England's Composed Start Overcomes Serbia’s Steely Defense in a Promising Opener

Under Gareth Southgate’s watchful eye, England has made a habit of avoiding opening-match stumbles. They win, yet each performance seems to carry a subtle reminder of areas that still require temperamental refinement. 

The build-up to this match against Serbia was charged, the air thick with nervous anticipation. It was Jude Bellingham, ever the precocious force, who rose to calm those nerves with an early header, allowing England to settle into their rhythm. But the expected fluidity was elusive, stifled by a disciplined Serbian defence, expertly orchestrated by Dragan Stojkovic.

Stojkovic placed his faith in Serbia’s leading men up front, Aleksandar Mitrovic and Dusan Vlahovic, with the crafty Dusan Tadic available on the bench. Out of possession, Serbia’s setup was calculated—a 5-4-1 formation that solidified into two formidable red walls, designed to absorb England’s incursions and test their patience.

Serbia’s approach was physical, their challenges unyielding, and England felt the brunt of it. Bellingham, who endured more than a few hard tackles, seemed to feed off the aggression, raising his game with a quiet intensity. His touches and vision decorated the first half, a testament to the maturity he’s developed since his move to Real Madrid—a schooling that has shaped him into England’s lynchpin.

Though Serbia remained compact, they rarely advanced with purpose, seldom troubling Jordan Pickford. When they did venture forward, England’s backline proved resilient, absorbing pressure with calm assurance. There would be no late drama this night; England's defence held steady.

Yet, as the final whistle blew, it was evident: England’s journey is only beginning, and tougher tests lie ahead.

Note: Excerpts from The Guardian

Thank You

Faisal Caesar 

Glorious Chaos: Serbia and Cameroon Deliver a World Cup Classic of Disorder and Drama

Chaos was never merely a byproduct; it was the main character. Two teams historically bound to footballing bedlam collided in a match that lived and breathed volatility. Serbia, a team hamstrung by injury. Cameroon, plunged into disarray after the expulsion of star goalkeeper André Onana. What followed, inevitably, was a spectacle drenched in turmoil—but oh, what sublime chaos it was.

At Al Janoub Stadium, nothing unfolded with simplicity—not the traffic, not the security protocols, and certainly not the pre-match narrative. In a moment that felt ripped from Cameroon's long, complicated footballing script, Onana was dismissed from the squad mere hours before kickoff. His crime? A refusal to abandon his modern, high-risk style of play, characterised by audacious ball-playing outside the box—an approach he executed to record-breaking effect against Switzerland.

Cameroon coach Rigobert Song framed it as a matter of principle. “We’re in a difficult tournament,” he said. “The team must come before the individual.” Song insisted Onana “wanted to step out,” but his follow-up remarks betrayed a different story. “If you can’t fit in with the discipline, with what’s required, then you need to accept responsibility.”

For Cameroon, this wasn’t new terrain. The ghosts of Italia ’90 loomed large, when internal dissent saw Joseph-Antoine Bell dropped on the eve of Cameroon’s iconic upset of Argentina. In 1994, Song's own World Cup debut was marred by such tumult in the goalkeeping ranks that each of the three keepers—Bell, N’Kono, and Songo’o—ended up playing a match. Cameroon's history, like its football, has never lacked for drama.

Initially, it seemed Serbia would add another ignominious chapter to their own chronicle of tournament collapses. Despite a bright opening—Aleksandar Mitrovic struck the post and narrowly missed again—it was Cameroon who drew first blood. Jean-Charles Castelletto prodded in from close range after a clever flick-on by Nicolas Nkoulou, and the storm clouds began to gather over the Serbian bench.

But then, in a breathtaking reversal just before halftime, Serbia struck twice in first-half stoppage time. Strahinja Pavlovic’s thumping header restored parity before Sergej Milinkovic-Savic fired a low shot past Epassy to seize the lead. When Mitrovic finally converted early in the second half, Serbia appeared to have finally exorcised their demons. At 3-1, they were not just leading—they were controlling.

And yet, Serbia is never far from a psychological unraveling.

Cameroon’s tactical shift changed everything. Song, previously cautious about deploying two strikers, introduced Vincent Aboubakar to partner Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting. The move was transformative. “We realised they were tall but tiring,” said Aboubakar, who had top-scored at the Africa Cup of Nations. “I looked to make those runs off the last defender—and they couldn’t keep up.”

