World Cup Team Profiles: Group A: Uruguay

Teams / Ari Last / 17 February 2010 / Leave a comment Free £25 Bet

They have a rich World Cup heritage, yet there's more to Uruguay than simply a glorious past...

At odds of [170.0] to win the tournament, it looks highly unlikely that this Uruguay side will add to their nation's proud international honours list. Even so, they've got a couple of individuals more than capable of pulling the proverbial rabbit out of the hat, and at [2.1] to qualify from the group, punters see them as battling with Mexico to proceed with France to the last 16.

Nation: Uruguay

Also known as...
'La Celeste'

Road to South Africa...
After finishing fifth out of the ten-team South American qualifying group (as they did in '01 & '05), Uruguay overcame Costa Rica 2-1 on aggregate in the play-off which no doubt helped them exorcise the ghosts of 2005, when they lost at the same stage to Australia.

World Cup Pedigree...
Uruguay hosted and won the inaugural World Cup in 1930, and then won it again in 1950. But while their history in the tournament may be rich, their efforts in more recent times don't make great reading. 2010 will be only their second appearance in the last five tournaments and the last time they reached the last 16 was some 40 years ago in Mexico, where they eventually lost in the Semi Finals.

They'll be relying on...
Diego Forlan showing up. The Atletico Madrid man is a Jekyll and Hyde type, able to appear brilliant one moment, yet utterly ordinary the next. It's vital to the side that he has a good tournament and finds his feet early on. If he scores in the first game, Uruguay could be ones to watch.

Something you may not have known is...
Uruguay's proud World Cup heritage is all the more impressive when you consider the fact that they are by far the smallest nation to have ever lifted the Jules Rimet trophy. With a population of fewer than four million, their talent pool is considerably smaller than that of rivals Argentina (40 million), who have also won the world Cup on two occasions.

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