Spain defeats Chile, both qualify to the second round

Spain beat Chile by 2-1 in the Loftus Versfeld Stadium of Pretoria, and both teams are advancing to the second round of the World Cup 2010 finals. The final standings for Group H are with Spain leading first and will be playing against Portugal on Tuesday, whereas Chile finished the group in second place and will try their luck against 5-time World Cup Champions Brazil a day earlier.

Spain was the team that absolutely needed a victory to advance past the group stage, so Vicente del Bosque and his men came strong on the field looking for a quick goal with Fernando Torres at the fourth minute of the game. But later on Chile balanced the match and became more dangerous, while having the overall ball possession and some good chances to open the score. Jean Beausejour gave a nice pass to Mark González in 10′, but the player missed the biggest chance for Chile in front of an empty net. And while Chile had the control of the game in Pretoria, Spain was the team to score a first goal: goalkeeper Claudio Bravo left his position to try and cut Torres, but the ball ended up on David Villa that pushed it inside the empty net. Spain woke up after the goal and scored a second one with Andrés Iniesta after a nice assist from Villa in 37′. At the same moment Chile lost Marco Estrada with a second yellow card, and had to keep playing with a man down for the rest of the game.

Just 2 minutes in the second half Chile was suddenly back in the game: Rodrigo Millar (that came in as a substitution during half time) took a shot from the penalty area, the ball bounced off Gerard Piqué to end up in the back of Iker Casillas’ net. And while Switzerland was unable to score a goal against Honduras in the other game of Group H, the 2-1 score between Spain and Chile was enough for both opponents to qualify in the round of 16. The match slowed down, and the two teams were able to celebrate after the final whistle.