quickly ruled the game from their half, taking a free kick, but this led to a Qatari counterattack not far from the center of the pitch.

Valencia played the leading role in this match and the Qatari players understood it. In one of the episodes, Karim Boudiaf cut Enner pretty hard and got a yellow card for it. The doctors were on the field to help the captain of the Ecuador national team, but everything was fine with Valencia, he was able to continue the match. Indeed, Ecuador would not want to lose such a player at the beginning of the championship. Moments later, Valencia was back on the turf after another collision with Boudiaf, Enner holding his knee and the doctors were back on the field.

Valencia struggled to their feet, even a stretcher appeared on the field, but they were not needed. Ecuadorian fans gave a standing ovation as Enner returned to the game.

Orsato added five minutes into the first half, and that time was pretty accurate: Everything that could happen in the first 45 minutes was seen – canceled goals and penalties and long celebrations and yellow cards and injuries to players entering the field medics.

Interestingly, after the break, both coaches decided not to make any changes and the injured Valencia remained on the pitch and did not make any changes in Qatar based on the halftime results. The scenario did not change much, the hosts tried to create something at halftime, but Ecuador practically did not let their opponents do anything and attacked on their own.

Ten minutes after the start of the second half, Ecuador had really dangerous moments. Ibarra went into shock position past the Qatari defenders and shot powerfully on goal, this time Al-Sheeb bounced the ball to save his team and none of the Ecuadorians were at the finish line. And then Mendez didn’t have to foul someone else’s box by driving spikes into Afif’s leg and receiving a second yellow card from Ecuador.

Qatar team sometimes caught the ball in their own half but no progress. Rolling under his opponent in one of the divisions, Preciado was taken to the field by doctors to the aid of the Ecuadorian defence.

It was not possible to help fully right away, the football player temporarily left the field and Qatar took advantage of this majority: Hassan Pedra blocked the pass and tried to close it, but the blow went out the door.

In the second half, the game from Ecuador looked much calmer. It was as if the team dropped the whole wick in the first half, when they scored two goals, then calmed down and allowed their opponents more. Qatar beat one of the rebounds at the Ecuadorian gates, Afif tried to create something but the defenders coped quite confidently.

The first substitution of the match was at the 65th minute: Ibarria left the field near Ecuador, replaced by Jeremy Sarmiento. And just five minutes later, Qatar made a double substitution: the captain of the Al-Haydos team gave the armband to his goalkeeper and replaced him by Mohammed Wad, Ali left the field, Mohammed Muntari appeared.

And within minutes of entering the pitch, Muntari assisted his team in their fight against Ecuador’s banner, smashing the ball away from his own penalty area after throwing a hard pass towards the goal.

Qatar started to attack a little more, but so far this has not worked: Afif shot on goal, but much higher. And Valencia suffered again, got another minor wound, and it was time to replace it: Ennar gave the captain’s armband to Estrada, giving way to Sifuentes.

Afif managed to score again, but in a negative context: He stepped on Plata’s ankle, for which he was shown a yellow card. Ecuador, meanwhile, seemed to have reawakened, running into the attack. But this only led to a rather unpleasant clash with Al-Sheeb for the goalkeeper, but the goalkeeper did not need help.

The end of the match was a bit tense, Orsato whistled a lot of fouls, players of both teams broke the rules many times. And with five minutes left in regular time, Qatar created its deadliest moment: Muntari opened inside the penalty area, passed two Ecuadorian defenders, got the ball, took a shot but failed to enter the goal.

Already at the end of the second half, Ecuador changed the captain again: Estrada left the field and gave the armband to Preciado, Kevin Rodriguez replaced him, and Alan Franco also replaced Caicedo. Five minutes were added to the match and as of that moment, the stands of the stadium began to empty, not all the fans were seated until the end of the match.

It is therefore worth noting that Qatar is the first host country to lose in the opening match in the 92-year World Cup history. The countries that have hosted the World Cup before that have won 16 times and drawn 6 times.