The China Mail - Paraguay coach says team 'fought like lions' in World Cup loss to France

"France couldn't find the answers, and it took a bit of individual skill and a penalty given by VAR to make the difference which their football had not been able to do," Alfaro said after the game at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia.

Kylian Mbappe's 70th-minute spot-kick finally broke the deadlock in the last-16 tie and took France through to a quarter-final against Morocco, as Paraguay go home.

The South American nation were appearing at the World Cup for the first time since 2010 and had been hoping to match their run to the quarter-finals at that tournament, which remains best ever showing.

The tactics they employed to try to unsettle their opponents irritated France forward Kylian Mbappe, while coach Didier Deschamps accused Paraguay of issuing verbal insults.

But Alfaro insisted his men had "fought like lions out on the pitch".

He added: "It took us 16 years to get back to a World Cup, while Mbappe won the World Cup the first time he played in it, got to the final in his second and now is fighting to be the top scorer."

It remains the case that Paraguay's only victories in the knockout stages of the World Cup have come in penalty shoot-outs -- including against Germany in Boston in the last 32.

"We worked so hard to get a different result but I will leave here with the knowledge that we came to compete and we did compete," added Alfaro, who added that his team were in tears of disappointment in the dressing room after the match.

"I have no doubt that this World Cup has made us all better, although I am sad to go out because I hoped we might go further."

F.Brown--ThChM