a 63rd-minute david villa goal proved enough for spain to beat portugal and reach the quarter-finals of the 2010 fifa world cup south africa™. the highly-anticipated meeting between these iberian rivals, the first in six years, lived up to expectations, certainly in the first half when carlos queiroz's side were unlucky not to be rewarded for their endeavour in cape town. la roja were dominant after the break, however, and el guaje's close-range finish ensured they will now meet paraguay for a place in the last four.
both teams went into the match protecting proud records, with spain having won 29 of their last 31 matches. portugal were on a 19-match undefeated run dating back to november 2008, with 20 clean sheets in 24 matches since queiroz assumed their reins.
spain coach vicente del bosque named an unchanged side from the one that beat chile in their final group game, with the inclusion of xavi alonso allaying initial fears that an ankle injury would prevent his inclusion. portugal, conversely, were forced into two changes as injuries to forward danny and midfielder duda afforded starts to atletico madrid's simao and hugo almeida of werder bremen.
a lively opening saw fernando torres unleash a goal-bound shot that eduardo did well to parry away, before it was the turn of the in-form villa to warm the hands of the portuguese goalkeeper. it was far from one-way traffic, and tiago’s drive from 30 metres was only palmed into the air by iker casillas, with hugo almeida seemingly set to head into an empty net only for the spain captain to recover and push the ball to safety at the midway point of the first half.
soon after, ronaldo unleashed a venomous long-range free-kick which casillas could again only parry away, with the ball somewhat fortuitously avoiding a host of lurking attackers. it was proving an uncomfortable opening period for the real madrid keeper, who was captaining la roja for a record 51st time, surpassing goalkeeping predecessor andoni zubizaretta at the head of the list.
the early energy gave way to a slightly more measured pace, with portugal having the better of the latter exchanges in the opening half. portugal seemingly resumed where they had left off after the interval, and tiago burst down the left flank with an impressive turn of speed with his centre looping off the knee of carles puyol only to narrowly bounce the wrong side of the post. spain’s pedigree soon started to shine through and on the hour mark substitute fernando llorente directed a diving header straight at a relieved eduardo. within 60 seconds villa grazed the post with a curling drive and the momentum had well and truly changed. spain scoring the all-important opening goal with a short pass from andres iniesta on the edge of the penalty area flicked on by xavi with villa converting at the second attempt.
spain were now dominating midfield possession despite portugal’s ever desperate attacking endeavours as they looked to save their south africa 2010 campaign. sergio ramos came within inches of a rare goal after a strong run and shot on the right only to see the impressive eduardo stick out a strong right hand and turn the ball narrowly around the post. having joined argentina’s gonzalo higuain and slovakia’s robert vittek on four goals at the top of the adidas golden boot tally with his goal, the barcelona-bound villa was looking to go one better and his stunning rocket-like drive from 30 metres would surely have found the net had it been marginally either side of eduardo.
star forward cristiano ronaldo was largely kept quiet throughout with ricardo costa suffering a late red card for an elbow. spain’s midfielder maestro xavi was named budweiser man of the match with his influence reflected in the match statistics with spain recording an impressive 61 per cent of possession.
