I was eagerly waiting to see how England skipper Steven Gerrard reacts with his club Liverpool’s talisman, but the day’s opponent, Luis Suarez. A loss in their respective opening games turned the fixture at the Arena de Sao Paulo into a do-or-die situation, and England knew their major threat would be the Uruguayan goal machine Suarez.
Suarez, who netted 31 goals for Liverpool in the last season, simply smiled at Gerrard while shaking hands after the national anthems were played. Gerrard in return patted his club’s striker back and probably wished him good luck.
In his career, Suarez made the headline on many occasions – may it be biting an opponent in the league, scoring spectacular goals or stopping the ball with his hands at the goal-line in a World Cup quarterfinal against Ghana.
With Liverpool, Suarez was seen crying on the pitch after they lost the English Premier League title on the final matchday. On Friday too he broke down into tears, but this time it was different. It was a burst of emotion borne out of happiness. Happiness of scoring two goals for Uruguay in front of a crowd of over 62,000 and most importantly keeping them alive in the World Cup. The win moved Uruguay to a great position of reaching the knockouts while for England it remains a far-fetched dream.
After Suarez’s season with Liverpool ended he started to experience pain and discomfort in his knee and opted for knee surgery at the end of May that kept him out of Uruguay’s final qualifiers, training sessions, and their opening-round match against Costa Rica which they lost 3-1.
His presence and movement in the field is a constant threat to the opponent and a half-fit Suarez was enough to seal the deal against England, where he has half a dozen of his club mates.
The stadium, packed with support for the South Americans, erupted upon hearing the striker’s name in the line-up who did not disappoint at all. A cleverly taken corner nearly sneaked through the near post in the opening minutes as Joe Hart’s quick reflex came to the rescue, but Hart was left with no chance when the Uruguayan’s calm header was placed across with perfection a few minutes later.
England did crawl back in the game courtesy of Wayne Rooney’s first World Cup strike, but with Suarez on the pitch Uruguay had every chance of restoring the lead. In the end it was the English captain Gerrard culpable again as, not for the first time on the big occasion this season, a mistake in midfield has cost his side dear (an attempted header from the English captain which saw the ball brushing his head and fall perfectly onto the path of Suarez) as Suarez showed no mercy in unleashing a powerful and pinpoint strike to beat the onrushing Hart.
“This is incredible. I had told my team-mates that I had a dream of scoring two goals in this match,” said Suarez who was visibly emotional after the result. “We had to win this match and we did it playing like Uruguay does in these kind of games. Now we have to think about Italy, another very important rival.”
“This victory is for all those people who said so many bad things about the team, it’s for them.”
No other Uruguayan player has scored more goals for the national side than Suarez who took his tally to 41 on Friday and only 27 years old now, it can safely be said there are many more to come.
