> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.theref.com.au/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Haaland dumps Brazil, Bellingham tames the Azteca: A day of World Cup history - URL: https://www.theref.com.au/haaland-dumps-brazil-bellingham-tames-the-azteca-a-day-of-world-cup-history/ - Published: 2026-07-06T04:07:46.000Z - Updated: 2026-07-06T04:07:46.000Z - Description: Norway end Brazil's World Cup in New Jersey. England survive a red card and a raucous Azteca to beat the co-hosts 3–2. The 2026 World Cup quarterfinals are set and they are extraordinary. - Author: The Ref Editorial - Tags: football, world cup, england, mexico, norway, brazil Sunday 5 July 2026 (local time) produced two of the finest knockout matches in recent World Cup history, played within hours of each other on different continents, each generating the kind of drama that reminds you why the tournament sits at the apex of world sport. By the final whistle in Mexico City, five-time world champions Brazil were eliminated, co-hosts Mexico were out, England and Norway were through, and the quarterfinal bracket had taken a shape that nobody had predicted. --- ### Norway 2 — Brazil 1 | MetLife Stadium, East Rutherford, New Jersey **Goals: Haaland 79', 90' (Norway); Neymar 90'+10' pen (Brazil)** The statistics around Norway's record against Brazil are one of sport's most persistent curiosities. Before Sunday, the two nations had met four times. Norway had won twice and drawn twice. Brazil had never beaten them. That record, forged in group stages and friendlies across decades, always felt like a statistical anomaly waiting to be corrected at a moment of genuine consequence. Sunday was a moment of genuine consequence. At MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, with 82,000 people - the overwhelming majority of them wearing yellow and green - Norway defeated Brazil 2–1 in the round of 16, and Erling Haaland scored both goals in the final 11 minutes of the match to send his country to their first-ever World Cup quarterfinal. The record stands. Norway have now met Brazil five times. Won three. Drew two. Brazil zero. For a nation of 5.4 million people, absent from the World Cup for 28 years, it is the greatest football result in their history. It is not particularly close. #### How the match unfolded For 78 minutes, Brazil controlled the match. Norway goalkeeper Ørjan Nyland was the defining figure of the first half, saving a penalty from Bruno Guimarães that would have put Brazil ahead and maintaining his clean sheet despite a Brazilian possession rate that dominated long stretches of the game. Carlo Ancelotti's side were fluid, patient, and, for long periods, comfortably superior in quality. The problem was the scoreboard. A dominated 78 minutes that produces no goals is not a dominated 78 minutes. It is an open door. Patrick Berg appeared to give Norway a lead in the early minutes but the goal was quickly ruled offside. Brazil continued to press. Casemiro came agonisingly close with a ball across the box that evaded everyone in yellow. The match looked heading for extra time. Then Haaland happened. In the 79th minute, the Norwegian striker rose above the Brazilian defence to power home a header, breaking the deadlock in a match that had been building toward exactly this kind of decisive moment. Then in the 90th minute, Haaland struck again with a composed finish into the bottom corner to extend the lead to 2–0\. Neymar finally got his chance from the penalty spot in stoppage time - his first goal of the tournament and, potentially, his final act in international football - but it came too late. The final whistle followed seconds later. Norway 2, Brazil 1\. #### Haaland's record and what it means The two goals give Haaland seven at this World Cup, tying him for the Golden Boot lead with Lionel Messi and Kylian Mbappé. He has now scored in every knockout match Norway have played. His movement for the first goal - a run timed to perfection that the Brazilian defensive line failed to track - was clinical in a way that his performances in the group stage, where he was excellent but not yet decisive, had pointed toward. For Brazil, the post-mortem will be extended and uncomfortable. Neymar, 34, had been carefully managed through the tournament after a grade two calf strain in late May, missing the opening two group fixtures before returning off the bench. His penalty conversion in stoppage time was ultimately cosmetic. Ancelotti, appointed with significant fanfare, has overseen an elimination in the round of 16\. The question of whether Brazil's golden generation - Vinícius Júnior, Rodrygo, Endrick - will ever deliver a World Cup remains unanswered and increasingly urgent. After the final whistle, the Norwegian squad gathered facing their supporters and performed the Viking Row in remarkable unison. Some Brazilian fans, scattered throughout the MetLife stands, joined in. It was one of those World Cup moments that outlasts the result. Norway face England in the quarterfinals in Miami next Saturday. --- ### Mexico 2 — England 3 | Estadio Azteca, Mexico City **Goals: Bellingham 36', 38', Quiñones 42', Kane 60' pen (England); Jiménez 69' pen (Mexico)** The Estadio Azteca has hosted three World