Welcome to The Tap-Inn. Where you can tap into the world of soccer with me, your Irish Tap-Inn bartender, Joe. 🍻

We’re back after Independence Day weekend and we have our first quarter finalists. Pull up a stool.

Here's what's on tap today:

Let’s tap in.

Sidny Lopes Cabral, Cape Verde v Argentina.

Picture the scene. Extra time in Miami, the defending champs lead 2-1, and Cape Verde's fairy tale is down to its final pages. Then Lopes Cabral picks the ball up at the edge of the box and curls one into the top corner. 2-2. Against defending champions, Argentina. In a World Cup knockout game.

Cape Verde didn't win. An own goal off Diney Borges settled it late in extra-time. But that strike will be replayed in Cape Verdean bars for the next fifty years, and honestly, in my bar too.

Epic.

Every bar has that one pool shark nobody sees coming. Quiet fella, sips his beer, then runs the table on the guy with the custom cue. This tournament, we’ve seen quite a few similar scenarios.

Cape Verde took world champions, Argentina to extra-time. Norway knocked out five-time winners Brazil. And in the last round Paraguay beat Germany on penalties. These aren't accidents.

“How does this even happen?”

Let’s break it down across four key elements of an upset.

1. The low block

When you hear a commentator say a team is "sitting in a low block" they mean every outfield player is camped deep in their own half, packed between the ball and the goal.

It looks defensive because it is. But it's not cowardice, it's geometry. Superstars like Messi thrive on space, so the underdog's first job is to make sure there isn't any. Shrink the field, force the stars into traffic, and suddenly the talent gap matters a lot less.

2. The counter-attacks

Here's the trade-off: to break down a low block, the better team has to push players forward. That leaves them very open.

So the underdog waits, wins the ball, and sprints. One long pass, one fast forward, and a team that hasn't crossed midfield in twenty minutes is suddenly one-on-one with the goalkeeper. Norway built their whole night around this against Brazil, soaking up pressure and springing Haaland loose.

3. Set pieces

Corners and free kicks are soccer's great equalizer. When the ball is dead, all that superior passing and movement means nothing. It's just a ball in the air and a crowd of bodies, and anyone can win a header.

For underdogs, set pieces aren't just a bonus. They're the game plan.

4. A goalkeeper having the night of his life

Every great upset has one. Against Argentina, Cape Verde's 40-year-old keeper Vozinha made eight saves, including a point-blank stop from Messi himself. Norway's Orjan Nyland saved a penalty against Brazil and kept saving all night.

One hot goalkeeper can erase an entire team's advantage.

“Why doesn’t this happen in other sports as much?”

Here's the part that makes it all possible. Soccer is the lowest scoring major sport on earth. In basketball, the better team scores 100 times and talent almost always wins out. In soccer, one goal can decide everything, and one goal can come from anywhere. A deflection, a corner, a keeper's fingertips.

Over a 38-game league season, the best team almost always rises to the top. But in one game? On one night? Anyone can beat anyone. That's not a flaw. It's the whole reason we watch.

Cheers to the underdogs.

Origin: Borrowed from Jack and the Beanstalk and adopted by English soccer over a century ago, mostly thanks to the FA Cup, where tiny part-time clubs get drawn against the giants of the game and occasionally slay one.

Definition: When a small club or unfancied nation knocks off one of the sport's superpowers. The bigger the gap between the teams, the bigger the giant-killing.

Usage: "Paraguay beating Germany? That's the biggest giant-killing this tournament's seen in years."

Another round for Balogun after all

On Friday we asked if it was last call for Folarin Balogun after his red card against Bosnia. Turns out the bar got a late license.

On Sunday, FIFA suspended his automatic one-game ban, putting him on a one-year probation instead. It's the first time in over 60 years of World Cups that a red card hasn't carried a suspension into the next match. Balogun is free to lead the line against Belgium tonight.

The backstory is messy. Reports say President Trump called FIFA president Gianni Infantino and asked him to review the red card. Belgium are furious. Their coach Rudi Garcia said he thought the news was an April Fools' joke, and the Belgian federation is exploring an appeal.

However you feel about how it happened. The USMNT's top scorer, with three goals already this tournament, is back for the biggest game of the summer. Belgium knocked the US out in 2014. Revenge is a dish best served in Seattle.

We are almost down to the QFs and the last few days delivered some of the best drama of the tournament.

Today (Monday) and tomorrow see the last of the Round of 16 games with the QFs kicking off on Thursday. It’s starting to get very real.

Best World Cup finish (TBC): Quarterfinals, right now. Before this summer, Norway had never won a knockout game and hadn't even been to a World Cup in 28 years. They've now beaten Ivory Coast and Brazil in the space of a week.

Star player: Erling Haaland. Seven goals in his first World Cup, including two against Brazil. The Manchester City striker is built like a Viking longship and finishes like one too, arriving fast and leaving destruction behind.

Joe's favorite city: Bergen. Colorful wooden houses, fjords in every direction, and it rains about 240 days a year, so the locals have perfected the art of being cozy indoors. My kind of people.

Top-selling beer: Ringnes. Brewed in Oslo since 1876, crisp and easy-drinking, and this week, flowing very freely.

"Joe, Why was Argentina’s winning goal given as an own goal and not credited to the Argentine who headed it?"

Thanks to Jerry in Dallas for the question.

Great question, and a painful one if you're Cape Verdean.

The rule of thumb: if a shot's on target and a defender gets a touch on its way in, the attacker keeps the goal. A deflection doesn't take it off him. But if the ball wasn't heading in, or the attacker never really got his effort away, and the defender's touch is what puts it past his own keeper, it goes down as an own goal.

That's what happened for Argentina’s goal vs Cape Verde. Romero went up for Messi's corner, but it was Borges, trying to stop him, who got the touch that beat Vozinha. No Borges, no goal. Rough way to lose a World Cup game.

Egypt 🇪🇬

The Pharaohs are quietly having an amazing tournament. They beat Australia on penalties (1-1, then 4-2 from the spot) to reach their first-ever World Cup Round of 16, and their reward is a Tuesday date with Messi and Argentina in Atlanta.

Very few were giving them a chance of getting this far, which is exactly what everyone said about Cape Verde. And with Mohamed Salah, Egypt have something Cape Verde didn't: one of the best players of his generation. One hot afternoon from Mo and the champs are in real bother.

Cape Verde comes home 🇨🇻

The Blue Sharks didn't win the World Cup, but you'd never know it from the scenes in Praia. Thousands lined the streets to welcome the squad home, a full national celebration for a team that didn't win a single game in the tournament.

They didn't need to. A scoreless draw with Spain, two more battling draws, and 120 minutes going toe-to-toe with Argentina. For a nation of half a million people at their first-ever World Cup, that's not a participation trophy. That's a legacy.

Spare a thought for England's Jordan Henderson, who managed to get injured at the World Cup without playing a single minute.

Celebrating on the sideline during the Mexico game, Henderson took a tumble over the advertising wall and hurt his wrist bracing the fall. He's every one of us who's ever come off worse against a bar stool, and he didn't even get a pint out of it.

England won 3-2, so at least the wrist wasn't sacrificed in vain. Get well soon, Hendo. Ice it. Preferably with something cold resting on top of the ice.

As they say in Norway, Skål! 🍻