World Cup day 18 is the day Brazil and Belgium needed to justify their favouritism against Mexico and Japan. In this post we look back at both round of 16 matches.

World Cup day 18

The 18th day of World Cup football started with Brazil versus Mexico. The evening match was Belgium versus Japan.

Brazil versus Mexico

Mexico started this match really well and showed they wanted to give Brazil a hard time. However, after the first twenty minutes Brazil really took control of this game and was the better team. Goalkeeper Ochoa saved his team a few times in the first half, but he had no chance on a tip-in from Neymar at the start of the second half. With the 1-0 lead Brazil really had this game in hand and despite a lot of effort, Mexico wasn’t able to create really big chances. A counter by Neymar who passed the ball behind Ochoa was finished by Roberto Firmino. Brazil was this match with 2-0 and qualified for the quarter final.

Belgium versus Japan

The first half of this match wasn’t the most interesting half of this tournament so far, but the second one was. Japan took a 2-0 lead within 7 minutes after the start of the second half. Belgium was on the verge of elimination and their manager decided to bring Fellaini and Chadli. What later appeared to be the golden move. Jan Vertonghen scored the 2-1 with a lucky header and then it was up to the substitutes. Marouane Fellaini scored the equaliser for Belgium and Nacer Chadli was at the end of a perfectly executed counter attack in the very last seconds of the match. This started when Courtois catched a corner ball. Kevin de Bruyne immediately started running, he received the ball, drove over the pitch to pass it to Meunier. The wingback passed it to Lukaku who was in the box, but he was so clever to let the ball go for Chadli who was in his back. Chadli finished the ball and brought Belgium to the quarter final.