Subs the way on a day of drama and a late penalty

Bench strength helps Belgium, England pull off rallying victories

- Dhiman Sarkar

By way of drama, scoring twice in 95 seconds to level scores in the last quarter of a World Cup final will take some beating.

Kylian Mbappe's brace against Argentina in Doha remain in pole position but Belgium ran him close, going from 0-2 to 2-2 in 159 seconds against Senegal. Till the 85th minute, Belgium trailed 0-2. By the 89th, it was 2-2. Then, with moments left before the tie-breaker, Belgium won it through a penalty.

“In football, anything is always possible as long as you believe in it,” said Rudi Garcia. The Belgium coach was speaking after Youri Tielemans’s 120+5 minute goal had made it 3-2. It is the latest in World Cup history and it came hours from the 6th anniversary of one of the competition's most dramatic moments, one that felled another African nation: Luis Suarez’s handball. It fetched a penalty which Ghana’s Asamoah Gyan missed. “Even when I stop playing it will haunt me,” Gyan told HT in 2019.

Belgium had erased a 0-2 deficit in a World Cup knockout match before. Thibaut Courtois, Kevin de Bruyne, Romelu Lukaku, Axel Witsel and Youri Tielemans were part of the squad that beat Japan 3-2. In Seattle, they trailed through Habib Diarra and Ismaila Sarr’s goals, Sadio Mane could have settled the issue but his shot was brilliantly saved by Courtois.