Colombia ended the round of 32 at the World Cup with a fine if unspectacular 1-0 victory over Ghana in Kansas City to complete the line-up of the last-16.
Jhon Arias scored the only goal of the game by meeting a cross from substitute Luis Suarez and sweeping in his shot from the far post.
Alidu Seidu had a tougher time after coming on at right-back for Ghana, facing the dangerous Luis Diaz as Colombia looked the more threatening team.
Ghana found some rhythm as Antoine Semenyo got more involved, but Colombia twice came close to extending their lead before the break – Diaz firing wide when unmarked in the box before Lawrence Ati Zigi produced an excellent save to turn away Johan Mojica’s header.
Colombia thought they had doubled their lead as they created a chance for Diaz to turn in at the far post, only for the offside flag to cut short celebrations, Ati Zigi denying the former Liverpool forward moments later after another sweeping move.
Diaz refused to get too excited, the Bayern Munich player saying: “We have won absolutely nothing.
“The good thing and the positive thing is that we’re playing very well, we feel comfortable, we are being a family, we are working as a team and that will work for what is coming.”
Ghana manager Carlos Queiroz his team were fearful and lacking experience saying: “I felt really quickly that some of the Ghanaian players were fearful. They were not cool, calm, and collected when the pressure hit.
“It’s a very young team. We need more experience, we need time for some players to win what we call maturity. When you play this kind of competition at this level, you cannot only count on the enthusiasm of the youths.
“The goal came too early for us … It took some time for us to adjust and recover from that substitution, and the goal came at the moment we were trying to resettle our team.”
Colombia will now travel to Vancouver to face Switzerland in the round of 16.
Additional reporting by PA.
