27.06.22 World Cup First Knockout Round
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And it brings Brazil!And a game of what-might-have-been. The game opens with Firmino shoving Alderweireld over and Belgium getting a penalty. Hazard then shoots to his right but sees it saved. A minute later, Brazil give the ball away from a goal kick and Hazard knocks the ball gently into the Brazil keeper's arms. Ten minutes later, Brazilian left-back, Jorge, opens up our defence and we're a goal down. We go on to chase the game with Lukaku being put through but missing a glaring chance just before HT. We carry on pushing forward after the break but, inevitably, Brazil hit us on the break and it's all over.
And so this save comes to an end. Belgium are out of the World Cup and, while the Beglian board and media are none-too-impressed with the national team's efforts, I do feel that the team has generally done all right over my four years in charge. I think, if I look back on the save, the there are a few things I'm pretty pleased with:
World Cup 2018 South Africa 1-2 Iran
The South Africa team I'd put together weren't even expected to get to this world cup so to get a win here was pretty amazing. It's just a shame that we didn't get any more.
Euro International League Final 2021 Belgium 1-0 Portugual
This had to be here as it's my only silverware of the save. A closely-fought final was decided in the last few minutes by a young striker just making his name in the game - fairytale stuff!
World Cup 2022 Belgium 7-1 Uruguay
When I saw the group we'd got for the World Cup, I was seriously concerned that Uruguay could beat us out of the group stage. As it was, our opening game of the tournament was an absolute barn-stormer and quite possibly the greatest highlight of my managerial career!
So, as I said above, this save is now complete! Thanks to everyone that's followed this story. I'd never imagined that I'd have over 1k views even before I'd got to the end of the story. I want to say thanks to DerbyJack who inspired me to write this save and whose general format I've adopted for this. If you've enjoyed following this, it would be great to hear from you. Let me know what you liked and what international challenges you'd like to see me try on FM19! See you out there!