Keeping track of the FIFA World Cup 2018

Messi in grief.  'The end of the Messi gneration.'

We could only view the highlights of games in the FIFA World Cup 2018 being held in various football arenas in Russia.

In the Round of 16, we saw the matches between Uruguay and Portugal, and France and Argentina, and saw the fall of the brightest stars of football: Cristiano Ronaldo (CR7) and Lionel Messi of the national teams of Portugal and Argentina, respectively. Their teams got eliminated and have gone home. The defending champion--Germany--had gone home after the first elimination round robin,

From these matches also rose the new stars: Kylian Mbappe of France and Edinson Cavani of Uruguay. Mbappe is 19 years old: is he a Pele in the making? Pele was 17 when his skills got noticed. 

We also watched Russia and Croatia clinching the berths for the Round of 8. Their games ended 1-1 against Spain and Denmark, respectively, They won by penalties at extension time. The Spanish and Danish national teams are heading for home.

Our thanks goes to www.newseum.org for providing us the window to look at the coverage of Russia 2018 by foreign (esp. South American) newspaper. Thank you also to the newspapers whose front pages of their 01 July 2018 editions are reproduced in this blog: Clarin (Buenos Aires, Argentina), El Commercio (Lima, Peru), El Heraldo (Barranquilla, Colombia), La Vanguardia (Barcelona, Spain) and O Tempo (Belo Horizonte, Brazil).

'Goodbye to the stars'

'With grief and without glory'

Kylian Mbappe

The new heroes: Edinson Cavani & Mbappe

As of this writing (02 July 2018): those who go to the Round of 8 will be Uruguay, France, Crotia and Russia.