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Serbia shocks Portugal to join Spain, Croatia at World Cup

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Serbia shocks Portugal to join Spain, Croatia at World Cup

Alexander Mitrovic’s header in the 90th minute allowed Cristiano Ronaldo and Portugal to beat Serbia 2-1 in Lisbon, which allowed Serbia to win the automatic qualifiers for the Qatar World Cup. Portugal still has a chance to advance, but must advance to four teams in the playoffs in March. All the teams that reserved World Cup seats in Europe on Sunday did this with dramatic late goals.

Spain only needed to tie in the final match against Sweden to qualify, but Alvaro Morata secured the veteran Swedish star Zlatan Ibrahimovic with the only goal 1-0 in the 86th minute. Rahimovic’s hope of playing in the World Cup again depends on the playoffs. Croatia’s goal of besieging Russia on the water-filled field quickly turned into a swamp and finally paid off.

The Russian defender scored an own goal in the 81st minute, enough to win 1-0. Russia will also participate in the playoffs starting on March 24, and will divide 12 teams-10 runner-ups in the group and two teams that have achieved outstanding results in the National League-into three of four teams team. Each bracket has a World Cup seat.

The draw was held in Zurich on November 26. Portugal was in a strong position when Renato Sanchez scored the first goal only two minutes later against Serbia, but Dusan Tadic kept Serbia in the game with an equalizer in the 33rd game. Mitrovic’s late header calmed the audience and shocked the Portuguese players, including Ronaldo, who was sitting on the court at the final whistle.

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“This is an amazing game, well deserved,” Mitrovic said. “I think we deserve to win the game and come to Qatar.” After Serbia failed to qualify for this year’s European Championships, defeating Portugal for the first time marked a reversal. Portugal has a positive factor. Its relatively strong record in the group stage means that it will become one of the seeded teams in the playoffs in March and will win a home draw in the semi-finals of the single leg bracket.

The last time Portugal missed the World Cup was in 1998. Substitute Morata scored the winning goal for Spain, and Danny Olmo’s long shot scored Spain’s 12th consecutive World Cup. Zlatan Ibrahimovic, 40, is fighting to participate in his first World Cup with Sweden since 2006 – he was not selected for the big squad in 2018 – but in the 74th The game cannot be changed after a substitute comes out. Before losing 2-0 to Georgia on Thursday, Sweden seemed to have controlled a movement.

News Source : Hindustan Times

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Cricket

KL Rahul dangerously close to Laxman territory; to be perished for Sarfaraz Khan and Shubman Gill

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KL Rahul dangerously close to Laxman territory; to be perished for Sarfaraz Khan and Shubman Gill

To accommodate both Sarfaraz and Gill and stick with their five-bowler formula, a batter from the Bengaluru Test must make way. Ergo Rahul and the predicted axe

VVS Laxman went through the first half of his illustrious 15-and-a-half-year international career with the proverbial axe hanging over him. Despite his magical stroke-play and a well-founded reputation for rallying the lower order to bat above itself, he was forever the first name that sprang to the decision-makers’ minds when they had to drop someone to accommodate someone else. It wasn’t until the second half of his stint with the national team that he had ‘job security’, which automatically manifested itself in an array of glorious, match-turning knocks and earmarked him as one for a crisis.

KL Rahul is now dangerously close to approaching the Laxman territory, though at least in this instance, a case can be made out, perhaps, for why he often seems to be playing for his place. Almost a decade after his Test debut in Australia in December 2014, he has yet to nail down a permanent spot, a result of glaring inconsistency and repeated dalliances with injuries that have left him with a modest average of 33.87 from 53 Test appearances.

Unlike Laxman, who was thrust to the opener’s position for three years from 1997, successive team managements have worked overtime to create space for Rahul. He started off in the middle order in Melbourne against Australia, opened in the next Test in Sydney when he made a sparkling century, continued in that position for a good nine years – around the large pockets when either injuries or lack of form relegated him to the sidelines – and now seems to have found his calling in the middle order, where he was tried out in an almost last throw of the dice in South Africa last December.

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In his limited time at the No. 6 position, Rahul has been a revelation. On a spiteful surface in Centurion in his first innings back in the middle order, the classy right-hander made a marvellous 101 – Virat Kohli’s 38 was the next highest score – in India’s 245 all out. Two Tests later, against England in Hyderabad, he waltzed to 86 of the best until a hamstring strain kept him out of the last four Tests.

On his comeback last month against Bangladesh, Rahul showed why he is rated so highly, and therefore why he so frustrates when he chooses to shackle himself mentally, with uninhibited shot-making when India were pressing for a declaration (Chennai) and looking to make up for lost time with a frenetic batting approach (Kanpur) in the two Tests. Kanpur was especially mesmeric, 68 flowing off his bat in a mere 43 deliveries. It was the best of Rahul.

Axe hangs over Rahul’s head for India vs New Zealand 2nd Test

And yet here we are, two innings later, wondering whether he will, or should, feature in the playing XI in Pune, where India take on New Zealand in a must-win second Test from Thursday.

Shubman Gill, him of three centuries in his last six Tests, missed the Bengaluru defeat to the Kiwis with a stiff neck. Replacement batter Sarfaraz Khan made the most of own good fortune with a delectable 150, which makes it near impossible to drop him now that Gill is fully fit. To accommodate both Sarfaraz and Gill and stick with their five-bowler formula which has worked beautifully in the last few years, a batter from the Bengaluru Test must make way. Ergo Rahul and the predicted axe.

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One of the few men to have led India in all three formats internationally, Rahul didn’t help his cause with scores of 0 and 12 at his home ground, the M Chinnaswamy Stadium. In the first innings, he was strangled down leg-side by William O’Rourke while in the second, he received a peach from the same paceman operating with the second new ball and was again caught behind. Rahul was one of 11 failures in India’s first-innings 46 and one of seven wickets to fall in 93 deliveries to the second new cherry, but failures past and the logjam created by Gill’s availability have combined to identify him as the most susceptible to the axe.

It’s a cross impossible to bear, but also impossible to ignore just because it is so heavy, so overarching. Rahul is beyond gifted and makes batting appear oh-so-simple, but his struggles to embrace sustained run-making can’t be wished away. He is the eternal team man, much like his celebrated namesake also from Karnataka – both kept wickets admirably in 50-over World Cups 21 years apart, both made attractive and impactful runs during the tournament and both tasted bitter defeat at the hands of Australia in the final – but ‘eternal team man’ can sometimes be an euphemism for the ‘most dispensable’ and Rahul can be excused for thinking that those two lines have blurred beyond repair. Of course, if he is brutally honest to himself, he will acknowledge at least to himself that he too must bear culpability for the blurring of the lines.

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