Serbia and Ghana scoreless at half-time

Group D rivals Serbia and Ghana played out a boring 0-0 stalemate in the first half of their World Cup opener at the Loftus Versfeld stadium on Sunday.

Chances were few and far between and every time either side played a pass with either pace or distance, the receiver was taking so long to bring the ball under control that the move lost its momentum.

What few chances there were largely came from dead ball situations.

Manchester United defender Nemanja Vidic and Serbia captain Dejan Stankovic combined to chop down the rampaging Prince Tagoe but Asamoah Gyan fired the 25 yard free-kick over the bar on four minutes.

On the quarter-hour mark Nikola Zigic almost turned a driven Kwadwo Asamoah cross into his own net before the Udinese wide-man then teed up centre-back John Mensah from a free-kick but the Sunderland centre-back headed over.

Gyan was then barely an inch away from converting an inswinging Kevin-Prince Boateng cross from six yards before Serbia’s Aleksandar Kolarov curled a free-kick just over.