Mriin 0 - 2 Brenecia
(4-3-3) 1 - Farrell; 2 - Broxham (22 - Beath 86'), 5 - Horgan, 6 - Mathers, 3 - Quill (c); 8 - Matheson, 23 - Fallon, 13 - Wheeler; 7 - Cheney (15 - Coghlan 75'), 9 - Ciogach (17 - Lindauer 64'), 16 - Fletcher
Goals: Matheson 47', Lindauer 71'
The funny thing was, at the interval, this was looking like 'one of those days' for both sides.
Any Brenecian in the world, with one exception, could point to the fact that their first shot of the game caromed off the upright just five minutes in, Corby Wheeler only able to laugh in disbelief. They could point to the two, three times that the Patriots had utterly gashed the Mriin defence with pace that had been foiled by heavy touches from someone, somewhere. They could talk about how Mara Solaani had saved spectacularly off a Wheeler free kick, and flung out a boot to deny Lauren Cheney from close range.
The one exception, Tailtiu Brennan, could point to the fact that Otalia Kasmeer really should have been given a penalty for Keane Mathers shoving her in the spine, or to Tia Mor's cross to the exact place that Solara Vol's far-post run would have reached three years ago. She would have pointed to the fact that Yonen had thrashed a shot into the side netting when it had seemed easier to score.
Funny thing was it suited them both as things stood, with Darmen jumping up and down on a limp South Covello. Barring a Covellan comeback, both sides would get through.
The rest of the game was no less bizarre. Both sides set out pretty much the same way, but the game turned on its head almost immediately. Kasmeer was flattened by Fallon, the ball came to Wheeler who pivoted quickly, passed it to Quill who centred it beautifully to split open two Mriin defenders and find Elysse Matheson gliding onto the end of it and arrowing between Solaani's feet. 1-0, and some fans hadn't even managed to retake their seats.
And yet so long as Darmen held their lead over South Covello, Mriin were still set to progress on just three points. Two nations had already been eliminated on six.
The match took on the obvious pattern from there. Brenecia sat back smugly on the counter, Mriin slung in cross after cross for the hulking Vol and Taani. Garrett Horgan, impressively, was a match in the air; Keane Mathers, not quite. So the wingers were pegged back to help deal with the aerial assault, while a couple dangerous headers from Taani were flicked away deftly by Cass Farrell.
Creidne Lindauer came on at some stage to replace the exhausted Kara Ciogach. Lindauer was worse in all aspects apart from pace, but pace and freshness were what were needed right now. Brennan frowned, and stayed the course, right up until Corby Wheeler continued her quietly effective game by splitting the defence at the key moment. Lindauer brushed off Kress' shoulder, took the ball in stride with a perfect first touch to open her body for the strike, and buried the ball past Solaani.
Tailtiu Brennan, unusually, had to turn to her phone to figure out what to do. And what that turned out to be was... sitting back more cautiously and defending a 2-0 deficit, for that deficit still saw them through provided Darmen didn't score again, or provided South Covello didn't score twice. And at no stage had South Covello ever been easy to score against or prolific in front of goal themselves.
So the game ... kind of petred out. It wasn't a fix, but neither side had any incentive to go forward and both had more than enough to sit back. Both back fours stroked around the ball a bit. Ronan Fallon got some practice.
And then, at the end, disaster struck for Mriin. Perhaps out of embarrassment, both sides at least felt somewhat honourbound to continue to play football, but this meant that a tired, underhit pass back from Yonen vaguely in the direction of Bruun could still be rocketed onto by Lindauer, who wasted no time cutting inside, out and falling over the moment she felt some contact with Kress. Was it a penalty? Probably. But perhaps less so than Kasmeer's, not given.
No matter. Garrett Horgan was here, with the ball in hand. A burly centre-half, a late bloomer, entrusted with these moments because he had nerves of steel. On the other end, Mara Solaani. Union vs. Kingsgrove, playing out on the world stage.
The whistle blew. Horgan took three steps back, one deep breath, raced forward and smashed the ball into the stratosphere.
Banija were next up. A rematch from qualifying, and qualifying had seen Banija reaffirm their slight edge. And yet, they were ... some combination of tie-breakers away from having taken an early fall despite two victories. Not enough of a wobble to question their form. Anyone could lose to Farfadillis. Most countries did. But still there was some hope.
Brenecia knew better than most nations that if you just had an excellent manager with a polished squad of trusted, disciplined battlers, you could beat anyone on your day so long as you could throw them off theirs. And this time, they had an edge; they were all very, very fast.
