Sports
Copa America: Exciting Facts As Brazil Advance To Quarterfinals
By Ekene Dike
Brazil fought back from a goal down to overcome Colombia 2-1 in the Copa America. The victory confirmed Brazil’s passage to the quarterfinal as they became the first team from Group B to secure qualification. The five times world champions have now joined Argentina and Chile in the next round.
Luiz Diaz scored an exquisite scissor kick to give Colombia a flying start before Roberto Firmino restored parity and Casemiro headed home a last minute winner from Neymar’s corner kick.
With this result, Brazil maintain their perfect record in the Copa America while Colombia stay on 4 points. They have qualified for the next round but they will have to wait for the final fixtures to define in what position.
However, Brazil’s win over Colombia and qualification were not the only major headlines. There were exciting facts from the game among which are that:
• Colombia has scored 5 goals against Brazil in the Tite era. No other team has scored as many goals in this period against Brazil.
• Brazil have only lost 2 of their 11 games against Colombia at the CONMEBOL Copa América (8 wins, 1 losses). The 2 defeats both came in Chile in 1991 and 2015. Wednesday was the third time the two have met in Brazil and Brazil have never lost (2 wins, 1 draw).
• As well as scoring the first goal Brazil had conceded in 6 games, Colombia is the first team to go in at halftime ahead against the Seleção since Argentina in 2019. On that occasion Argentina held their 1-0 lead while Colombia lost 2-1.
• The Casemiro goal on 99:22 minutes was the second latest in the CONMEBOL Copa América since at least 2011. During this period only Chile have scored later with Arturo Vidal putting one past Bolivia on 99:48 minutes.
• Tite has overtaken Sebastião Lazaroni as the manager with the longest unbeaten streak at the CONMEBOL Copa América with 8. Mario Zagallo is the only boss with a longer undefeated run with 12 games in the competition (10 wins, 2 draws).
DATA: OPTA
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