Just Four Things: Serbia Vs. Switzerland

Swiss Blitz

Switzerland’s plan is to play swiftly and get the ball quickly as possible to get through Serbia’s tough and physical players so that they won’t recover. Valon Behrami was tasked to be the engineer, to build up play from midfield to start the attacks. The plan was encouraging as they looked much brighter of the two despite being a goal down.

They had two great chances when Blerim Dzemaili dragged a sitter wide from Ricardo Rodriguez’ cutback, and Steven Zuber’s effort was well stopped point-blank by Serbia keeper, Vladimir Stojkovic after he ran into the box to receive the through-pass.

Switzerland’s approach forced Serbia to sit back deep and their swift pace with the ball looked hard to deal with. They kept going and going and finally got their deserved equalizer when Granit Xhaka lashed home a long shot that left Stojkovic stranded. Switzerland changed their approach somewhat after the restart. They were looking to catch Serbia out with counter-attacks in the second half compared to the all-out attack in the first. After all, one of those counter-attacks did lead to Xhaka’s goal. Then…

Immense Shaqiri

Here’s an opinion: If you can’t bring out the best of Xherdan Shaqiri, you deserved to be relegated (Looking at you, Stoke). Now you see why he is one of Switzerland’s best players. The diminutive winger was hard-working and tricky to the point where the priority of a few Serbia players is to stop him or close him down. He had 91% pass accuracy, 77 touches, five fouls won and four successful take-ons, according to Squawka Football. No wonder Serbia had a tough time to stop him.

His skillful runs had caused problems and one of those runs lead to the winning goal in the final minute of normal time. With Serbia committing so many numbers up front, poor old Dusko Tosic was the sole defender to chase Shaqiri when he set off to run towards the goal starting from just inside his own half. By the time Tosic caught up to him, it was too late. Shaqiri rolled the ball past Stojkovic to send Switzerland in jubilation. Seriously, Shaqiri deserves a better club.

Mitrovic Muscle

Someone better call the fire department. Aleksandar Mitrovic is on fire. Not literally though; he now has scored 15 goals in his last 18 games for Serbia. You could see why he is capable of being a hotshot. His very presence made the Swiss defence nervous. Although the Swiss fire truck did put a stop to his fire with help of the rainy weather.

He fired a warning shot when he was able to win the first aerial battle. He won that battle easily to connect with a header that was saved by Yann Sommer only about two minutes. He only needed another two minutes when Dusan Tadic swung a cross in and Mitrovic once again got the better of Fabian Schär to put Serbia ahead. If Serbia’s task is to stifle Shaqiri, Switzerland did the same to Mitrovic, keeping close to him when a cross comes in.

But Mitrovic will feel hard done by when he was wrestled to the ground by two Swiss players inside the Swiss box and the referee for some reason awarded a free-kick against him. Definitely one of Serbia’s best players today, so it’s a shame he got nothing in return for his goal.

Serbia’s Difficult Task

They have their fair share of promising attacks, especially in the final 20 minutes. But Serbia weren’t just as threatening as Switzerland. Serbia though shouldn’t be too upset. The good news is they still have another match to play and their fate is still in their hands. What is the bad news? Their final group opponent is Brazil.

This is a despairing situation for Serbia. Despite Brazil having a tricky time to deal with Switzerland and Costa Rica, they still are capable to cause grief. One particular key battle is by the wings. Serbia has the tools to dominate the midfield, but their first-choice full-backs though will find it difficult to stop Willian and Neymar once they are running at full speed. Branislav Ivanovic looked the weaker of the two during this match when he was perceived to lose focus in the final minutes. Serbia can’t afford to get caught out like they did to Switzerland. Repeat the same mistake and their ticket home is as good as booked.

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