At exactly 10:00 p.m. on June 15, Estádio Pernambuco in Recife, Brazil.
The second match of the first round of Group C at the Brazil World Cup: China versus Côte d'Ivoire.
After kickoff, China Team was the first to create a corner opportunity through quick passing and movement in the final third, but they failed to produce a shot or create danger. Instead, they became somewhat passive as the match went on.
Drogba, the spiritual leader and core of Côte d'Ivoire, was absent from the starting lineup. Instead, Wilfried Bony, who played for Swansea, led the line alone. The striker had scored seventeen goals in thirty-four Premier League appearances the previous season, putting in an outstanding performance.
Not only that, but during the 2012–13 season, Bony had played for Vitesse in the Eredivisie, scoring thirty-one goals in thirty matches.
It was not difficult to tell from his career that he was a highly efficient scorer, and one of the key players Queiroz had specifically instructed his team to defend against before the match.
After the match began, Côte d'Ivoire played with great aggression.
African teams held an advantage in physical strength, but Côte d'Ivoire was not a traditional power-based team in the popular sense. Their players also possessed excellent technique, and even Bony was very skillful with the ball at his feet. This left China Team looking rather passive from the opening minutes.
During the first ten-odd minutes, China Team failed to produce a single shot and had only forty percent of the possession. They were under heavy pressure.
But China Team did one thing very well: defend.
Queiroz had coached China Team for four years and had always focused on their overall shape and defense. Before this World Cup, he had drilled their defensive play repeatedly. All three warm-up