World Cup 2018: Stephan Lichtsteiner criticises referee and hails ‘perfect’ Switzerland defence in Brazil draw

‘I was a little bit worried about the referee,’ the new Arsenal signing said

Stephan Lichtsteiner said Switzerland were extra careful out of concern for referee Cesar Ramos’s apparent willingness to call every Brazilian fall as a foul in their 1-1 draw in Rostov, but said his side put in a “perfect” defensive game to frustrate the favourites.

Brazil were underwhelming for most of the game despite a strong start that saw Philippe Coutinho open the scoring, and increasingly complained to the Mexican official about over-zealous Swiss challenges – most notably for a push on Miranda for Steven Zubar’s equaliser. Lichtsteiner feels the Swiss actually kept themselves in check, though, because they felt decisions were going against their side.

“I was a little bit worried about the referee,” the new Arsenal signing said. “Every time they fell down it was a whistle, a foul. This was a bit of a challenge. You think ‘don’t be too aggressive’ because every time they go down it’s a foul. For that I was a bit careful.

“It was very good teamwork on the right side – [Valon] Behrami, [Fabian] Schaer and me. It was almost a perfect game. It’s important to have this teamwork in the next game because we’ll have new situations. We are a mix I think. We are physical, and we defend well, but we also attack. We showed that tonight.”

They also showed they could keep a disappointing Neymar quiet, although that didn’t make it much less of a test for the Swiss.

“It’s very difficult,” Lichsteiner said. “He’s fast, he’s technical, you need to keep up with him all the time because he’s dangerous. It’s a big challenge.”

The full-back did admit it was probably best to play a side like Brazil now, as favourites like them are still finding their feet at this point of a tournament.

“It’s not easy for a big team in the first game, you don’t have the feel [for the tournament] You’ve seen all the big teams in this tournament. Switzerland have a good team so we got a good point. Maybe it’s an advantage to play a big team first. Maybe they don’t know us that well, they don’t have the feeling for the tournament. It was OK to play them first.

“Of course, it’s a very good point, against one of the favourites. We did a good game, we started well then lost a little bit of confidence … but a good game, a good point.”