{"id":767982,"date":"2026-06-29T02:40:18","date_gmt":"2026-06-29T02:40:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/767982\/"},"modified":"2026-06-29T02:40:18","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T02:40:18","slug":"from-being-ranked-120th-to-the-last-16-of-a-world-cup-canada-have-their-history-making-moment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/767982\/","title":{"rendered":"From being ranked 120th to the last 16 of a World Cup, Canada have their history-making moment"},"content":{"rendered":"

INGLEWOOD, Calif. \u2014 Ten days ago, Isma\u00ebl Kon\u00e9 suffered a horrific broken leg in front of 52,497 fans at BC Place in Vancouver and watched his World Cup end in the blink of an eye<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But on Sunday, he was again alongside his Canadian teammates, and the midfielder, who cannot walk without crutches, danced.<\/p>\n

Kon\u00e9 swayed deliriously to music in the middle of Canada\u2019s dressing room.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe seemed to have recovered from his injury quite quickly,\u201d defender Luc De Fougerolles joked.<\/p>\n

With the sun breaking through after a grey Southern California afternoon, Kon\u00e9 and the rest of the Canadian men\u2019s national team became, as head coach Jesse Marsch said in the post-match speech<\/a>, heroes, elevated into Canadian history.<\/p>\n

After 91 minutes of tense soccer in Canada\u2019s first-ever knockout-round game in the men\u2019s World Cup (the biggest sports event in the world, it is worth reminding curious Canadians), Stephen Eustaquio delivered a thrilling added-time goal to send South Africa home and Canada into the round of 16. Teammates stormed the pitch, then they danced in their locker room. They could dance because they had accomplished one of their many goals: deliver a moment that would change soccer in Canada.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou guys are Canadian heroes,\u201d Marsch said to his players huddled around him on the pitch with the same emotion any soccer fan from Port McNeil to Rivi\u00e8re-au-Renard would have provided. \u201cTo the future children of this country who play this sport, this sport has a big future because of you guys.\u201d<\/p>\n

Canada\u2019s 1-0 win over South Africa was not just a soccer story; it was a story that will shine brightly in the annals of Canadian sports history.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a place the men\u2019s national team has rarely been. But they are never leaving, now.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\n Head coach Jesse Marsch told his players they were Canadian heroes after their round-of-32 win. (Sarah Stier \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

\u201cFor Canadian sports history, it\u2019s going to be a moment where you\u2019re going to know where you were when that moment happened,\u201d defender Alistair Johnston said. \u201cThat\u2019s something that is not lost on us. We know that not only are we writing history in Canadian soccer, but in Canadian sport, and that\u2019s a magical thing when you think about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

To properly understand \u2014 nah, savour \u2014 this result, you have to appreciate where this sport and this team were not too long ago.<\/p>\n

Overlooked in the Canadian sports landscape, soccer was the sport that people from other countries played. It was the sport that more kids played than any other team sport, but never as a proper Canadian pastime. Years of poor results saw the national team fall as low as 120th in the FIFA rankings in 2017.<\/p>\n

Let that marinate for a moment: nine years ago, Canada were closer to the bottom of the world of men\u2019s soccer than the top.<\/p>\n

\u201cI remember playing U.S. Virgin Islands at IMG Academy a couple of years ago, and there were five people in the stands,\u201d goalkeeper Maxime Crepeau said of Canada\u2019s 8-0 victory in the Concacaf Nations League qualifying stage in 2018, \u201cand now we\u2019re going to the World Cup round of 16.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Sunday, there was no bigger story in the country than the men\u2019s national soccer team.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a strange feeling and I bet that it\u2019s not dissimilar to what Canadians felt back home and in the stands,\u201d Johnston said of Eustaquio\u2019s goal. \u201cIt\u2019s just a moment of magic and something just comes over your body. You see Steph sprinting away and the whole team sprinting.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s one of those moments that you\u2019ll never forget where you were.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\n Canada midfielder Stephen Eustaquio scored the historic goal that sent his team through to the round of 16. (Alex Grimm \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

