A goal by attacker Cristhoper Zambrano in minute 91 enabled Ecuador to equalize with Venezuela (1-1) on the penultimate day of the last hexagon on Thursday, stay alive in the South American Sub’20 and incidentally worried Colombia the standings, without a play, the World Cup in Indonesia.
With this result, Brazil and Uruguay lead the final hexagon with nine points, followed by Colombia, which will face Brazil with six on Thursday, Venezuela with two and Paraguay and Ecuador with one.
La Vinotinto, meanwhile, had scored a controversial goal with the hand of striker Brayan Alcócer, but could not resist Ecuador’s onslaught and lost a golden opportunity to play in the World Cup, so now it will depend on what this team does. Paraguay against Uruguay and defeated hosts Colombia on Sunday.
Venezuela came out with everything and opened the scoring in minute 2 in a controversial game in which midfielder Yerson Chacón sent a cross from the right that sent Alcócer with a swipe to the back of Gilmar Napa’s goal, without the referee Uruguayan Gustavo Tejera realized it.
The team led by Argentine Fabricio Coloccini, suspended and replaced on the lime line by Nicolás Medina, tried to increase the advantage on the counter-attack and Álcocer, very linked, was about to do so in a one-on-one in which he a deflected shot.
Those led by Jimmy Bran, meanwhile, had a lot of trouble showing their best version and could barely get close to Frankarlos Benítez’s goal with two shots from José Klinger, one saved by the Venezuelan goalkeeper and one that went wide without much danger.
However, both teams had to deal with injuries in the early stages. La Vinotinto lost Chacón, one of their best players in the championship, while La Tri saw midfielder Patrickson Delgado, a promising Ajax player, leave.
That didn’t change the context of a game in which Venezuela continued to dominate and Ecuador was unable to find a way out, although they were getting closer with shots that went past Benítez’s goal without much danger.
In the second half, those led by Coloccini withdrew and Bran’s team began to doggedly search for a draw that would leave them alive on the final day.
Thus came the chances of Minda, who took a deflected shot and Sebastián González with a shot that was saved by Benítez without much effort.
As the minutes passed, Ecuador’s spark ran out and despite the arrival of attacking players such as Yaimar Medina and Cristhoper Zambrano, Bran’s team struggled to break the Venezuelan defense once again, bolstered by the arrival of the tall center – back Santiago Gómez for midfielder Andrés Romero.
In the end, when Vinotinto’s victory seemed closed, Cristhoper Zambrano, who had entered in the second half, took advantage of a filtered phase from Óscar Zambrano and took a right hand on the edge of the area extinguishing the illusion of Venezuela , who will live and the qualification will be played against host country Colombia on Sunday.
La Tri is now also looking for a place at the World Cup against Paraguay.
Source: El heraldo
I’m George Gonzalez, a professional journalist and author at The Nation View. With more than 5 years of experience in the field, I specialize in covering sports news for various print media outlets. My passion for writing has enabled me to craft stories that capture the attention of readers all over the world.
