Published On 7/3/2026
The Swiss national team achieved an important victory over its Algerian counterpart with a clean score in the round of 32 of the 2026 World Cup, eliminating the “Greens” from the first elimination round after passing the first round.
The Swiss national team won all three matches it played against African teams in the World Cup, and kept a clean sheet in all of those confrontations. Other victories were against Togo in 2006 (2-0) and against Cameroon in 2022 (1-0).
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The Swiss national team broke a series of seven consecutive matches in the World Cup knockout rounds without achieving any victory (a draw in one match and a loss in six), while the last time it achieved a victory in such matches was in 1938 (4-2 against Germany in the first round rematch).
This is the third victory for the Swiss national team in the 2026 World Cup, and it is the first time that the Swiss national team has achieved three or more victories in one edition of the World Cup.
At 20 years and 261 days old, Johan Manzambi became the youngest player to reach five goals (three goals and two assists) in a World Cup since 1966.
‘Worthless’ takeover
The Algerian national team had 56% possession of the ball against Switzerland, outperforming its opponents in all four matches in the 2026 World Cup. The Desert Warriors have never finished a single tournament with a higher percentage of possession in all their matches.
Excluding own goals, Dan Ndoye’s goal was the quickest in the second half of a World Cup knockout match (45:46) since Davor Šuker’s goal for Croatia against France in the 1998 semi-final (45:25).
Brill Embolo scored his fourth goal for the Swiss national team in the World Cup, and he is only surpassed in the number of goals for the national team by Joseph Haughey (6) and Xherdan Shaqiri (5), while the same player scored his third opening goal in a World Cup match, the most for a Swiss player in the history of the tournament, at the age of 35 years and 131 days.
Algerian Riyad Mahrez became the second oldest African player to start a match in the World Cup knockout rounds, after Senegalese Idrissa Gueye (36 years and 278 days) against Belgium in the round of 32 of the current tournament, before Mahrez retired internationally.
