“Egypt beat Australia in a penalty shootout at the AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas. The North African nation progresses to the round-of-16 game in Atlanta on July 7, where they will face the winner of Argentina’s game with Cape Verde, which kicks off at 6pm EDT (11pm BST) tonight in Miami. Australia started the game well with Cristian Volpato hitting the bar with a long-range shot inside the first five minutes. Egypt, though, were soon in control and opened the scoring on 13 minutes as midfielder Emam Ashour headed in a Karim Hafez cross at the far post. …”
NYT/ATH
YouTube: Australia vs Egypt Highlights 🌎🏆 2026 FIFA World Cup™ | Round of 32
Egypt defeat Australia on penalties to reach the last 16, as goalkeeper gambit fails
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“It’s a warm June afternoon in 2009. The teams look uneven. At 30, I am the second-oldest player in our lineup. Lloyd, Nathan and Ben are early 20s – they can all play. Micky the German isn’t in top condition, and at 34 is past his peak. But at a conservative estimate every member of the opposition has two more decades in their legs. A couple of them might be pushing 70. We’re in kit. They are in jeans. We have trainers. They’re in boots – working boots, not ‘cleats’. And yet after an hour we have been beaten to a pulp. The final score evades my memory, but it might be the only six-a-side I’ve ever played in where ‘next goal wins’ wasn’t a vaguely justifiable way to end things. How had this team of old men beaten us? A word you may have heard more often than usual in 
“Spain dominated Austria in Los Angeles to reach the last-16 with a 3-0 victory and looked every bit one of the teams to beat in the World Cup. Among the favourites for the tournament, Spain were in complete control and with Lamine Yamal again pulling tricks and striking fear into defenders, Luis de la Fuente’s side look the biggest challengers to France for the title. They could face the 2022 finalists in the semi-finals in Dallas on July 14. Mikel Oyarzabal calmly slotted home after a cross from the left in the first half before Pedro Porro made it 2-0 in the second half after great work from Marc Cucurella. Another Cucurella cross was then finished by Oyarzabal for his fourth goal of the tournament. …”
“Presented as a still image by the video referee, the case for the prosecution is obvious. United States forward Folarin Balogun is stepping down, with force, seemingly over the right ankle of Bosnia and Herzegovina defender Tarik Muharemovic. The opponent’s foot is also in a contorted shape, sliding slightly to his right, providing a squeamish image where the first instinct of the viewer is to wince and turn away. It does not take a wild, imaginative leap to hypothesize that this challenge could lead to serious injury, such is the manner of the tackler’s landing and the point of contact. This perception is only enhanced by Muharemovic, clearly in initial pain, beating the turf he lies on. …”
“Even by the standards of this World Cup, this was ridiculous. Belgium produced the biggest comeback victory of the 2026 tournament so far, rallying after going 2-0 down to equalise through Romelu Lukaku and Youri Tielemans in the space of five mad minutes late in normal time before snatching a 3-2 win deep in added time of extra time through Tielemans’ penalty, awarded after a VAR review, to advance to the last 16. At 125 minutes, it is the latest goal in the history of the World Cup finals. …”
“The England men’s team has been playing football for 154 years, but it has never had a player quite like Harry Kane before. England have had some great moments in their history, winning the World Cup in 1966. But they have rarely won a game quite like this. Not with this same sense of being seized, being saved, of one man deciding to take control of a game that was slipping through English fingers. 
“I was born in the late 70s of a mother from Martinique and a father from Lorraine region in eastern continental France: I was always aware that, for good and bad, France was more than white, more than Europe, more than what most thought and took for granted. I looked to history to make sense of the very existence of my family, and the history I found was a history of exploitation, slavery, abuse ignored by most French people. Growing up in the 1980s, there were few places where French flags were acceptable: government buildings, sporting events, right-wing and fascist meetings. …”
“WE should not be surprised at the way the World Cup looks after the bloated and occasionally dull first stage, but the overwhelming appearance of the competition smacks of “Entertainment USA”. Where do we start? The pitch-side announcements, the absurd kick-off countdowns, the obsessive celebrity spotting and the strange jeering when fouls occur. If that isn’t bad enough, the hydration breaks, which will go down in history as the most blatant back-door way to make a little extra money, are really moving a global game closer to US sports culture. …”
Scissors Kick 