Brazil knock-out Ghana 3-0 to grab quarter-final place

Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Brazil are through to the quarter-finals of the Fifa World Cup after a comfortable 3-0 win over Ghana, Tuesday.

Ghana seemed to dictate the style of this match; with their defensive back four near to the half-way line Brazil was kept out of shooting range. While Ghana could not stop the reigning champions scoring on three counter-attacks they achieved slightly more ball possession and shots on goal over the game.

The Africans out shot the South Americans 18:11 but were not very accurate, often wide from long range. Brazil looked much more deadly going forward and got ten out of their 11 shots on target.

Ratomir Dujkovic's team's offside trap was brittle and beaten after just five minutes. Kaka sent Ronaldo sprinting through. The forward did a step over in front of Richard Kingston and put in his fifteenth World Cup goal, his third in this championship - a total which surpassed the German Gerd Müller as the highest scorer in the history of the World Cup.

Another counterattack before half time led to Adriano's tap-in from Cafu's low pass across goal.

Ghana came closest to a goal when John Mensah headed a corner straight down at Dida's feet. The Brazilian keeper reacted quickly to save and kick the ball out of harm's way.

The third goal was from a simple long ball from full-back Ricardinho over the Ghanaian defence. Ze Roberto ran on to it and nicked it by the on-rushing keeper Kingston and coaxed it over the line.

At this point in the match the Brazilians had received boos from some of the crowd who thought football's traditional crowd-pleasers were deliberately playing within themselves.

But as the clock ran down there were a number of exciting Brazilian attacks and Richard Kingston had to make three outstanding saves to keep the score respectable for Ghana.

Asamoah Gyan was sent off when he got a second yellow card for foul simulation.

In the next phase Brazil would play against France, in a game held in Frankfurt on July 1.

Round of sixteen

Match 55

June 27, 2006 17:00
	Brazil	3–0	Ghana	Signal Iduna Park
	Ronaldo '5 Adriano 46'+ Ze Roberto 84'

Attendance: 65'000

Formations

Brazil

Right wing	Right	Center	Left	Left wing

		Dida (GK)
	Lucio		Juan 44'
Cafu (C)				Roberto Carlos
	Emerson		Ze Roberto
	Kaka		Ronaldinho
	Adriano 13'		Ronaldo

Substitutes

46' Gilberto Silva for Emerson
61' Juninho Pernambucano for Adriano
83' Ricardinho for Kaka

denotes one goal scored.

Ghana

Right wing	Right	Center	Left	Left wing

		Richard Kingston (GK)
Emmanuel Pappoe	John Pantsil 29'		John Mensah	Illiasu Shilla

Haminu Draman	Stephen Appiah (C) 7'		Sulley Muntari 11'	Eric Addo 38'

	Matthew Amoah		Asamoah Gyan 48' 81'