Chile defeated Northern Ireland 2-0 in Valparaiso in their final warm up match up before they head to Brazil to face Australia in their Group B opener.
Despite dictating the rhythm throughout the game, it took La Roja 79 minutes to open the scoring through Valencia forward Eduardo Vargas who is on loan from Napoli before Cagliari striker Mauricio Pinilla doubled Chile’s advantage in the 82nd minute.
Three of Chile’s key players in Alexis Sanchez and the goalscorers Pinilla and Vargas had started the game on the bench but coach Jorge Sampaoli brought on all three on to break down Northern Ireland and prevent their stubborn resistance from spoiling the sendoff.
Sanchez almost managed to open the scoring in a bizarre fashion after Conor McLauglin’s clearance bounced off the Barcelona man and forced a save from Roy Carroll.
Vargas has been Chile’s top score in the last six friendlies with the 24-year-old having scored four goals.
Behind Vargas in the scoring charts is Sanchez with two goals and his total is matched by O’Higgins attacking midfielder Pablo Hernandez who has scored twice in his international debut against Costa Rica in January but he failed to make the final 23-man World Cup squad.
Chile have been in good form in recent friendlies, winning four out of their last six and only losing twice to Germany and Brazil and many felt they were unfortunate to lose to the Nationalmannschaft
Another positive for the South American side was the appearance of midfielder Arturo Vidal who came on as a substitute against Northern Ireland following knee surgery and it now looks more likely that he will be ready to face Australia on June 13.
Coach Sampaoli praised Vidal’s boldness and hard work to recover as quickly as possible to get some minutes against in the friendly against Northern Ireland.
