France book their place in the semi-finals.. with a helping hand from Muslera

France became the first side to book their place in the World Cup semi-finals as they saw off a stubborn Uruguay side 2-0.

A lot of the prematch talk surrounded the fitness of Edison Cavani. The PSG forward has been one of his country’s star men, particularly in the match against Portugal, but an injury in the very same game meant he was only able to make the bench.

The first big chance of the game fell to man of the moment Kylian Mbappe. Olivier Giroud headed a deep cross back across goal and it fell kindly to Mbappe some 10 yards out. However, maybe not realising he was in so much space, Mbappe decided to head it first time towards goal and it looped over the bar. In reality, he had all the time in the world to bring it down and give France the lead.

The only other noticeable talking point from the earlier exchanges was when cameras spotted Hugo Lloris looking uncomfortable. No, he wasn’t just dealing with a standard back pass but a dragonfly that had somehow found its way into his mouth. Thankfully, as this is the World Cup and there are cameras everywhere, we got to see the moment he discovered it was in his mouth and promptly spat it out. It just lacked David Attenborough’s voiceover or perhaps the Titanic theme song.

However soon after France took the lead. Antoine Griezmann whipped in a fine freekick and up popped Raphael Varane to direct a wonderful header beyond Muslera’s reach. You could see how much it meant to the defender by his celebration. The pressure on this team is very real and you could sense the relief scoring the first goal brought.

Uruguay look to respond from a freekick of their own, Martin Caceres directed his header towards the bottom corner but Hugo Lloris leapt to right hand side at full stretch, perhaps powered by that stray dragonfly, to deny Uruguay an equaliser. Diego Godin made an absolute mess of the rebound but that save didn’t deserve to be punished.

Muslera then tried to prove goalkeepers can be good footballers too but he was closed down quicker than he expected by Griezmann. The Atletico striker almost forced the ball to rebound into the goal. A needless chance taken by the stopper.

And it would go from bad to worse for Muslera in the second half. Griezmann let fly from just outside of the box but his effort was straight at the Galatasaray man. However whether it was a slight movement of the ball putting him off, the keeper got his angles all wrong and he only ended up fumbling the ball into his own net.

Uruguay tried to change things up but nothing was working. They brought on Cristian Rodriguez, otherwise known as ‘The Onion’. His only real involvement in the game was when he caught Mbappe with the faintest of touches. Like a baseball match, the benches were cleared and there were many mini battles going on all over the pitch. The Uruguayans were angry at what they felt was a lack of sportsmanship from Mbappe where as France were busy trying to protect their miniature starlet. Even Suarez and Umtiti got into it.

In the end the referee followed the protocol whenever there’s a bit of pushing and shoving: a yellow card for each man.

Jose Maria Gimenez was seen crying as the game entered stoppage time. The joy of being in the World Cup, the dream that you could win, there’s nothing else like it. Yet when reality slaps you in the face and you realise time’s up, the pain is just the same as exiting at the group stage.

France march on to the semi-finals where they’ll face either Brazil or Belgium next.