When FIFA expanded the World Cup field from 32 to 48 teams for this summer’s tournament, the gnashing of teeth and clutching of pearls was as predictable as it was loud. The field would be watered down, the traditionalists protested. The group stage would be a series of blowouts, the sharks would devour the minnows.
In fact, none of that happened.
What we got instead was plucky Cape Verde playing No. 3 Spain to a draw and becoming the smallest nation to reach to the elimination rounds. We got Austria advancing on a goal six minutes into stoppage time — eliminating unbeaten Iran, which deserved better — and Canada, Egypt and the Democratic Republic of Congo all winning World Cup games for the first time.
We got Lionel Messi scoring six goals and Mexico and Spain giving up none. We got South Africa, Canada, Egypt and Cape Verde advancing to the knockout rounds for the first time while South Korea and Uruguay went home.
It was one of the most surprising, exciting and compelling group stages in recent World Cup history. And on Sunday it gave way to the first game of the knockout rounds, with Canada beating South Africa 1-0 on a goal by LAFC midfielder Stephen Eustaquio in the second minute of stoppage time.
Unlike much of the group stage, Sunday’s game was a sloppy, sleepy affair, with South Africa relying on some heroic play from its back line to keep the game even. But it ended with a bang with Eustaquio latching on to a loose ball at top of the box and blasting a right-footed volleying just inside the left post.
Canada will play the winner of Monday’s Netherlands-Morocco match in the round of 16 next week. For South Africa, the World Cup is over.
For both countries, this World Cup was the most successful ever. Canada, which is sharing host duties with Mexico and the U.S., has won twice. South Africa had won games before, but it had never gotten beyond the group stage.
For South Africa, that success is part of a continental soccer resurgence. Four years ago in Qatar, Morocco became the first African nation to reach the World Cup semifinals. This summer, thanks to the expanded field, 10 African nations qualified for the tournament and nine advanced to the round of 32.
And the rise of African soccer hasn’t just boosted the fortunes of African teams. Top-ranked France, a World Cup favorite, has 21 players of African descent on its roster; at least a dozen other non-African teams, including Canada, have at least two players of African heritage.
Canada is one of the world’s most diverse countries with nearly a quarter of its population having been born somewhere else. Former coach John Herdman leaned into that diversity when he took over the men’s team in 2018; four years later, Canada made its second trip to the World Cup with a lineup that included four dual nationals.
Jesse Marsch, the U.S.-born coach who succeeded Herdman, doubled down on that. As a result, the 26 players on Canada’s roster, or their parents, come from more than 17 countries — from Iran, Croatia, Jamaica and Barbados to Haiti, Lebanon, Nigeria and the Philippines. Captain Alphonso Davies, Canada’s best player, was born to Liberian parents in a refugee camp in Ghana before being resettled in Edmonton, becoming a citizen in 2017.
Davies, who hasn’t played since sustained an acute hamstring injury in early May, came on in the 76th minute Sunday and had an immediate impact, threading a perfect pass to the feet of Promise David, whose right-footed shot from the top of the box drifted inches wide of the left post.
Three minutes later Davies drew two defenders to him on the left flank, opening space for Jonathan David to slip into the box and get off a tight-angled shot near the end line that stood up South African keeper Ronwen Williams. But the winner came from Eustaquio, the son of Portuguese parents who Herdman wooed away from the Portuguese U-21 team in 2019.
He has made 60 appearances with Canada’s senior national team, none bigger than Sunday’s.
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