Lionel Messi ties Miroslav Klose for most World Cup goals as Argentina cruise past Algeria 3-0
France finds a way to break a goalless first half as they cruise past Senegal, the African champions whose recent AFCON title was stripped on a technicality and awarded to Morocco, delivering a 3-1 win campaign opener.
France powered its way through to open its World Cup with a dominant display over disputed African champions Senegal on Tuesday as Les Bleus looked for ways to break tight defences and find a breakthrough despite a goalless first half.
Goals starting pouring in the fixture after, propelling the former champions to the top of their group, avoiding a repeat of an earlier upset to Spain, deemed one of the favourites to win the title, who opened their campaign with a goalless draw with Cape Verde on Monday, despite close to two dozen shots on goal.
Meanwhile, reigning champions Argentina led by football icon Lionel Messi played their opener where they cruised past Algeria 3-0 with a convincing display and as Norway delivered a 4-1 performance to pound their way past Iraq in their opening match.
Here are all the matches you may have missed on Tuesday and into the early hours of Wednesday.
France v Senegal
French striker and Real Madrid forward Kylian Mbappe delivered a stellar performance in his opening World Cup match, cementing his country’s status as one of the favourites to win the title.
After a flat and goalless first half, Kylian Mbappé got France back in tune.
The superstar forward scored twice to move past Pelé with 14 World Cup goals, celebrating by mimicking a flutist as he had promised.
“He could have scored four or five goals, OK, theoretically, but we’re happy with two goals,” France coach Didier Deschamps said.
Mbappé had 14 touches in the scoreless first half, the fewest of any player, then put France ahead in the 66th minute. He burst past Senegal captain Kalidou Koulibaly, turned onto a diagonal pass from Michael Olise and slid the ball past goalkeeper Édouard Mendy from just outside the 6-yard box.
In a segment with Mbappé taped 20 May which aired on Friday by US broadcaster Fox, award-winning actor and television host James Corden suggested the 27-year-old star striker celebrate his next World Cup goal by imitating a flute player.
Mbappé practiced the instrument for a year or two as a child at the behest of his parents.
“I’ll do it for you first game,” Mbappé said.
Mbappé ran toward a corner, brought both hands to his lips and air-tooted for a few seconds.
“If he wants to miss the first half again and score two goals in the second half in another match, that’s OK with me,” Deschamps said.
PSG’s Bradley Barcola doubled the lead in the 82nd minute, two minutes after being subbed on, and Ibrahim Mbaye cut the deficit in the fifth minute of stoppage time for Senegal.
Mbappé scored just 68 seconds later on a spectacular right-footed shot from 30 yards. The ball dipped perfectly between Mendy's outstretched left arm and the crossbar.
“A crazy goal,” French defender William Saliba said.
Mbappé, who led the 2022 tournament with eight goals, moved one ahead of Lionel Messi and fellow Frenchman Just Fontaine on the World Cup career scoring list before Messi scored his 14th, 15th and 16th for Argentina later Tuesday.
Mbappé is now tied with Germany’s Gerd Müller, trailing Messi, Germany's Miroslav Klose (16) and Brazil's Ronaldo (15) in all-time World Cup goals.
Mbappé also became France's career scoring leader with 58 goals, one more than Olivier Giroud.
“He can from time to time miss a game or two but on one action he really is able to tip the scales and bring his team to victory,” Deschamps said. “People say he doesn’t defend enough. Well, he’s not here to defend.”
Mbappé brushed off critics.
“It’s not about revenge,” he said. “If I started playing for all the people who criticize me just to silence them, I’d have to play until I was 80.”
Argentina v Algeria
Lionel Messi delivered his first World Cup hat trick while matching Miroslav Klose's career tournament scoring record Tuesday night, giving thousands of Argentina fans packed inside of Arrowhead Stadium for a match against Algeria a moment they will never forget.
