World Cup Group B: Matchday One Review
With each team in the top 20 of the FIFA World Rankings, Group B is one of the closest on paper. USA find themselves 16th, Wales 19th and Iran 20th in the rankings and with England in the top five, they are the clear favourites to win the group.
England 6-2 Iran
England took on Iran in their opening match. There was a lot of discussion prior to the match speculating on whether England would opt for the back four formation that gets the best out of all their star players at club level or stick with the back five that took them to the 2020 European Championships final.
Much like in the recent Nations League matches, Gareth Southgate chose the back four, lining up in a 4-2-3-1 formation.
England wasted no time in showing the world that they were the main men of Group B. After a prolonged break in play through the injury of Iran ‘keeper Alireza Beiranvand, England completely overwhelmed Iran, scoring three goals in 10 minutes. Jude Bellingham, Bukayo Saka and Raheem Sterling gave the Three Lions a 3-0 lead at the break.
England continued in the same vein in the second half. Saka added his second just before Iran’s star player, Mehdi Taremi, found a consolation, however, this didn’t slow England down as a quadruple substitution saw them freshen things up with Marcus Rashford and Jack Grealish piling on Iran’s agony. Taremi secured his brace in the 103rd minute to complete the scoring.
With attacking threat coming from all areas of the pitch, Southgate will be delighted with his team's performance in the first game of the World Cup.
USA 1-1 Wales
After a long 64-year wait, Wales are back at the World Cup. It’d be a dream for Wales, if they could emulate the success of their last campaign, a quarter-finals appearance in 1958.
The USMNT also suffered time away from this competition, although not to the same extent as Rob Page’s side, after failing to qualify for Russia 2018. USA are a team low on positivity at the moment, the exclusion of talented striker Ricardo Pepi from the 26-man squad baffled many USA fans, but with Wales being a team that prosper almost exclusively on positivity and team chemistry – they'll want to put this behind them.
It’s rare that a match of this importance takes place on the first matchday, but with both sides expected to battle it out for second spot, they’ll both be eager to gain maximum points throughout the group.
USA began the match in a promising fashion, attacking the Wales goal with little reply. Timothy Weah would eventually get the breakthrough for American’s as they went into half-time with a slender lead.
Page’s half-time team talk must’ve reenergised the Wales team as the match was flipped completely in the second half. USA could only gain minor control of the ball with Kieffer Moore and Ben Davies coming close to equalising, but neither could find the target.
The sustained pressure from Wales had the American defence shaking. It would finally pay off as Walker Zimmerman hacked down Gareth Bale in the box and they were awarded a penalty. Despite not contributing much to the match so far, Bale made no mistake from the spot to give his nation their first World Cup goal in 64 years.
The points were evenly shared as the game finished a goal apiece, with the cliché, ‘a game of two halves’ a very fitting description of the match.
Wales face Iran on Friday where they will hope to build on their decent start while England take on USA.