Cups. It has staged Maradona's Hand of God and his Goal of the Century in 1986\. It witnessed the 1970 final between Brazil and Italy, contested in heat that reduced professional footballers to walking pace. At 2,240 metres above sea level, it has defeated visiting teams who were better than the home side purely through the punishment of altitude. On Sunday night, it hosted what was perhaps the most exciting match of the 2026 World Cup. A match in which England went 2–0 up, Mexico came back to 2–1, England extended to 3–1, Mexico came back to 3–2, England were reduced to ten men, and somehow, in eleven minutes of injury time at the end of the second half, the Three Lions held on. England won 3–2\. Mexico, who had not conceded a single goal across their five previous matches in the tournament, were eliminated. Thomas Tuchel's side face Norway in Miami next week for a place in the semi-finals. #### Bellingham's first half Mexico came out strong only to go down 2–0 on a pair of Bellingham goals in three minutes. The first, in the 36th minute, came after sustained English pressure finally found a way through Mexico's defensive structure — Bellingham arriving late into the box to finish with the composure that has defined his tournament. The second, in the 38th minute, was almost identical in execution and devastating in timing. Two goals in 180 seconds. The Azteca - 80,000 Mexicans who had come expecting to watch their team match the occasion - was silenced. Mexico's response was immediate and characteristically ferocious. Julián Quiñones' 42nd-minute goal came from a free kick that generated chaos in the box. England's half-time lead was one goal. Their dressing room, with the altitude beginning to accumulate in legs that had not prepared for it, would have known the second half was a different proposition entirely. #### Kane's penalty, the red card, and England's rearguard Harry Kane delivered a penalty kick in the 60th minute to make it 3–1, converting with the clinical efficiency that has now brought him six goals in the tournament and kept him in the Golden Boot conversation alongside Haaland and Mbappé. Kane has now scored four headed goals at FIFA World Cups, with three coming at this tournament alone, surpassing all but Miroslav Klose and Gerd Müller for headed goals in World Cup history. Then Jarell Quansah was sent off. Quansah's red card was awarded by VAR for a foul that the England defensive line disputed furiously but could not reverse. England were down to ten men, leading 3–1, in the Azteca, in the second half, with Mexico pouring forward and the crowd roaring them on with the kind of noise that has genuinely cost visiting teams their composure in this stadium across three World Cup cycles. A Raúl Jiménez penalty in the 69th minute - won after Brian Gutiérrez earned the spot kick - made it 3–2\. The Azteca erupted. Mexico had everything except the equaliser. They did not get it. Jordan Pickford - one of the outstanding individual performers of the tournament - made a series of crucial interventions as Mexico sent cross after cross into the England box across eleven minutes of injury time that felt significantly longer. England's substitutes - Dan Burn and Djed Spence replacing O'Reilly and Elliot Anderson - defended with the kind of organised desperation that Tuchel's coaching has produced in abundance. John Stones made a sliding clearance with the final meaningful touch of the match to deny México an equaliser from a corner that had, briefly, looked like fate. The whistle went. England had survived. #### What England and Norway represent England reached the World Cup semi-final in 2018 and the quarterfinal in 2022\. They are looking to reach the last eight in three consecutive editions for the second time in their history - previously achieved across 1962, 1966, and 1970\. The quarterfinal against Norway in Miami next Saturday sets up a contest between the two pf the best strikers at this tournament (Haaland and Kane) in a match that will define both nations' summers and potentially the career trajectories of both players. For Mexico, the defeat carries a specific pain. The co-hosts had been one of only two teams this century to win their opening four World Cup matches, alongside Germany in 2006\. They had not conceded a goal in the tournament before England broke them open at the Azteca. The quarter-final curse - Mexico have now been eliminated in the round of 16 or equivalent in seven consecutive World Cups. Roberto Alvarado's three assists were the most by a Mexican player in a single World Cup edition since records began. Julián Quiñones' tally of three goals and one assist is the joint-most on record by a Mexican player in a single edition, equalling Luis Hernández's contribution in 1998\. A Mexican generation that deserved better than this tournament gave them will reflect on Sunday night for a long time. The World Cup rolls on... --- *World Cup quarterfinal bracket: Morocco v France (Boston, July 9); Norway v England (Miami, July 12); USA v Belgium (Seattle, July 12); Spain v Argentina/Colombia (July 13). All times to be confirmed.* *Stats and scorers verified from ESPN, CBS Sports, NBC Sports, Yahoo Sports, England Football, and FIFA match centre. 6 July 2026.* 🏉