Neymar scores twice (and escapes a sending off) as Oscar stunner rounds off opening win for hosts

Jun 13, 2014 Sports

Oscar scored the goal of the night, so in the end it did not matter. A lovely little prod, knowing Croatian goalkeeper Stipe Pletikosa was dreadfully slow down, put sufficient distance between these teams to restore credibility.

Neymar puts his penalty past Stipe Pletikosa despite the Croatia keeper getting a hand to it.

Until that moment, however, this was one for the conspiracy theorists. After the penalty that gave Brazil the lead, and Croatia’s disallowed goal, if this is the way the World Cup is to be won, it appears the scandals will not be limited to events off the field.
One of the softest penalty decisions of recent memory was all that divided the teams until Oscar intervened in the last minute, giving the more extreme cynics a head start on their speculation about the lengths the governing body will go to in order to keep the hosts in the tournament.
Brazil had the best of the game, but were struggling to find a way through when Fred – not as exciting a forward as his name suggests – backed in to Dejan Lovren and then fell beneath the merest contact from the Croatian defender. Yuichi Nishimura, the Japanese referee, needed no second invitation to do the bidding of the Arena Corinthians and pointed to the spot. Brazil’s No 10 did the rest.
Neymar is the first Brazilian wearing that famous shirt to score a goal in the World Cup since Rivaldo in 2002. In fact, he got two. Yet while Brazil’s first-half equaliser showed the hosts at their best – despite the assistance of some poor goalkeeping – the second saw FIFA’s match officials at their worst.
Croatia deserved a point here, for their determination to play Brazil as equals – and can even count themselves unlucky not to have kept out Neymar’s attempt from the spot. The man of the hour jockeyed to the left, stuttered and half-stopped before shooting, but goalkeeper Pletikosa still got both hands to the ball, only to divert it into the side of the net, rather than around the post.
By the time Ivan Perisic had put the ball into an unguarded net, with seven minutes remaining, only for Nishimura to blow for a very soft foul on goalkeeper Julio Cesar, it was only too apparent the way this match was going.
The way it needed to go. This is undoubtedly a coincidence; but a rather handy one, nonetheless, as some will be quick to point out. When he assesses the replays nobody owes Oscar a greater vote of thanks than Nishimura.
Croatia’s game plan from the start was sheer common sense. Not coach Niko Kovac’s decision to set out a tight 4-3-3 as such, but his decision to play, not Brazil, but the 11 players in front of him.
To play the team that included the ineffectual Tottenham Hotspur midfielder Paulinho, and Oscar who couldn’t get in Chelsea’s team by the end, and David Luiz who was always regarded, in the Premier League at least, as a bit of a flake.
Given the spine-tingling atmosphere before the game – Brazil’s national anthem carried on accapella after the band had finished performing with the players joining the fans in an extra chorus, some of the close to tears with the intensity of it – it would have been easy for Croatia to capitulate.
So many do, faced with those famous canary yellow shirts – but Croatia have a history and proud colours of their own, and it showed in the way they began the game. They were not intimidated, and certainly not along for the ride. They hadn’t written this game off better to concentrate on Mexico and Cameroon, the other Group A opponents. They played Brazil as if they were vulnerable, as if their players would be burdened by the pressure of the tournament and, at first, it worked.

An emotional Oscar celebrates scoring Brazil’s clincher

Croatia had the initial chance of the game, ordinary and wide from Mateo Kovacic, but the fact it came within the opening minute showed an ambition few had expected. Croatia went for it, with surprising success, considering many had talked up Brazil’s back-line ahead of its forwards at this World Cup.
In the seventh minute, Ivica Olic should have put them ahead when he met Perisic’s cross at the far post, but buried a header into the pitch and wide. Just four minutes later, the dynamic of the evening turning on its head as Croatia took the lead.
Brazil had still not mustered a chance of worth – David Luiz had a soft header saved after six minutes – when Croatia went deservedly ahead. It was Olic again down the left flank, skinning Dani Alves and hitting a low cross which should have been finished by Nikica Jelavic at the near post.
The Hull City striker scuffed his shot though and the ball skidded through to Marcelo who, surprised, could only run it into his own net. No Brazilian has ever scored an own goal at the World Cup and to do it on such a stage – in front of his own crowd, no less – must have felt calamitous for the Real Madrid man.
It is incredible the way sport throws up these extremes. Last month Marcelo’s appearance as a substitute was credited with turning the Champions League final in Real Madrid’s favour. Now here he was trundling the ball past his own goalkeeper Julio Cesar to the astonishment of the Brazilian nation.
Within five minutes the floodlights had gone out in a quarter of the stadium – it was off the host nation was shutting down in horror. Yet Croatia’s goal acted as a catalyst – and the true Brazil emerged.
They bounced back, bravely, energetically, to level the scores by half-time through Neymar. That this World Cup’s poster boy should score the first Brazilian goal was fitting: whether he should have been on the field by then is another matter.
In the 27th minute, he jumped for a ball with Luka Modric. Before he leapt, however, glanced across to check the position of his opponent and, when he went up, poked a forearm in his face. The look was the key. Referees will sometimes let such incidents slide if it looks inadvertent, but Neymar knew precisely what he was doing. So did Croatia, who reacted instantly.
Referee Nishimura brandished a yellow card, instantly, but could just as easily have reached for red. It would have been a brave man who sent off Brazil’s hero in waiting in front of his home crowd less than 30 minutes into his first World Cup game, though. Few referees are that brave.
The price of Nishimura’s leniency was high for Croatia, though, for two minutes later Neymar equalised. Oscar did the hard yards, mopping up in midfield and riding two challenges to slip the ball to his team-mate, and there was undoubtedly contributory negligence from goalkeeper Pletikosa who fell with all the grace of the giant in Jack and the Beanstalk, but it was a priceless moment, nonetheless.
Neymar’s shot did not have great power and it wasn’t struck cleanly, either, but he somehow squirrelled it away, low, into a corner and with Pletikosa going down in instalments, as the professionals say, it was enough to level the scores via the inside of a post.
Sadly, Pletikosa’s clumsiness erased the memory of a fine save made from an Oscar shot earlier, but that is the nature of World Cups. Moments, moments.