Colombia Beat Greece 3×0 in World Cup Group C: Daily

By Robbie Blakeley, Senior Contributing Reporter

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Colombia made a fantastic start to the 2014 FIFA World Cup with a comprehensive 3-0 win over Greece at the Mineirão Stadium in Belo Horizonte. Today (June 14th) is a first in World Cup history, with four games played in succession, starting in the Minas capital.

Goals from Armero, Téofilo Gutiérrez and James Rodriguez eased the Colombians through their World Cup opener. It also maintained a hundred percent record for South Americans in the tournament so far, following wins for Brazil on Thursday and Chile yesterday.

Support for Colombia was strong in the Minas Gerais capital, with ninety percent of the 57,000 crowd being Colombia fans. After being drawn in a relatively straightforward group alongside, Greece, Japan and Ivory Coast, there is a strong belief they can progress to the knock-out stages.

On this showing they have as good a chance as anybody. Here, they raced into the lead after only five minutes, Armero sweeping home from just inside the penalty area. Greece came into the game and enjoyed a period of control midway through the first half, but failed to make it count.

Forward Samaras caused problems for veteran defender Mario Yepes, who failed to keep up with his man on two occasions. Yet after the break, Colombia ran away with the game. Just before the hour mark, Téofilo Gutiérrez poked hom a corner from close range to double the lead.

Greece didn’t manage to reach the same level of ferocity after falling further behind, and the Colombian advantage looked secure. Deep into injury time, James Rodriguez rolled home the third to add gloss to the scoreline.

* The Rio Times Daily Updates feature is offered to help keep you up-to-date with important news as it happens.