JOHANNESBURG, (Reuters) – Ghana’s “Black Stars” hope to go where no African team has been before and reach the World Cup semi-finals today while Brazil face Netherlands in the day’s first and equally intriguing quarter-final.
After a two-day lull, the action restarts at Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium in Port Elizabeth where five-times champions Brazil take on a Netherlands who have failed to lift the trophy despite fielding some of the most eye-catching teams ever.
Their four-out-of-four wins in South Africa so far have been solid rather than spectacular. Yet with attacking talent like Arjen Robben, Wesley Sneijder, Robin van Persie and Rafael van der Vaart lurking, the Dutch could come alight any time.
“We play our better games against teams that want to play football as well and on Friday, Brazil is not going to wait,” winger Ryan Babel said.
For all their own attacking power, Brazil have also become masters in defence under coach Dunga.
Despite criticism at home for abandoning some flair, Dunga appears to have found a winning formula of impregnable, European-style defence combined with the lightning-fast counter-attack capacity of Robinho, Kaka and Luis Fabiano.
The notoriously grumpy Dunga, who captained Brazil to wins over Netherlands in the 1994 and 1998 World Cups, seemed more worried about accommodation arrangements and a new training venue than his in-form opponents on the eve.
“It interferes with things. We will have to share a hotel with more people, there will be more confusion, and we will have to overcome this situation,” he said.
Ghana have already equalled the best African showing at a World Cup by reaching the quarter-finals.
Cameroon did the same in 1990 and Senegal in 2002.
To chart new territory and cheer millions around Africa, Ghana need to beat a mean-looking Uruguay side, who are one of an unprecedented four South American teams in the quarters. “It is a match of destiny which places an onerous responsbility on the Black Stars,” Ghana’s former president John Kufuor told Reuters.
