Next came a 2-0 loss to the U.S.<\/a>, then a scoreless draw with Paraguay. When Emam Ashour\u2019s header in the 13th minute found the left side of the net, it had all the looks of an insurmountable lead.\u00a0<\/p>\nArticle continues below this ad<\/p>\n
Australia couldn\u2019t even in good conscience claim the game-tying goal in the 55th minute of the second half.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Not when it came off the noggin of Egypt\u2019s Mohamed Hany, his second own goal of the World Cup.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Sooner or later, you figure one of the Pharaohs would have to ask Hany just whose side he\u2019s on, anyway.<\/p>\n
For the first knockout win in Egypt\u2019s history, the Pharaohs probably earned the right to play Argentina, the defending champs.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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Of course, such a cynical statement misses the point of the World Cup. The goal for most isn\u2019t winning, really. France is a formidable favorite, with only a handful of nations in its class.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The mission for most is to hang at the party until someone throws you out.<\/p>\n
As a veteran of 10 Olympics, eight on foreign soil, I can tell you they are no comparison to a World Cup. Not the crowds, anyway. Brazilians were so over it in Rio, they practically boycotted events. The demand for Friday\u2019s game at JerryWorld wasn\u2019t the same as it was for Argentina, when so-so tickets on the secondary market went for more than $2,000. The same seats went for $700 Friday, which still ain\u2019t cheap. Yet more than 70,000 packed the place.<\/p>\n
Hosting an international event of this magnitude has, indeed, been an eye-opener. I don\u2019t have any great memories from my abbreviated work detail at Cotton Bowl matches in 1994. Then again, I don\u2019t remember breakfast.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The closest we usually get around here to games between sovereign nations is Texas-OU.<\/p>\n
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The good news is the World Cup hasn\u2019t come with any controversies locally. Not so much at other sites, some of it hard to explain to the layman. Ecuador\u2019s Piero Hincapi\u00e9\u00a0was red-carded for speaking to a player from Mexico with his hand over his mouth. Where I come from, it\u2019s simply the polite thing to do with your mouth full, which apparently was the case with Hincapi\u00e9.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Closer to home, the U.S. suffered a major blow when Folarin Balogun, one of the team’s best scoring threats, was red-carded after a replay for stomping a Bosnian player\u2019s ankle, even if it didn\u2019t appear to be his intent. Bad call. Some made the point that Messi committed a far more egregious offense earlier in the tournament, and he didn\u2019t get carded.<\/p>\n
No one had to explain that one to me. Here in America, we call it the \u201csuperstar rule,\u201d because superstars make the rules.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The only player of a similar caliber at JerryWorld on Friday was Egypt\u2019s Mo Salah, who was questionable going in with a bum leg. Fans hoisted flags with his picture and \u201cKing of Egypt\u201d scrawled underneath. The 34-year-old former Liverpool star, who figures it might be his final World Cup, wasn\u2019t about to sit this one out.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Even scored a penalty kick that left Australia\u2019s keeper on his bum.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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\u201cIt\u2019s history,\u201d Salah said of Egypt\u2019s first knockout win ever. \u201cI told the boys before the game this is the biggest stage you can play in your life.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The party rolls on for the Pharaohs, anyway. Sam the Sham would be down with that.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"John Hanna of Tampa (center) cheers as Egypt players go around the field to greet the crowd following…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":360469,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[102,104,103,121655,87907,87906],"class_list":["post-360468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-dallas","tag-dallas","tag-dallas-headlines","tag-dallas-news","tag-tp-at-t-stadium","tag-tp-arlington","tag-tp-world-cup"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=360468"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360468\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/360469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=360468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=360468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=360468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}