{"id":779727,"date":"2026-07-05T02:40:14","date_gmt":"2026-07-05T02:40:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/779727\/"},"modified":"2026-07-05T02:40:14","modified_gmt":"2026-07-05T02:40:14","slug":"world-cup-quick-hits-mo-salah-shows-his-class-to-socceroos-paraguay-labelled-a-disgrace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/779727\/","title":{"rendered":"World Cup quick hits: Mo Salah shows his class to Socceroos, Paraguay labelled a ‘disgrace’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mo Salah’s classy post-penalty act to the stricken Socceroos and a Paraguay team blasted as a “disgrace”.<\/p>\n

Also, Jesse Marsch goes all Bazball after Canada’s defeat, as a goalkeeper goes walkabout.<\/p>\n

Here are today’s World Cup quick hits.<\/p>\n

1. Paraguay acts out as France plays up<\/p>\n

France came into their clash as heavy favourites, and absolutely dominated a Paraguay team who have at best stumbled<\/a>, at worst kicked, their way into the last 16 of the tournament.<\/p>\n

France made 568 passes and had 76 per cent possession, while Paraguay only made 183. France made more successful passes than that in the final third alone (199).<\/p>\n

But it was still a desperate slog for Les Bleus, who only scored thanks to a VAR awarded penalty for a foul on D\u00e9sir\u00e9 Dou\u00e9.<\/p>\n

\"France<\/p>\n

Players came together after Kylian Mbapp\u00e9 was hauled down. (Getty Images: Anadolu\/Abdulhamid Hosbas)<\/p>\n

The frustration was clearly rising for the French, with Paraguay unashamedly deploying more dark arts than you’d read about in a Harry Potter book.<\/p>\n

The Paraguayan team did everything possible to disrupt the penalty being taken, with Gustavo Vel\u00e1zquez sneaking in behind the referee to dig up the penalty spot with two, well-aimed prods with his boot.<\/p>\n

It didn’t matter, Kylian Mbapp\u00e9 scored and ran off with a mocking grin on his face.<\/p>\n

He smiled even through all the niggle throughout the rest of the game, with Mbapp\u00e9 being kicked out at by Juan Jos\u00e9 C\u00e1ceres. There was an elbow into the chest of Dayot Upamecano by Gabriel \u00c1valos. A collection of embarrassing dives from any number of players, and the French largely kept their cool.<\/p>\n

\"Paraguay<\/p>\n

Gustavo Vel\u00e1zquez dug up the penalty spot when the referee was not looking. (Supplied: SBS)<\/p>\n

“The Paraguay players were an absolute disgrace tonight. If they were on my team, I’d be dragging half of them off the pitch,” former English goalkeeper Joe Hart told the BBC.<\/p>\n

“I would never want to win that way and I would never want to play football that way.<\/p>\n

“The fact that not one Paraguayan was booked inside the 90 minutes is astonishing.”<\/p>\n

They gave away more fouls than the French, who were shown three by referee Ilgiz Tantashev of Uzbekistan.<\/p>\n

“That is probably the worse referee performance I’ve seen at this tournament,” former Germany midfielder Thomas Hitzlsperger told the BBC, potentially with vested interests given the Paraguayan’s knocked Germany out in the round of 32.<\/p>\n

But then again, who knows how Paraguay would have gone at this World Cup if they’d tried to play football?<\/p>\n

2. A stinker in Philadelphia<\/p>\n

As the heat rose on the pitch thanks to Paraguay’s deployment of the dark arts, the temperature was well and truly high off the pitch as well.<\/p>\n

The US National Weather Service said the city hit a high of 38.3C.<\/p>\n

\"Ousmane<\/p>\n

Players needed to do everything possible to say cool in the Philadelphia heat. (Getty Images: FIFA\/Patrick Smith)<\/p>\n

That is far from the hottest ever World Cup game played, though.<\/p>\n

When the US last hosted the World Cup, in in 1994, Mexico played Ireland in Orlando when the temperature reached a staggering 43C.<\/p>\n

A midday kick off and a Florida summer was never going to be a good idea, but Ireland still managed to claim a 1-0 victory.<\/p>\n

3. Moral wins for Marsch?<\/p>\n

Losing to Morocco left Canada coach Jesse Marsch sick to the stomach.<\/p>\n

Having watched his side come flying out of the blocks and absolutely dominating the early exchanges, by the time of the first hydration break Canada had managed four shots to Morocco’s nil, and had 12 touches in the opposition’s box, to Morocco’s nil.<\/p>\n

