The end of Japan's World Cup game was straight out of 'The Simpsons'

In season nine of "The Simpsons," an episode titled "The Cartridge Family" focuses on Homer buying a gun, but it opens with a soccer match coming to Springfield.

It's Mexico against Portugal to "determine once and for all which nation is the greatest on Earth."

Intrigued by a commercial promotion for the game that was clearly influenced by "Monday Night Football," the family attends the match.

However, the game opens with very little action, the fans revolt and there is a riot that spreads into town. That prompts Homer to get a gun.

That opening sequence of the game may have looked familiar to fans watching the end of Thursday's game between Japan and Poland. In the waning moments, Japan trailed 1-0, but because of what was happening in the other Group H game between Colombia and Senegal, a loss by a single goal was fine.

Japan and Senegal ended up tied for second in points, goal differential, goals for and goals against. The next tie-breaker? The fair play points, which was calculated by the number of yellow and red cards for each team in the tournament.

Senegal had more yellow cards, so Japan was happy to kick the ball around against Poland and let time expire because it meant they would advance to the knockout stage. That time wasting resembled that "Simpsons" soccer game.

Take a look at the two:

This story was originally published June 28, 2018 at 2:12 PM.