The 2026 FIFA World Cup continued on Wednesday with five games, including a stunning draw, a thriller between England and Croatia and a stunning last-second win by Ghana.
Here are some takeaways from Wednesday’s action.
Congo DR’s World Cup return begins with impressive draw
Playing in its first World Cup match in 52 years, Congo DR opened its tournament on Wednesday with an impressive 1-1 draw against Portugal that also saw Congo DR score its first World Cup goal.
Yoane Wissa’s goal in stoppage time in the first half served as the equalizer and sent small pockets of fans into an absolute frenzy.
Even Congo DR fans in Lisbon were celebrating and making their presence felt.
The big story of this game, however, was the shockingly poor performance from Cristiano Ronaldo.
He recorded just 25 touches and did not get a single shot on target, while also drawing criticism from Thierry Henry for trying to do too much.
Ghana secures crucial Group win in stoppage time
The finish of the day game in the Ghana-Panama game, where Panama was just seconds away from securing what would have been its first point in a World Cup match.
But Caleb Yirenkyi was able to get a tap-in goal in the fifth minute of second-half stoppage time to give Ghana a massive win in Group L action. It allowed Ghana to match England in the standings at the top of the group.
Ghana needed the win after England put on an offensive show against Croatia.
England finds its confidence
England and Croatia played what might have been the game of the tournament so far, with England walking away with a 4-2 win, highlighted by a pair of goals by Harry Kane.
Despite Kane’s early brilliance, England still found itself tied at the half before Jude Bellingham put it ahead.
It was at that point that England manager Thomas Tuchel said his team found its confidence and shook off its nerves.
“I think we showed a bit of nerves,” Tuchel said. “Maybe we wanted to do overdo it, but we clearly overthought our decisions. It took us too long to take decisions. When we could play short, we played long. When we could have played long, we played short.
“We couldn’t find a real rhythm in our game and even in defending it took us too long to make decisions to go as a block into the high press. We spend way too much time in a low block, which is also not our identity and not what we wanted to have.”
Austria gets first World Cup win in 36 years
Thanks to a 3-1 win over a Jordan team making its World Cup debut, Austria earned its first World Cup win since 1990.
An own-goal by Jordan off a corner kick in the 76th minute gave Austria the lead, while Marko Arnautovic added a penalty kick goal in stoppage time to extend the lead.
Austria now finds itself tied with Argentina at the top of Group J with three points each.
Colombia gets upper hand in Group K
Colombia’s World Cup got off to a great start on Wednesday by not only beating Uzbekistan by a 3-1 margin, but also because Portugal could not get a win against Congo DR. The combination of those two results has Colombia at the top of the group.
Luis Diaz’s goal in the 65th minute was the winner.
He also added an assist on Daniel Munoz’s goal to open the scoring.
