Switzerland v. Spain: The First Cinderella Story of the 2010 World Cup

I, for one, was thrilled to finally see a truly interesting game this morning. With all of the low scoring games and ties, the 2010 World Cup was - I hate to admit it - kind of starting to look like a snooze fest. We’ve had an upset or two so far this World Cup, but Switzerland’s 1-0 win over Spain this morning was the first truly shocking result of the tournament.

Spain came in as the HUGE favorite for this game. Shoot, they came in as the favorite for the whole tournament. They’ve been nearly unbeatable for the past couple of years. In their last 49 international matches, Spain had lost only once - and that was a shocking upset to the United States in last year’s Confederation Cup. Spain had played Switzerland 18 times in the past, and never lost once.

Spain is really, really good. They are all about offense and it usually shows. I heard one analyst say this morning that they have averaged 3 goals per game in World Cup qualifying. In soccer, that’s a lot. True to form, Spain’s offense hammered Switzerland today. Especially in the second half, Spain had near miss, after near miss, after near miss. They have got to be some of the most frustrated people on the planet today.

Nobody thought Switzerland had a chance coming into this. But you have to give them credit. They played with heart and they played smart and they didn’t let Spain’s mystique get into their heads.

Switzerland new that they’d get hammered by Spain’s offense, so they put all of their attention into a solid defense. If you watch the game later, notice that every single time Spain approached Switzerland’s goal, the penalty box was absolutely full of Swiss players. With gutsy play and a lot of luck, Switzerland’s strategy worked. They held off Spain’s stellar offense enough to leave the door open for a scrappy goal to make all the difference.

What does this mean for Spain’s chances going forward? Probably nothing as they are also favored over the other teams in their group, Chile and Honduras. Unless lightning strikes twice, Spain should still make it out of group play. But there is one statistic that must be shaking their confidence today: No team who lost their opening World Cup match has ever gone on to win the tournament.

If you missed the match this morning, you can watch it on ESPN’s GameCast. If you are short on time, just watch the second half. That’s where all of the good stuff happened anyway.

This was good quality, exciting soccer with some drama and a feel-good Cinderella story. Now we’re talking. Let’s hope we get to enjoy a few more games like this.