1 hour ago
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Key events
87 min: Ferran Torres rattles the bar after waltzing into space about 15 yards out. The skills was lovely, the finish not quite so much.
85 min: Uruguay do not look as frantic as I’d like for a team who need to score to stay in the World Cup. Or do they? De la Cruz’s dipping shot tests Unai Simon. That’s probably what they should have started trying a while back.
83 min: Another Uruguay cross-shot. This one from Olivera and Unai Simon has to save at his near post. This is not a classic.
82 min: Canobbio cross shot is neither a cross or a shot (a crot? a shoss?) and it goes well over the bar.
80 min: Chance! Nearly! Nunez almost gets on to a through ball into the box but Unai Simon charges out to smother the threat.
77 min: It’s still 0-0 in the group’s other game. That means Cape Verde would go through as things stand. What a magnificent story if it pans out.
76 min: Nico Williams and Ferran Torres will be entering the field for your entertainment. Lamine Yamal and Oyarzabal are the men going off.
74 min: Dani Olmo spins wonderfully then plays a through ball, but there’s no one through. So it’s just a ball.
72 min: Lamine Yamal strolls past a few Uruguay players because he can. But he’s hasn’t quite been at his best this evening, Uruguay have done a fairly good job of containing the teenager.
Hydration break email. And Justin Kavanagh likes his drinks with some literature:
“Eduardo Galeano – the great Uruguayan writer, journalist, and political activist famously wrote: I am… a beggar for good soccer. I go about the world, hand outstretched, and in the stadiums I plead: ‘A pretty move, for the love of God.’
“Although he claimed to not care who provided it, or whether a goal resulted, I’m sure Galeano’s spirit – sitting in purgatory along with all the Scottish faithful departe – —is rooting for only one team tonight, one pretty move, one elusive goal… for the love of God.”
67 min: This half has been much more open than the first. Perhaps because Uruguay have nothing to lose. The goalscorer, Alex Baena, is replaced by Pino. And with that … let’s hydrate!
65 min: Lamine Yamal twists some blood before laying the ball off to Dani Olmo. But the ball bobbles as it approaches him and he takes a strange wedge shot that scoops over the bar.
63 min: Dani Olmo skips into the area and there are appeals for a free-kick just outside the box but the ref waves play on. Spain will almost certainly win this group. They’ll face either Austria or Algeria in Los Angeles.
61 min: Spain have completed 400 passes to Uruguay’s 132.
60 min: Spain subs: Dani Olmo and Fabian Ruiz trot on for Pedri and Merino.
58 min: Vinas on for Valverde. Uruguay will hope he gives them a more physical threat up front.
55 min: A big yelp from Lamine Yamal as Sanabria hacks him. He is correctly booked. I wonder if Spain will take the teenager off soon if Uruguay are feeling spicy.
52 min: De La Cruz attempts a through ball to Canobbio but the pair don’t connect. Uruguay have been a little sparkier in this half but don’t start organising the winners parade in Montevideo just yet.
49 min: In tribute to the match being played in Guadalajara I will be ditching my Pepsi Zero for a Mexican Coke this half. The real sugar means it’s a health food. Talking of keepers, Uruguay’s best chance in this match has probably been to exploit the shaky Unai Simon. Something for Spain to think about going forward.
46 min: Yikes, Rochet is on for Muslera. Yes, he let in the only shot on target in this match and he was bad in the other two matches but that’s a horrible way for his long World Cup – this is his fourth – career to end. Still, Bielsa doesn’t really do sentiment.
My colleague Beau Dure is covering the Cape Verde v Saudi Arabia match. And at the moment it’s Cape Verde who are going through to face Argentina in the last 32. Here’s Beau on the match so far:
“Cape Verde social media icon Vozinha has made the only save of a sloppy first half, but the Blue Sharks were in the ascendancy in the last 15 minutes of the half and are poised to advance at the expense of Saudi Arabia. And Uruguay, apparently.”
You can follow the rest here:
Half-time emails:
Justin Kavanagh: “Is it too obvious to state that Uruguay have looked a little toothless up-front without Luis Suarez? Even the wisdom of Bielsa, with all his endless drilling, is not going to get them the crown.”
Paul Cockburn: “My coverage here in NZ jumped to commercial as the Spain goal went in. Was that a FIFA feed thing, or do I need to go and rage at our local people?”
Half-time: Uruguay 0-1 Spain
Uruguay are heading out of the World Cup, and based on that performance – and their other two in this World Cup -they can’t complain too much. Yes, Spain are one of the best teams in the world but Uruguay have been curiously lifeless considering what is at stake. Spain have been … fine. They don’t need to get much from this match but neither did France, who pulverised Norway earlier in the today.
45 min: +7: Maxi Araujo whips in a free-kick but a Spanish head gets to it first. Uruguay have offered very li… Correction: Araujo has an excellent chance that Unai Simon dives to his right to pluck out the air.
45 min + 5: Oyarzabal thinks he has won a corner; he has not. Uruguay have done very little since conceding. They look pretty beaten, as they have for much of this World Cup.
45 min +1: Eight minutes of added time. Muslera is such an experienced player, it’s sad to see him make a terrible mistake like that in what will almost certainly be his last match. I could have seen Uruguay nicking a 1-0 win today based on early evidence. But this does not look like a team who will score twice in the next 45 minutes or so.
45 min: That was so sad that even Spain’s king, Felipe “Silver Fox” VI, looked guilty about it in the stands. To add injury to insult Ugarte is taken off injured, de la Cruz replaces him.
GOAL! Uruguay 0-1 Spain (Alex Baena 41 min)
Ouch, not a good way to concede a goal. Baena turns nicely and unleashes a shot that is very close to Muslera, who pats the ball into his own goal. That was up there with Scotland for gifting your opponent a goal in a crucial match.
41 min: Oyarzabal has the wind knocked out of him. He’ll have to stand on the sidelines for a minute while he tries to locate it. He has a lot to say about that for a man with no wind.
39 min: Is Cucurella on the wrong team? “I like Spain, they’re exciting, but I struggle to back any team with Cucurella in it. He’d be a perfect fit in Bielsa’s team, his shithousery, his whole being feels culturally Uruguayan,” writes Chris Boys. Can we say “shithousery” in the Guardian? We can! Shithousery.
