Maxi Ara\u00fajo rescues Uruguay and avoids defeat against Saudi Arabia in the 2026 World Cup<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The African team was close to pulling off one of the biggest surprises of the day thanks to an outstanding performance led by their star player, Mohamed Salah, who celebrated his 34th birthday by being decisive in the Pharaohs’ attack.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Egypt opened the scoring at the 20-minute mark when Emam Ashour capitalized on an assist from Salah to break the Belgian resistance and put his team ahead. The goal momentarily silenced the Red Devils’ fans and put pressure on one of the favorites of Group G.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For much of the match, Belgium struggled to create danger against a well-organized Egyptian defense. The experience and quality of players like Kevin De Bruyne, J\u00e9r\u00e9my Doku, and Leandro Trossard were not enough to break the tactical order of the team led by Hossam Hassan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Belgian reaction came in the second half after the entry of striker Romelu Lukaku. Just minutes after entering the field, the attacker participated in the play that led to the equalizer, when a ball ended up being deflected into his own goal by defender Mohamed Hany in the 66th minute.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With the draw, Belgium avoided starting the tournament with a defeat that would have complicated their aspirations of advancing to the knockout stage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Despite the draw, the result represents a wake-up call for the team led by Frenchman Rudi Garcia, who arrived as the favorite to dominate a group also made up of Iran and New Zealand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For its part, Egypt left a positive impression and showed that it can compete on equal terms against top-level national teams, driven by Salah’s leadership and a solid collective performance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the next matchday of Group G, Belgium will face Iran in search of their first victory of the tournament, while Egypt will take on New Zealand with the hope of getting closer to qualification.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The draw adds to other unexpected results recorded at the start of the World Cup, confirming that the competition has begun with a high level of parity and several surprises among the favorite teams.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SEATTLE, UNITED STATES. The Belgium national team had to react in the second half to avoid an unexpected defeat and ended up drawing 1-1 against Egypt in their debut at the 2026 FIFA World Cup, in a match played this Monday in Seattle. You might be interested in:Maxi Ara\u00fajo rescues Uruguay and avoids defeat against […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":511384,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[40943],"tags":[43446,43601,40231,43735],"class_list":["post-511383","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-2026-fifa-world-cup","tag-breakingnews","tag-dominican-republic","tag-thenewspaperoftruth"],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/phj1q1-2927","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/06\/mundial-2026-belgica-salva-un-empate-con-egipto-en-su-debut-01b4b14e-focus-min0.34-0.41-375-240.jpg","dum_api":{"author_name":"EFE","author_image":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/08\/1200px-EFE_logo.svg-96x96.png","categories_name":["Football"],"featured_media_url":"https:\/\/cdn.deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/06\/mundial-2026-belgica-salva-un-empate-con-egipto-en-su-debut-01b4b14e-focus-min0.34-0.41-375-240.jpg"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/511383","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=511383"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/511383\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/511384"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=511383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=511383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=511383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}