Group B of the FC 24 Pro Open saw an extremely dramatic final spurt on Tuesday. In the end, one goal decided who would go on to the World Cup
The competition for a place at the World Cup has reached its climax in Group B – both dramatically and in sporting terms. Before the decisive matchday, everything was still possible for four professionals. Only Matias Bonanno, with zero points to date, only had a theoretical chance of taking one of the top two places.
First things first: the Argentinian was not to succeed in catching up, but the 21-year-old still had an influence on the script. An exciting four-way battle ensued between Paulo ‘PHzin’ Chaves, Gabriel ‘Young’ Freitas, Facundo ‘Cowen’ Cowen and Aaron ‘HappYMeaL664’ Rivera. Only those responsible at Tuzzy E-Sport could sit back and relax before the last two games. Because it was clear that at least one of their players would qualify. The last three protagonists mentioned are playing for the eSports organization
No more intervention possible
Cowen had put in an almost perfect performance, scoring ten out of a possible twelve points. With all his games already played, the Argentine had to hope that ‘Young’ would not win his last game against Bonanno by more than two goals. Rivera, meanwhile, was no longer a threat to Cowen. The Mexican would have had to improve on a goal difference of -7 against group winners Paulo ‘PHzin’ Chaves
So all eyes were on the duel between ‘Young’ and ‘Matias’ – a camera was pointed at Cowen in the live broadcast. His hopes were soon dashed as Freitas came out strong against ‘Matias’ and took a comfortable 5-1 lead with twenty in-game minutes to go. But from then on, things got exciting again. At first, Cowen regained some hope as Bonanno reduced the gap to three goals. That meant one more goal from his Argentinian compatriot and Cowen would be through to the knockout stages. Bitter from ‘Young’s point of view: He was in possession of the ball in his own penalty area before conceding the goal, but lost possession and thus invited ‘Matias’ to score
A rollercoaster of emotions
Cowen’s reaction: blow through it. What he didn’t know at the time was that it was going to be a rollercoaster of emotions. In the 80th minute, Freitas scored to make it 6:2 and put himself back in a promising position. A loud cry of joy echoed through the hall as Cowen stared into nothingness. The Brazilian tried to bring about the decision with another goal. But it was ultimately Bonanno who reduced the deficit again. Renewed hope for Cowen? Three in-game minutes were officially left to play. “A crazy ending,” said the commentators, while ‘Cowen’ was shown again, not reacting to the goal, at least outwardly. Perhaps it was also a premonition, because that was as good as it got for ‘Matias’.
As a result, ‘Young’ narrowly qualified for the knockout phase. In the end, Cowen and Freitas had the same number of points and goal difference – so the number of goals scored was the deciding factor. In this statistic, the Brazilian had the edge with nine more goals scored. There was no stopping Freitas after the final whistle, the 21-year-old was on the verge of tears. Like ‘PHzin’, he only needs one more win to qualify for the FC 24 World Cup play-offs