What followed was pure poetry in chaos. Aboubakar latched onto Castelletto’s lofted pass, shrugged off Serbia’s towering defenders, and delivered a goal of outrageous flair—a scooped finish reminiscent of Karel Poborsky’s iconic lob at Euro ‘96. Minutes later, it was Aboubakar again, this time provider, sprinting down the right to square the ball for Choupo-Moting, who made it 3-3.

Stojkovic, ruing the injuries to Dusan Vlahovic and Luka Jovic, was left to dissect his team’s disintegration. “Two huge mistakes,” he lamented. “It is very dangerous to push high when the opponent has the ball. Completely unnecessary.”

In contrast, Song viewed Onana’s exit as a galvanizing moment. Stripped of ego, Cameroon rallied. The draw ended a miserable run of eight straight World Cup defeats. “It’s about pride,” Song said. “Responsibility. Unity.”

And yet, for all the talk of redemption, the result leaves both sides in a precarious position. A draw that felt emotionally rich was, in the standings, strategically hollow. Serbia must now defeat Switzerland to survive. Cameroon need both fortune and fortitude.

Ultimately, this was a match that celebrated football’s most ungovernable instinct: unpredictability. A clash not merely of tactics or talent, but of psychological resilience and historical weight. It was chaos—brilliant, maddening, unforgettable chaos—and for all its flaws, it reminded us why we watch.

Thank You

Faisal Caesar 

Brazil Return to the World Stage with Swagger and Steel

Yes, Brazil. Just as we remembered you. A new generation of players, a new era, a new World Cup challenge—but somehow still the same old Brazil. On a balmy night under the golden vault of Lusail Stadium, the tournament favourites delivered a performance that felt not just deliberate, but curated. It had the rhythm of theatre, the precision of orchestration, and the kind of nonchalant brilliance that causes other nations to clench their jaws in envy.

This was Brazil’s tournament opener, but it read like a familiar script. A game in three distinct acts.

Act One: Caution. Brazil began hesitantly, almost unsure of their own rhythms. They probed Serbia’s defence with tempo, but not much incision. There was more feeling out than feeling forward.

Act Two: Adjustment. As the second half began, the temperature rose. Brazil shook off their torpor. The pressure built, and eventually it broke. Richarlison’s first goal was born from a Neymar-Vinícius combination—one of several on the night—followed by the striker’s predatory finish after Vanja Milinković-Savić parried the initial shot.

Act Three: Liberation. With the dam broken, Brazil played with the kind of giddy abandon only they can make seem inevitable. Richarlison’s second was an outrageous bicycle kick—a moment of singular audacity. A goal that seemed airbrushed straight out of a commercial. Flick, swivel, airborne strike. Capoeira in boots.

Around him, the supporting cast dazzled. Vinícius Júnior was all silk and swerve; Neymar, even while hobbling off late, remained the connective tissue of every move. Raphinha brought aggression and incision on the right. And behind them, Casemiro conducted with understated brilliance, a midfield metronome whose tempo never faltered.

Brazil, on this showing, might just possess the tournament’s most potent attacking trident. Not just pace and trickery, but structure too. Balance, as Tite often preaches—not just between attack and defence, but between joy and discipline, impulse and intent.

And yet, this was no exhibition.Serbia, to their credit, came to challenge. For 45 minutes they held the line. Their plan was clear: to fight, to disrupt, to provoke. They kicked Neymar. They followed Vinícius like a shadow’s shadow. Andrija Živković, in particular, tracked him so doggedly he might as well have been assigned to his room key. The metaphor stretched: by night’s end, Živković felt like the kind of clingy guest who’d already stolen the hotel duvet.

But effort only gets you so far when your opponent is playing light. Brazil were inexorable. They kept knocking, prying, teasing. Like a determined hand in a nearly-empty bag of pistachios, they eventually found the stubborn nut that would open the game.

Casemiro hit the bar. Tite turned to his embarrassment of riches: Rodrygo, Martinelli, Antony—all unleashed with the casual menace of a team that could afford to treat the closing stages as a workshop. Brazil had already sealed the deal.

Of course, they are no longer automatic favourites. Since 2010, their World Cup record against European sides is patchy: three wins in nine. They’ve had to grind more, shine less. But this match, perhaps, reminded us of what Brazil still are when they choose to be: confident, flamboyant, just a little bit arrogant. A team that doesn’t just play to win—but plays to remind you of who they are.

