1-0 Ghana. A lot of opportunities on both sides, but Ghana played better and the pressure they put on Serbia paid off when Aleksandar Lukovic got his second yellow ('74) and Zdravko Kuzmanovic tried one of those fake-the-header handballs (ala Maradona's Hand of God) in his own box. The referee caught him and Asamoah Gyan scored the PK for the win (though it wasn't a terribly good one).
As much as I'd like to see a lot of African teams go on, I have to support my bracket predictions at some point. Here's a few reasons I think Serbia still has a chance. 1) They played better with 10 players. 2) Germany will underestimate them. 3) Bulgaria opened the '94 World Cup with a 3-0 loss to Nigeria. Things looked hopeless for them, but then a 4-0 destruction of Greece and 2-0 upset of Argentina--who had already beaten both Greece (4-0) and Nigeria (2-1)--saw them through. After that, they went all the way to the semi-finals. So an early setback isn't necessarily an ill omen. And there's gotta be an Eastern European dark horse (we like to call it a Cinderella story). Bulgaria: 4th in '94, Croatia: 3rd in 1998, Turkey: 3rd in 2002. Unluckily, Ukraine met the eventually champions in the quarterfinals of '06 and couldn't make it to the semis. I only wish that Serbia were playing Germany last instead of second. A nice 4-0 drumming of their own against Australia would really bring the spark of confidence they need to take on the soccer powerhouse. For now, I'll just pray...
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