The World Cup saw one of its biggest-ever surprises when Cape Verde, playing its first game at the tournament, held Spain – European champions and many people’s favourites to win this summer – to a 0-0 draw.

The first round of games in Group G ended with all four teams on one point, as another shock was avoided by a late goal from Maxi Araujo, as Uruguay came from behind to salvage a draw against Saudi Arabia.

Romelu Lukaku made an immediate impact by forcing an equaliser for Belgium, after it had spent much of the game in Seattle trailing to Egypt, while the other game in that group saw Iran come from behind twice to earn a draw with New Zealand.

This game makes fools of us all. Is that why we love it?

The mystery Polymarket speculator probably thought they were helping themselves to a free $85,000 when they put $1 million on Spain to beat Cape Verde in Atlanta.

Because the result was inevitable, right? There was no possible way that tiny Cape Verde, ranked 64 in the world and playing at their first World Cup, was going to do anything but roll over for Spain. It’s nice that it’s here, and we all enjoyed the joyous scenes when it qualified, but Cape Verde were definitely going to lose to Spain.

Not so much.

It was a magnificent performance from the African minnows, the third-smallest nation to appear at a World Cup with a population of not much more than 500,000, combining mental fortitude, a good tactical plan and a steadfast refusal to panic in the face of Spanish attack after attack.

After the game, coach Bubista tried not to single anyone out for praise, but the consensus hero was 40-year-old goalkeeper Vozinha, who burst into tears at the end of the game: he explained that his emotions stemmed from the fact that his grandparents, who essentially raised him, had passed away before they saw his crowning achievement, and his mother couldn’t travel to the United States because of the onerous cost of a visa from Cape Verde.

But even with a magnificent performance from an inspired goalkeeper, there’s no way that this result should have happened, even with Luis de la Fuente’s decision to leave Lamine Yamal and Nico Williams on the bench. Both eventually came on, but it did no good.

It’s been said plenty of times that even with everything unpleasant that has surrounded this World Cup, the games will never let us down. And they haven’t, because you never know what trick is going to be pulled next. Pretty much anything is possible in this game, and it will make fools of us all.

There is a slightly masochistic streak in any fan, because we know that we love a game that has the power to make us look utterly ridiculous. Perhaps not $1 million ridiculous for most of us, but ridiculous all the same. And in the end, that’s why we love it.

What’s the problem with the South American teams?

In the end, Uruguay was a little unlucky not to beat Saudi Arabia.

It was pressing for a winner until the last, and nearly got it a few times. Uruguay was the better team, but still didn’t get the victory. And that’s been a theme of the tournament, for the South American teams.

Brazil drew with Morocco and was generally a little underwhelming; Ecuador’s famously strong defence was eventually breached by Amad as it lost to Ivory Coast; and Paraguay was taken to the cleaners by the USA, thoroughly outclassed by Christian Pulisic and Folarin Balogun and everyone else.

Not only have the four sides not won a game yet between them, but they haven’t held the lead yet: this represents their worst collective start to a World Cup since 1974.

What does this mean? What has gone wrong for the South American sides? Have they fallen behind the rest of the world? Is this an equalising of quality throughout the world?

Well, perhaps we can’t start to answer those questions until all six South American sides have played, and maybe not until the end of the group stage.

And especially not until Lionel Messi and Argentina have made their bow: they face Algeria today, and it will be the biggest surprise of the lot if they don’t manage a win in that. And if Colombia don’t beat Uzbekistan on Wednesday… then it really will start to look like a pattern at this World Cup.

• A Tell Media report / Source: The Athletic