Welcome back, Brazil. The music hasn’t changed. The notes are still golden.

Thank You

Faisal Caesar

Brazil 2 – 0 Serbia: A Controlled Advance Amid Emotional Reverberations

There was joy for Brazil in Moscow—measured, methodical joy—though tinged with a peculiar shade of schadenfreude. As Tite’s maturing side secured a 2-0 victory over Serbia to claim safe passage into the World Cup knockout rounds, news filtered through from Kazan that reigning champions Germany had been undone by South Korea. The ripple was immediate: jubilant cheers from the press gallery, euphoria in yellow from the stands, and a collective exhale from a footballing nation ever-haunted by the ghosts of 2014.

The specter of a last-16 clash with Germany—Brazil’s tormentor in that infamous Belo Horizonte unravelling—was banished in an instant. Instead, they will meet Mexico in Samara, a prospect far less burdened by traumatic narrative. And yet, despite the clarity of the result, something more opaque lingers in Brazil’s performance—a blend of technical elegance and psychological fragility, poised delicately on the edge of brilliance and breakdown.

In the lead-up, Brazil’s emotional equilibrium had become a national obsession. Tite, a statesman-like figure on the touchline, found himself fielding questions not about tactics or fitness, but about the appropriate volume and frequency of crying. The sobs of Neymar from the previous match had dominated headlines—an image that, whether genuine or performative, told of a team wrestling with the magnitude of its own mythology.

There were no tears here, only moments of grace punctuated by stretches of tactical ambiguity. Brazil began with poise and possession, moving the ball neatly through the triangle of Coutinho, Neymar, and Gabriel Jesus. It was Coutinho, again, who emerged as Brazil’s fulcrum—dropping deep to orchestrate tempo, releasing runners with balletic ease, and ultimately fashioning the opening goal with a sublime lofted pass for Paulinho to finish.

The goal was not merely a product of technique, but of vision—Coutinho spotting not just space, but possibility. In this Brazilian side, he is the conductor, while Neymar remains the soloist—brilliant in fragments, excessive in his flourishes.

Indeed, Neymar’s performance was once again a curious tapestry of industry and indulgence. He registered the most touches, the most shots, and displayed occasional glimmers of the otherworldly talent that made him a global icon. Yet each flash was counterbalanced by histrionics. When a light hand was laid upon his shoulder, he fell as though smitten by divine fury—a pantomime of agony so implausible it seemed almost designed to parody itself. That he is targeted is undoubted. That he invites—and perhaps even craves—the spotlight of conflict is equally undeniable.

Brazil’s first-half dominance was periodically undermined by Serbia’s physical assertiveness in midfield. Nemanja Matic and Sergej Milinkovic-Savic found joy in the spaces left open by Brazil’s light-touch central structure. Casemiro and Paulinho, dogged though they were, at times found themselves isolated and outnumbered. It is a vulnerability Mexico may well seek to exploit, having already dismantled a similar midfield axis in their victory over Germany.

Serbia, meanwhile, offered brief surges of menace—most notably after the interval. A spilled cross by Alisson almost fell kindly to Aleksandar Mitrovic, whose threat in the air remained constant. But as Serbia pressed, they exposed themselves. In the 68th minute, from a corner Thiago Silva rose—unmarked, undisturbed—and powered a header past Stojkovic. The game was sealed not with a flourish, but with a thud: authoritative and irreversible.

Around it all loomed the Spartak Stadium, its heavy steel girders and sprawling roof closing in like a modern coliseum. It is a compact venue by this tournament’s grand standards, and on this muggy Moscow night, it felt intimate with tension. A defeat would have sent Brazil crashing out at the group stage for the first time since 1966. Instead, they advanced with a sense of gathering cohesion, if not quite conviction.

Brazil remain a side in search of a definitive statement—a 90-minute thesis of superiority. This was not that. It was measured, it was intermittently stylish, and it was enough. Perhaps for now, that is what this tournament demands: survival laced with evolution.

They move on, then, to Samara—not as champions-elect, but as contenders still refining their shape, still negotiating the psychological inheritance of a nation that does not simply play the World Cup, but lives inside it.

Thank You

Faisal Caesar