Sunday, March 29, 2009

WCQ South American standings and stats

After 11 rounds of matches (with only seven to go), Argentina climbed to second place and shortened the gap with leaders Paraguay to four points.

Chile were the other big winners as they took all three points from bottom-placed Perú and now Marcelo BIELSA's men are sitting pretty with 19 points, together with Argentina and relegating Brazil to fourth place.

DUNGA's team looked even worse than his green-T-shirt-underneath-a-violet-shirt combination!

They went ahead against the run of play against an erratic Ecuadorian side that controlled the game from the start. Their consolation prize came in the dying minutes of the game with an equalizer that ended up tasting not as sweet as it may look.

On Saturday, Uruguay really kept their hopes alive by beating leaders Paraguay at the Centenario Stadium with goals from two Diegos (FORLÁN and LUGANO). If the WCQ finished today, they would be the ones facing the fourth-placed team from CONCACAF (El Salvador at the moment).

Colombia scored a goal after more than 500 minutes without finding the back of the net and then they added a second to see off Bolivia 2-0 at Bogotá. With that result, they leap-frogged Ecuador to reach the sixth spot while they keep their 2-point distance with Uruguay.

Here are the results from the matches played on Saturday and Sunday:

Uruguay 2-0 Paraguay

Argentina 4-0 Venezuela

Colombia 2-0 Bolivia

Ecuador 1-1 Brazil

Perú 1-3 Chile

Let's see how the standings look like:

Paraguay 23 pts. + 10 goal difference
Argentina 19 pts. +10 GD
Chile 19 pts. +3 GD
Brazil 18 pts. +11 GD
Uruguay 16 pts. +11 GD
Colombia 14 pts. - 2 GD
Ecuador 13 pts. - 5 GD
Venezuela 10 pts -10 GD
Bolivia 9 pts. - 11 GD
Perú 7 pts. - 17 GD

Next round of matches:

Tuesday:
Venezuela v. Colombia

Wednesday:
Bolivia v. Argentina (4:30 PM Buenos Aires; 3:30 PM New York; 8:30 PM London; Thursday 3:30 AM Beijing)
Ecuador v. Paraguay
Chile v. Uruguay
Brazil v. Perú

Topscorers:

Sebastián ABREU, Diego FORLÁN (URU); Joaquín BOTERO, Marcelo MARTINS (BOL); David SUAZO (CHI): 5 goals each.

Argentina topscorers:

Sergio AGÜERO; Lionel MESSI and Juan Román RIQUELME: 4 goals each.
Esteban CAMBIASSO; Gabriel MILITO; Maxi RODRIGUEZ; Rodrigo PALACIO and Carlos TEVEZ: 1 goal each.

The second edition of Mundo Albiceleste's podcast will be coming soon. We will be covering the news about the South American World Cup Qualifying zone, with special attention on Argentina's win over Venezuela and the upcoming fixture in La Paz against Bolivia.

Stay tuned and send us your thoughts and comments to: argentina.correspondent@gmail.com

4 comments:

Sebastian said...

We'll talk about it in the podcast, but so you know, apparently, both Diego MILITO and Ezequiel LAVEZZI could be out of the match in Bolivia due to minor injuries.

Worth keeping an eye on them, but don't be surprised if they don't even sit on the bench in La Paz.

Lopez,India said...

Argentina team must have some plans for playing at 2,750 meters above sea level. I remembered Diego has shown his full support for playing football at Bolivia when FIFA was against it. He had played along with Bolivia’s president Evo Morales .So he must aware about the situation there. Diego's that experience could be act like catalyst for the national team and with respect to our current form, I am damn sure that we will get the three points over there.

John said...

The altitude thing for me is something that is unique on world football that even I was against FIFA's decision. It will physical demanding from our boys but let'hope Diego has something in mind for this game.

Unknown said...

And yet again Brasil plays like shit and gets away with at least one point.....