That being said, Morocco turned it up after half time and won 3-0.<\/p>\n

And although Marsch had every reason to be incredibly proud of his side, the former Leeds United manager did go a bit Bazball in his post-match comments.<\/p>\n

\"Jesse<\/p>\n

Jesse Marsch said he would rather be in his team’s shoes than Morocco’s. (Getty Images: FIFA\/Hector Vivas)<\/p>\n

“We were the better team. They made a couple more plays than us but cracking up the intensity was not the issue, it’s just they had a bit of quality in the final third and we lacked the ability to make a play when we needed to,” Marsch said.<\/p>\n

“In terms of match the plan, [the] idea, believing in themselves and taking a top team to the limit, we were the much better team in the first half and even the beginning of the second half.<\/p>\n

“What a privilege our fans have to follow a team like this that goes after the game like this and doesn’t play defensive and shows they can be better.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I’d rather be us than them. As good as Morocco are, I’d rather be us. I couldn’t be happier.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

I bet Morocco will be thinking exactly that as they line up for their quarterfinal.<\/p>\n

4. Rush keeper<\/p>\n

There is nothing better than seeing a team throw caution to the wind, whatever the sport is.<\/p>\n

In football, the best illustration of this is when a goalkeeper abandons his goal and advances to the ratified air of the opposition penalty box, just as Maxime Cr\u00e9peau did in Houston. Twice.<\/p>\n

This is very much a break-glass in case of an emergency option, not unlike the benching of a goal tender in ice hockey when teams are searching for a goal to get them back into the contest, and was absolutely necessary for Canada, trailing as they did 2-0.<\/p>\n

\"Yassine<\/p>\n

Maxime Cr\u00e9peau couldn’t score past Yassine Bounou. (Getty Images: Lars Baron)<\/p>\n

And there is precedent for it to work too.<\/p>\n

In the 98th minute of a Champions League tie against Real Madrid in January this year, in fact, Benfica’s Ukranian keeper Anatoliy Trubin scored a last-gasp header to give Benfica a 4-2 win, as well as improving the team’s goal difference enough to qualify for the play-offs.<\/p>\n

Brazilian keeper Alisson Bekker scored in a similar way for Liverpool in 2021<\/a>, glancing home from Trent Alexander-Arnold’s corner to become just the sixth keeper to score a goal in Premier League history, and the first to score a winner.<\/p>\n

The 32-year-old Cr\u00e9peau twice came forward as Canada pushed for a last-gasp moment of quality or chaos in the death throes of its World Cup campaign.<\/p>\n

Cr\u00e9peau was always up against scoring though. No goalkeeper has ever scored in the opposition goal in World Cup history.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And such was the case here too, when on neither occasion could he make contact, with Yassine Bounou punching clear.<\/p>\n

Bounou’s intervention was a blow for Canada in more ways than one \u2014 the Moroccan custodian was actually born in Montreal to Moroccan parents, moving back to north Africa aged three.<\/p>\n

5. Salah’s class in victory<\/p>\n

There may be no worse feeling in sport than being knocked out of a tournament via a penalty shoot out.<\/p>\n

Conversely, there can be no greater release of joy than prevailing in one, the juxtaposing feelings playing out at opposite ends of the field.<\/p>\n

\"Mo<\/p>\n

Mo Salah went straight over to the beaten Australian players. (Getty Images: FIFA\/Ryan Pierse)<\/p>\n

So as almost all Egyptian players tore off after Hossam Abdelmaguid following his successful fourth penalty, and Australia’s brave Socceroos stood motionless on half way<\/a>, it was heartening to see Egypt’s totemic captain Mo Salah walk over to the vanquished Socceroos to shake their hands.<\/p>\n

Only after had he congratulated his opponents, did he go and celebrate.<\/p>\n

The ferocity of elite sport often relegates such sporting moments to glimpses of light amidst a maelstrom of aggression.<\/p>\n

Which make moments like Salah’s shine all the brighter, and is why they need to be celebrated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mo Salah’s classy post-penalty act to the stricken Socceroos and a Paraguay team blasted as a “disgrace”. Also,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":779728,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[131204,64,63,2065,5579,16135,2592,369258,69800,367960,7104,42150,85,21418],"class_list":["post-779727","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-2026-world-cup","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-canada","tag-egypt","tag-fifa-world-cup","tag-france","tag-jesse-marsch","tag-kylian-mbappe","tag-mo-salah","tag-paraguay","tag-socceroos","tag-sports","tag-world-cup"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/779727","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=779727"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/779727\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/779728"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=779727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=779727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=779727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}