Belgium stood up after an infighting and USA’s hero was sent off.
Here are some of the night’s headlines from the World Cup.
Belgium–Senegal 2–2 (3–2 after extra time)
Belgium avoided another championship fiasco. 0–2 became 2–2 in the final minutes of the round of 16 against Senegal. In extra time, Youri Tielemans decided on penalties with the latest ever goal in WC history.
Tielemans became a two-goal scorer, after arguing openly with a teammate.
► Read more here.
USA–Bosnia-Herzegovina 2–0
The home nation USA advanced from the round of 16, but one of the team’s key players is suspended in the round of 16 against Belgium.
Folarin Balogun scored his third World Cup goal in as many games as the USA defeated Bosnia-Herzegovina. In the middle of the second half, he was then sent off.
► Read more here.
Several planeswalkers
The 2026 FIFA World Cup has been relatively spared from plane stormers so far, but in tonight’s match between Belgium and Senegal, several spectators rushed into Seattle Stadium at the same time.
One of them ran around the pitch for quite a while before being cornered by the chasing security staff.
► Read more here.
13-fold increase in violations
The international football confederation, Fifa, identified 89,000 offensive posts and comments on social media during the World Cup group stage. It is a 13-fold increase compared to the group stage during the World Cup four years ago, according to Fifa.
Eleven percent of the violations were racist.
Fifa’s social media protection system, SMPS, went through over six million posts and comments.
New episode of Bank & Niva
After Sweden’s exit, the WC is also over for the Inside Blågult podcast, but Simon Bank and Erik Niva continue to call each other every day during the championship.
In tonight’s episode, they talk about Yassine Bounou’s revolutionary goalkeeping technique, among other things.
► Listen to the podcast in the player above.
