Ecuador, led by the Argentine coach Gustavo Alfaro, drew 1-1 this Friday with the Netherlands at the Khalifa International stadium, for the second date of Group A of the Qatar 2022 World Cup, and dreams of qualifying for the round of 16. In the decisive day they will face Senegal and will catch up with a tie to advance to the next phase.
The Netherlands struck from the start and took the lead at the start of the initial stage with a left-footed shot from Cody Gakpo, scorer of one of the goals in his debut against Senegal, who overcame the resistance of goalkeeper Hernán Galíndez.
However, Ecuador charged in the plugin and tied it at the start of the plugin with a goal from the historic scorer Enner Valencia, who captured a rebound and broke the goal on Andries Noppert’s goal.
The first half had shown an intense start for Louis van Gaal’s team, who quickly took the lead with Gakpo’s great goal. In the long run, this situation would be the only one available to the Dutch team in that period.
The South American team paid a high price for a ball sold in the setback, which the PSV Eindhoven winger billed with a left-footed shot from mid-distance, after looking for space for the shot.
But being at a disadvantage generated the reaction of Ecuador, because those led by Alfaro went in search of a tie with Gustavo Plata as the banner and starred in several goal situations.
In the second half, Ecuador completely dominated the game and Estupiñán had revenge because his shot led to Noppert’s save and the rebound was used by Valencia to seal the tie.
From then on it was all for the South American team, who even had a shot off the crossbar and had no luck to take the well-deserved victory, so they had to settle for equality.
With this result, the Netherlands and Ecuador add four points in the table, where Senegal appears behind with three, while the host Qatar has already run out of chances of advancing to the next instance of the World Cup.
On the last date, the Netherlands will seek to seal their ticket to the round of 16 against the weak Qatar next Tuesday at 12, the same day and time that Ecuador will do its own against Senegal, in a decisive duel for the aspirations of both.
