{"id":658636,"date":"2026-06-26T03:22:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-26T03:22:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/658636\/"},"modified":"2026-06-26T03:22:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-26T03:22:10","slug":"world-cup-2026-ecuador-2-1-germany-south-american-side-stun-four-time-winners-to-reach-knockout-stages-football-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/658636\/","title":{"rendered":"World Cup 2026: Ecuador 2-1 Germany &#8211; South American side stun four-time winners to reach knockout stages | Football News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Ecuador stunned already-qualified Germany with a 2-1 comeback win in New Jersey to reach the World Cup knockout stages and dent Scotland\u2019s round of 32 hopes.<\/p>\n<p>Gonzalo Plata&#8217;s 77th-minute winner sent Ecuador through as one of the best third-placed teams, with the South American side a potential round of 32 opponent for England should the Three Lions top Group L.<\/p>\n<p>But for Scotland, Ecuador&#8217;s dramatic victory means Steve Clarke&#8217;s side <a href=\"https:\/\/www.skysports.com\/football\/news\/11095\/13556635\/world-cup-2026-third-place-standings-live-table-as-top-eight-sides-qualify-for-knockout-stage\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">drop to the final eighth third-place spot<\/a> with other teams still to finish their group stage.<\/p>\n<p>          <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"sdc-article-image__item\" loading=\"lazy\" intrinsicsize=\"768x432\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/skysports-ecuador-world-cup_7283072.jpg\"   alt=\"Ecuador's Nilson Angulo celebrates scoring his side's first goal at the World Cup\" data-testid=\"article-image-image\"\/><\/p>\n<p>        Image:<br \/>\n        Sunderland&#8217;s Nilson Angulo scored Ecuador&#8217;s leveller in their win over Germany<\/p>\n<p>The Tartan Army needed a favour from Germany, and it started well as Leroy Sane struck an opener inside the opening two minutes.<\/p>\n<p>But Sunderland&#8217;s Nilson Angulo hit a fine leveller just seven minutes later before Plata prodded home late in the second half to spark wild Ecuadorian scenes in New Jersey.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.skysports.com\/football\/ecuador-vs-germany\/live\/549823\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">How Ecuador overcame VAR controversy to win<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The stunning win represented an amazing turnaround for Sebastian Beccacece&#8217;s side, who failed to win their opening two games without scoring.<\/p>\n<p>Ecuador felt Sane&#8217;s first-time finish after just 109 seconds should have been disallowed by VAR for a for a high foot by Aleksander Pavlovic on Pedro Vite.<\/p>\n<p>But La Tri responded quickly through Angulo&#8217;s arrowed ninth-minute shot, which was their first goal of the tournament with their 40th attempt.<\/p>\n<p>          <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"sdc-article-image__item\" loading=\"lazy\" intrinsicsize=\"768x432\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/skysports-moises-caicedo-ecuador_7283147.jpg\"   alt=\"Final celebration, Moises Caicedo (Ecuador) East Rutherford, June 25, 2026, Soccer, FIFA World Cup 2026\" data-testid=\"article-image-image\"\/><\/p>\n<p>        Image:<br \/>\n        Chelsea midfielder Moises Caicedo celebrates Ecuador&#8217;s knockout-stage qualification<\/p>\n<p>VAR came to Ecuador&#8217;s rescue immediately in the second half as Germany&#8217;s penalty for Joel Ordonez&#8217;s foul on Kai Havertz was overturned by referee Tori Penso after a pitchside monitor VAR call, which showed Vite had been fouled in the build-up by Sane.<\/p>\n<p>Ecuador then pushed for a winner in the closing stages and were rewarded when Plata stabbed in ahead of Manuel Neuer, who failed to claim the ball from a front-post flick-on at a corner.<\/p>\n<p>Ecuador then defended superbly to reach the knockout stages for just the second time in their history.<\/p>\n<p>Germany, meanwhile, will need to recover from their first defeat of the tournament, with the four-time winners taking on the third-place finisher from either Group A\/B\/C\/D\/F in the round of 32 on Monday at 9.30pm UK time in Boston.<\/p>\n<p>What the result means&#8230; <\/p>\n<p>Ecuador boss: This is for the people<\/p>\n<p>Ecuador boss Sebastian Beccacece in quotes on the official FIFA website:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It is not about what it means to me; this is for the people. The players have given them this qualification. Let them celebrate and enjoy it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Match-winner Gonzalo Plata added: &#8220;It is a learning experience for us, and now we will go into the next round even more hungry for glory.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This team believes strongly in itself. We have 26 players who will give their all for Ecuador.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Nagelsmann: There was too much freestyle<\/p>\n<p>Germany head coach Julian Nagelsmann told German broadcaster ARD:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have to learn that after a good start and an early lead, we can play with more composure instead of suddenly switching positions too much. There was too much freestyle.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We just need to be more patient and stay a bit more structured in our positions, and if on top of that we are giving the ball away too often, at some point it becomes difficult.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Rate the players! <\/p>\n<p>        Monterosa<\/p>\n<p>                This content is provided by Monterosa, which may be using cookies and other technologies.<br \/>\n                To show you this content, we need your permission to use cookies.<br \/>\n                You can use the buttons below to amend your preferences to enable Monterosa cookies or to allow those cookies just once.<br \/>\n                You can change your settings at any time via the <a href=\"#privacy-options\">Privacy Options<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>                Unfortunately we have been unable to verify if you have consented to Monterosa cookies.<br \/>\n                To view this content you can use the button below to allow Monterosa cookies for this session only.<\/p>\n<p>                    <a href=\"#\" class=\"ui-consent-roadblock-body__link ui-consent-roadblock-permanently\" data-single-click-vendor-name=\"monterosa\" data-show-on-fallback=\"false\" data-testid=\"consent-roadblock-allow\">Enable Cookies<\/a><br \/>\n                <a href=\"#\" class=\"ui-consent-roadblock-body__link ui-consent-roadblock-once\" data-single-click-vendor-name=\"monterosa\" data-testid=\"consent-roadblock-allow-once\">Allow Cookies Once<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ecuador stunned already-qualified Germany with a 2-1 comeback win in New Jersey to reach the World Cup knockout&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":658637,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":["post-658636","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658636","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=658636"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658636\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/658637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=658636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=658636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=658636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}