This result has been building, sometimes out of the limelight but recently under bright lights, for some time. In Qatar during the 2022 World Cup, Canada were not ready for the moment. That was evident when the team was more than 30 minutes late for their first press conference. It was evident in how Canada showed flashes of brilliance, whether it was running Belgium into the ground or scoring their first goal, but they were unable to compete for an entire 90 minutes. They had not yet learned what resilience on the world stage looks like.<\/p>\n

On Sunday, they defined it. Canada kept grinding after not converting multiple chances and had to push through a South Africa team that wanted only to defend. Finally, the moment.<\/p>\n

Eustaquio\u2019s goal and the performance it encapsulated eclipses Alphonso Davies\u2019 goal in 2022, Canada\u2019s first at a men\u2019s World Cup, because it cemented a win.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we fight for each other, when we play for each other,\u201d Eustaquio said, \u201cspecial things like this can happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

If Canada had not clawed into relevance domestically after hosting World Cup games, it would have been a prime opportunity wasted. The opportunity of playing World Cup games at home and providing moments for young Canadians to latch onto might never come back.<\/p>\n

The win will take Canada to a different place in the sport internationally, too. They should now be viewed as the kind of team that can win games when it matters, after losing those types of games for generations.<\/p>\n

Eustaquio\u2019s goal should be played alongside the great Canadian goals in sports history, whether it is Paul Henderson\u2019s Summit Series-winning goal over the Soviet Union in 1972 or Sidney Crosby\u2019s goal over the Americans in the 2010 Winter Olympics.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe just have the belief, and I shot it with everything I have,\u201d Eustaquio said.<\/p>\n

The moment represented all that is worth celebrating about Canadian soccer: a perfect cross from a kid raised in a Nova Scotian town of a little over 7,000, where soccer was not played much. Jacob Shaffelburg kept playing the game he loved anyway, and delivered the cross on his wrong foot, no less.<\/p>\n

And an emphatic finish from a man who grew up in another small Canadian town but is of Portuguese descent and played for Portugal\u2019s youth national teams. Perhaps Eustaquio could have ended up playing for Portugal down the line, but he chose not to, telling those close to him in 2019 that \u201cIt\u2019s my time to give back to Canada.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\n Stephen Eustaquio delivered a moment Canada soccer has been searching for. (Sarah Stier \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Seven years later, he gave Canada more than they ever thought possible in men\u2019s soccer.<\/p>\n

Crucially, Canada\u2019s performance should, and will, inspire what comes next. Canadian children have new heroes who grew up in the same places they did.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we set off for this World Cup, the biggest message was that we\u2019re trying to grow the game in Canada,\u201d forward Tani Oluwaseyi said. \u201cWe\u2019re trying to create opportunities for kids who want to be where we are right now. And I think doing that, being one of the 16 teams left in the World Cup. I think that\u2019s exactly what we\u2019re doing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Canadians never used to get up and dance about men\u2019s soccer, as Kon\u00e9 did in Canada\u2019s locker room. But after Sunday afternoon, they are now allowed not only to dance, but to think far more differently about the sport than they ever have.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt feels great to inspire a lot of kids, because I was one of them as well,\u201d defender Moise Bombito said. \u201cI was looking at other teams, other big players. And now that you can make history and have people look at you and say, \u2018I want to be like this guy when I grow up,\u2019 it\u2019s a proud moment.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"INGLEWOOD, Calif. \u2014 Ten days ago, Isma\u00ebl Kon\u00e9 suffered a horrific broken leg in front of 52,497 fans…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":767983,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[49,48,103818,561,82],"class_list":["post-767982","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-fifa-mens-world-cup","tag-soccer","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767982","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=767982"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767982\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/767983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=767982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=767982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=767982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}