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19 hours ago
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Could France do it on a hot, humid, waterlogged and lightning-threatened night in Pennsylvania? The answer was pretty straightforward. Despite an interruption of more than two hours after a chain of severe thunderstorms disrupted play at Philadelphia Stadium, France brushed past the physical challenge of Iraq, and furthered Kylian Mbappé’s personal duel with Lionel Messi in the process.
The France captain got another two goals on the night of his 100th cap, the first a rip-snorter from outside the box after a period of dominance, the second a tap in after disastrous defending from Iraq. Ousmane Dembélé got the third, his first goal at a major tournament. Didier Deschamps, meanwhile, was able to confirm passage to the knockout rounds, rest players from his starting XI, and even retire Dembélé and Michael Olise on the hour, preserving them for more taxing contests. There were no clouds on this particular horizon.
“It’s the first time it has happened to me or my players”, said Deschamps who joked that they had whiled away the interruption playing cards (rather than watching clips from the first half). “It was a long gap, that’s a fact, and we have another match in four days but the most important part is we have six points and have qualified for the round of 32.”
France started where they had left off against Senegal and to say the first goal was coming is an understatement. At least 10 minutes of unrelenting pressure on the Iraqi goal preceded it, with defenders scrambling left and right to put out fires. The siege was such that Iraq couldn’t even move their defensive line beyond the six-yard box, which was a problem, given Mbappé had drifted out to the 18-yard line.
After buildup down the right with Jules Koundé, the assist came from Olise. It didn’t require any creative genius this time, just a simple roll of the ball into Mbappé who took the ball out of his feet and immediately hit a venomous left-footed shot across goal. Ahmed Basil was able to get his fingertips to it but could do no more. Mbappé’s celebration was fierce and voluble.
Iraq made it to the hydration break without conceding another, however. An enforced substitution, with Ali al-Hamadi replacing the injured captain, Aymen Hussein, also worked to their benefit. Following the restart, al-Hamadi immediately connected with a Merchas Doski cross, his header skimming wide of goal, and single-handedly took the game to William Saliba and Dayot Upamecano.
With 10 minutes of the half remaining, the rain began to fall. With Philadelphia Stadium almost entirely uncovered there was a communal rush to pull on waterproofs, but that quickly seemed insufficient for the conditions. As the half-time whistle blew, stadium announcers told spectators to shelter indoors and, 10 minutes later, a delay to the restart was confirmed.
What nobody in the ground knew at that time was that this was just the start. A heavy storm passed, then another came over the ground and it wasn’t until an hour and a half later that news of a potential restart began to circulate and bedraggled coaching staff began sticking training cones on the pitch ahead of a second warm-up for the players.
Play eventually restarted two hours and 11 minutes after it had paused. The stadium – and the Iraqi fans in particular – remained in a durably festive mood, perhaps influenced by the news there would be no second half hydration break. But the chants of “Iraq, Iraq, Iraq” were subdued within 10 minutes, as France took advantage of terrible defending to double their lead.
It was all Zaid Tahseen’s fault, the defender taking a goal-kick in the modern style, but overhitting the pass to his keeper. Basil got a toe to the ball but only turned it into the path of the onrushing Dembélé. He passed immediately to Mbappé who finished with ease. The fact of the former assisting the latter brought a broad smile to Deschamps’s face afterwards. It was also Mbappé’s fourth goal of the tournament, which put him one behind Messi in the race for the Golden Boot and two behind the Argentinian in their exclusive competition to become the highest scorer in World Cup history.
Dembélé went on to get his own goal on the hour, a clipped finish after typically graceful movement from Olise to tee him up. The pair were withdrawn seconds later.
“The two-hour stoppage in the game made it much harder for the players and that break could have contributed to some of our mistakes,” said the Iraq head coach, Graham Arnold. “I said to them before half-time it was all about who was going to be focused straight away. But you’ve got to look at the positives, we were playing against number one or two in the world and we out-possessed them. We wanted to keep the ball as I felt they weren’t a great pressing team. We out-possessed them but ultimately they outscored us.”
