At the end of the game against France, the thousands of Tunisians present at the Education City stadium, in Al Rayyan, Qatar, gave their country’s national team a standing ovation for their 1-0 victory over the French.
The triumph was not enough to prevent the African team from failing in its sixth attempt to advance to the World Cup knockout stage. But the fans’ recognition praised not only the players’ struggle, but also a historic feat: it was Tunisia’s first victory over a European team in World Cups.
Until then, their record had seven defeats and four draws. And it looked like the duel against the reigning world champions would bolster those numbers dramatically. In stoppage time, Antoine Griezmann equalized. After analyzing the VAR (video referee), however, the bid was canceled due to offside.
The play that was worth it and defined the match was carried out by Wahbi Khazri, who plays for Montpellier, in the 13th minute of the second half, when he finished for the back of the net after a counterattack.
Despite the Tunisian party, once again, the classification in the knockout stage did not come. In a game played simultaneously, Australia beat Denmark 1-0, also with a goal scored in the final stage, and took the second place in Group D.
The French, who already entered the field classified, changed almost the entire team. Of the athletes considered starters, only defender Ibrahima Konaté and midfielder Aurélien Tchouaméni started playing.
Needing to win to dream of a place, the Tunisians took advantage of the lack of rhythm of the French players who played little in the World Cup and went on the attack.
They even opened the scoring in the first half, with Ghandri, but he was slightly offside when completing Khazri’s cross.
After the move, France managed to balance their forces and the goalless draw before the break seemed fair given the performance of both teams.
At the restart of the game, however, Tunisia returned to show the momentum of the beginning of the game and, this time, eliminated the zero of the scoreboard. In the 13th minute, Khazri finished after a quick counterattack and opened the scoring.
At that moment, the place in the round of 16 was with the Africans. However, almost at the same time, Australia opened the scoring against Denmark and returned to the classification zone, taking out the Tunisians.
In addition to the victory, the striker’s goal prevented Tunisia from leaving Qatar without having scored a single goal. In the debut, they drew 0-0 with Denmark and, in the second duel, they lost to Australia, by 1-0.
Even though he never managed to get past the group stage in the five Cups he played before, he had at least always left a mark on the scoreboard in 1978, 1998, 2002, 2006 and 2018.
Shortly after the Tunisian goal, however, coach Didier Deschamps promoted some changes in the team, among them, the entry of shirt number 10, Kylian Mbappé.
France improved in the game, but only managed to reach a tie in stoppage time, with Griezmann, but the goal was disallowed for offside.
On the field, the Tunisians seemed to feel the apprehension of their fans, who already knew the result of the other match in the bracket, and had little chance of expanding.
Now, the French and Australians will wait for the definition of Group C (Argentina, Poland, Saudi Arabia and Mexico) to know their opponents in the knockout stage.
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