A battle of contrasting styles of football will be on view when classical Spain crosses swords with a robust Mali in the semifinal of the FIFA U17 World Cup here on Wednesday.
The semifinal contest at the DY Patil Stadium is expected to produce top-drawer football with Euro U17 champions Spain adopting their Tiki-Taka (short-passing) style of play in trying to overcome the free-flowing and attacking manner of play by African champions Mali. Both the teams have progressed to the last eight after losing their opening games, Spain to another top title- favourite and South American champions Brazil and Mali to another latin American outfit, Paraguay, respectively.
While Spain have played mostly in the southern coastal city of Kochi, Mali have a slight advantage of having played at the DY Patil Stadium in two Group B games before travelling out and returning to the same venue in under a fortnight's time.
How much of an advantage the familiarity of the playing surface will be for Mali will be known tomorrow with one small difference from their stay and play earlier on - the rains have gone away.
In both of Mali's previous games here, rains had made the ground wet and even in the quarter finals against fellow- Africans Ghana they had to brave a soggy field in Guwahati to sail through.
Three-time Euro U17 champions Spain will be confronted by the hard-tackling Africans who also play at a fast pace and the outcome will be determined by which team lasts longer in the trying conditions although the game has an 8 pm start.
After losing to the stylish Brazilians, who too have advanced to the semis, Spain have not put a foot wrong. After brushing off the challenge from Niger and DPR Korea comfortably, the Spaniards had a tough game against fellow- Euro outfit France at Guwahati and won on the back of a penalty goal by their lead scorer Abel Ruiz.
Striker Ruiz has scored four goals in the competition, including the first in the 3-1 victory over Iran in the quarters, and will certainly be tightly marked by Mali's defenders.