WORLD CUP ROUND-UP - DAY 8

Day eight of the World Cup provided a thrilling goalfest, a top quality exhibition of football and a tight goalless draw.

Argentina got the day off to a perfect start, thumping Serbia & Montenegro 6-0 to secure their passage to the last 16 and underline their undoubted credentials as potential winners of the 2006 finals.

Holland followed suit, with their 2-1 win over the impressive Ivory Coast setting a group decider with Argentina next Wednesday.

The day ended with Mexico having to settle for a goalless draw against the defensively resolute Angolans.

Diego Maradona was in the crowd to watch Argentina perform in a style he will have been proud of.

Serbia and Montenegro were blown away - despite arriving as one of the most difficult teams to beat in Europe during the qualifying campaign.

They were rocked back on their heels by a thrilling display of attacking football that included a return to action of Lionel Messi.

The Barcelona wonderkid has sent out a message to the rest of the world he is back in business.

Messi, 18, saw his progress hampered by a thigh injury in the run-up to the tournament.

But he stepped off the bench against Serbia and Montenegro to score the final goal in Argentina's 6-0 romp.

Messi looked full of running when he came on and is thrilled to be involved at this level.

"I am happy because we played well," he said.

"I wanted to play some minutes and am pleased to have scored. We knew that Serbia and Montenegro would be difficult but we looked like the winners of the game right from the start.

"I was pleased with our form today and against Ivory Coast as we are scoring a lot of goals."

Argentina scored three goals either side of half-time to send out a warning shot to the good and the great assembled here in Germany.

Maxi Rodriguez scored twice while Esteban Cambiasso, Hernan Crespo and Carlos Tevez also found the target before Messi rounded off a spectacular victory.

By contrast, Holland coach Marco Van Basten was left to concede Ivory Coast were unlucky in their clash, despite two quality strikes from Robin van Persie and Ruud van Nistelrooy setting the Dutch on a collision course for Argentina in what should become the main highlight of the group stages.

"We got through this game with a lot of luck," said Van Basten.

"I think that we did a good job in the first half hour, after that it all became much more difficult.

"They put all their efforts in making goal chances and we lost the battle in midfield.

"After half-time we could not bring the style of play we wanted, but that had everything to do with the power of the Ivory Coast.

"They are man-by-man big players, certainly when they start playing with full speed and with many positional changes.

"But we can be satisfied that we had a good defensive team and we were hard to break.

"We have won two games and we can be happy about that."

The Dutchman added that he was placing no expectations on his side ahead of the final Group C match against Argentina.

"I think that we must try to play good football and do the job we were asked to do.

"If all players do their task how we want them to, we will see what happens."
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Angola coach Luis Oliveira Goncalves admitted he was delighted with his country's first World Cup point after a backs-to-the-wall defensive display earned a goalless draw with Group D leaders Mexico.

Goncalves savoured a breakthrough moment for the team in their first appearance at a World Cup tournament in what has so far been a disappointing campaign for African teams.

"It was a good point - playing Mexico was very difficult for us and in the first half we did alright," said Goncalves.

"In the second half we gave our maximum although we did not score. I want to congratulate the team for this result. It's the first time for us at the World Cup and that makes this our best result."

Mexico coach Ricardo Lavolpe made no attempt to hide his dismay at the result.

"The players worked very hard and played hard - the only thing we failed to do was finish things off," said Lavolpe. "I can't fault the effort of the players.

"I don't want to keep repeating myself but we did nothing wrong in the way we approached the game - lamentably we only finished with a zero.

"At a World Cup there are no easy games and we were not expecting this to be an easy game."