As the goals piled up, and the Japanese celebrations grew more and more revelatory, it was hard not to wonder where the showdown everyone expected had gone.
Japan and Spain had been the class of their group at this World Cup, with each breezing to two early victories to quickly lock up places in the knockout round. Their collision on Monday in Wellington, New Zealand — a meeting of two teams with offenses that scored easily and defenses that had yet to surrender a goal — held the promise of a good measuring stick of their relative strength, and of their respective cases as title contenders.