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GROUP G
Cameroon 1-0 Brazil, Serbia 2-3 Switzerland
Brazil takes on Cameroon looking for at least a draw to top group G while Serbia takes on Switzerland in a direct qualification tie. Brazil's rotated starting lineup could not breakthrough Cameroon's organized defenses and Ederson denied Cameroon to take the lead on the counter a couple of times. Meanwhile, Switzerland takes the lead as Veteran Xherdan Shaqiri strikes Djibril Sow's assist in the back of the net 20 minutes into the first half.
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Six minutes later, Dusan Tadic sent a cross that Aleksandar Mitrovic heads into goal with ease to level the score. Dusan Vlahovic took the lead for Serbia by punishing a poor attempt at clearing the ball. Serbia becomes 2nd in the group with the lead which only continued for 9 minutes before Breel Embolo taps in Silvan Widmer low cross to level the score again and retain the all important qualifying spot.
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In the second half, Switzerland added a third goal when Ruben Vargas heel flick finds Remo Frueler in the 6 yards box to finish the ball in the net. The result in both matches did not change until Cameroon striker Vincent Aboubakar had the strangest heroic exit scoring from a header in the added time of the second half assisted by Jerome Mbekeli.
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Aboubakar was earlier booked for pulling down a Brazilian player on a dangerous counter attack and choose to take off his jersey to celebrate yet another upset before the referee (smiling) shows him a second yellow card followed by a red card making this probably the happiest (only?) sending off in the history of the World Cup.
GROUP H
South Korea 2-1 Portugal, Ghana 0-2 Uruguay
A heavily rotated Portugal lineup takes on Korea Republic in MD-3 while Uruguay and Ghana are expected to battle it out for qualification. It did not take long for Portugal to find the net thanks to Ricardo Horta assisted by Diogo Dalot at the 5th minute. Shortly after, Ghana were awarded a penalty but Uruguay goalkeeper Sergio Rochet stopped Andre Ayew from scoring. Almost simultaneously, Uruguay and Korea scored their first goal of the match. Gioregian de Arrascaeta followed through on a saved Luis Suarez shot on goal to give Uruguay the lead while Kim Young Gwon made no mistake finishing a bouncing loose ball in the back of the net to level the score with Portugal.
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The one goal lead was enough for Uruguay to overtake second place from Ghana 27 minutes into the match and 5 minutes later Gioregian scored his second goal from a Luis Suarez assist to extend Uruguay’s lead. The first half or Uruguay vs Ghana had a longer added time which resulted in Portugal vs Korea to resume almost 10 minutes earlier for the second half.
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The second half lacked goals but attempts were several from all four teams without success. Right when the clock hit 90 minutes, Hueng Min Son was running on the counter from a cleared corner kick for Portugal. The Tottenham winger was criticised heavily before the match and he answered his critics with probably the best through pass so far in the World Cup putting Hwang Hee Chan in a one on one with the keeper to score the winning goal. After the final whistle, Korea was ahead of Uruguay in ranking (2nd place) on goals scored in the group stage since they are tied on 4 points and zero goal difference. The Korean had to wait for more than 10 minutes for the final whistle in Uruguay vs Ghana to celebrate qualification to the round of 16.
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