Messi scored his first goal in the opening minutes off a nifty feed from Inter Miami teammate Rodrigo De Paul, the second early in the second half, and the third moments before subbing out to a standing ovation.
The goals came 20 years to the day that Messi made his World Cup debut for Argentina in a match against Serbia and Montenegro — he scored in that one, too — and made him only the second player to score in five editions of the tournament.
Messi has 16 goals in his six World Cup appearances, and it seems inevitable that Klose's record will fall in the coming weeks. The hat trick was the 61st of his career and his 11th while playing with the national team.
It was the fifth straight World Cup game in which Messi has scored.
Messi, who turns 39 next week, had been dealing with a minor hamstring injury with Inter Miami that slowed him in the lead-up to the World Cup.
But the eight-time winner of the Ballon d'Or, which honours global soccer's best player, had no problems in a tuneup last week with Iceland, scoring on a penalty kick while playing 20 minutes.
Messi's appearance against Algeria was the 200th of his international career match, which began in 2005 at the age of 18. The only players with more are Portugal's Ronaldo, who will play in his 229th on Wednesday, and Bader al-Mutawa, who played in 202 for Kuwait.
Argentina is among four teams making their base camp in the Kansas City metro, and much as it has the rest of the world, Messi-mania has swept through the area ever since La Albiceleste's arrival about two weeks ago.
Norway v Iraq
Norway will go as far in this World Cup as Erling Haaland takes it, as the star striker, showed in his tournament debut, that he’s more than up for that challenge.
Haaland scored two goals, including one off a defensive blunder, on Tuesday to propel Norway to a 4-1 victory over Iraq in Group I.
The Manchester City striker's 56th and 57th international goals came in Norway’s first appearance in the tournament since reaching the knockout round at the 1998 World Cup in France — two years before Haaland was born.
Haaland said he will do his best to meet the expectations he created with this performance.
“Of course I will try,” Haaland said. “It’s about continuing and don’t think too much. It’s difficult at this stage. But I’ll focus on (the) next (game) and of course be happy. But also stay calm.”
Norway coach Stale Solbakken said he had a feeling Haaland was ready after watching how loose he was in the team's last training session before the match.
“You could see that he lived up to the occasion,” Solbakken said. “The occasion wasn’t too big for him.”
Leo Ostigard scored in the 76th minute off a corner kick from Martin Odegaard. An own-goal by Iraq forward Aymen Hussein just before the final whistle completed Norway's scoring.
Hussein also scored for his team, an equaliser just nine minutes after Haaland’s first strike.
Haaland put the Norwegians in front for good just before halftime when he sneaked in front of a poor back pass to Iraq goalkeeper Jalal Hassan. Haaland beat Hassan to the ball, pre-empting his attempted clearance, and then used his shin to put the ball in the back of the net.
“It's one of those things. It happened,” Iraq coach Graham Arnold said. “It is what is and we have to learn from it.”
Haaland’s first goal, which came in the 29th minute, followed a cross into the box from David Moller Wolfe.
The club football superstar slid and used his right heel to finish it off. It ignited waves of cheers from the Norway supporters, who dominated the stands clad in red as they broke out in synchronised Viking row chants.
Iraq, playing in the World Cup for just the second time after debuting in 1986, held its own with a sizable contingent of supporters that was mostly concentrated behind one of the goals.
That energy helped Iraq briefly get back into the game.
In the 38th minute, Amir Alammari corralled a ball on the baseline halfway between the left corner and the goal and fired a cross in front of the net.
It got past Norway’s defenders, allowing Hussein to punch a clean header that bounced under the hand of diving goalkeeper Orjan Nyland to even the score at 1-1.
It was Hussein’s 34th international goal. That includes his winning goal against Bolivia in Iraq’s final World Cup qualifying match in April that gave the country the last spot in the 48-team tournament field.
“It’s a proud moment to be back in the World Cup after 40 years. To lose 4-1, it hurts,” Iraq's Hussein Ali said.
