- Match includes three red cards at Azteca Stadium.
- South Africa receives two red cards in the match.
- Mexican defender Montes also sent in a late game.
Mexico got the World Cup celebrations started as co-hosts swept South Africa 2-0 in a three-red card encounter on Thursday, as the pyrotechnic smoke from the opening ceremony gave way to a cloud of red mist at a booming Azteca stadium.
The match kicked off the quadrennial football extravaganza, but the messy encounter will likely be remembered not for the exciting football, but for the wave of layoffs.
Julian Quinones’ early goal set the tone for a dominant Mexican performance in Group A, with Raul Jimenez’s header defusing any lingering tension for the home crowd midway through the second half.
Yet South Africa were reduced to ten men when Sphephelo Sithole was sent off early in the second half, with his teammate Themba Zwane following him off the field before Mexico’s Cesar Montes was sent off in the dying moments.
The ill-tempered encounter spoiled the otherwise festive atmosphere, but the home crowd were allowed to celebrate an opening victory that would set them up well to advance from a group that also includes South Korea and the Czech Republic.
“It’s a moment I will carry with me for the rest of my life,” said Mexican midfielder Erik Lira. “All I felt was that everything it took to get here had been worth it.”
Day of firsts
It was a day of World Cup firsts, as the first edition with 48 teams, and the first to be held in three countries, kicked off in the first stadium to host three World Cup openers.
It was therefore fitting that in the first of a record 104 matches, Mexico recorded a first victory in the opening match of the tournament, after seven previous failures, and it was of course the first World Cup opener with three red cards.
The match was a repeat of the 2010 tournament opener, when South Africa held Mexico to a 1-1 draw in Johannesburg, but this encounter was played in a stadium steeped in World Cup history.
The Azteca has witnessed some of the tournament’s most iconic moments, from Maradona’s ‘Hand of God’ and heroics of 1986 to Pele’s all-conquering Brazilian side of 1970.
Although there was none of that era-defining quality on display on Thursday, it made little difference to the hordes of green-clad supporters, who were thrown into frenzied excitement before a ball was kicked.
With the match being played against the backdrop of protests that threatened to bring Mexico City to a standstill, the supporters were taking no chances; many were already hovering around the stadium almost seven hours before kick-off.
Mexico is off to a fast start
An opening ceremony featuring Shakira and Burna Boy performing the World Cup anthem had pumped up the crowd even further before Mexico quickly got to work.
The match was barely a few minutes old when Jimenez stabbed South African goalkeeper Ronwen Williams in the fingertips with a volley from twelve yards, but the opening goal of the tournament was not long in coming.
Sithole was robbed on the edge of his own penalty area by Lira, who was preferred in the heart of midfield to captain Edson Alvarez, and he quickly fed Quinones who danced in before drilling a low finish under Williams.
South Africa held on for dear life as the first half came to an end and the second began in similar fashion.
Brian Gutierrez drew the first red card when his marauding run into the box was stopped by Sithole, whose clumsy tackle from behind gave him his marching orders to complete a miserable afternoon’s work for the midfielder.
The crowd were starting to get a little restless as Mexico failed to convert their numerical advantage into another goal, but that frustration was allayed when Jimenez slotted home his first World Cup goal, with a powerful downward header past Williams from a devilish Roberto Alvarado cross.
The final match was dominated by the dismissals, with Zwane sent off after a VAR check for an alleged arm to the face, while Montes was sent off to Mexico for denying a goal-scoring opportunity.
