Photo: Bryan Berlin / CC BY-SA 4.0 / Wikimedia Commons
England beat France 6-4 in the third-place play-off at Miami Stadium on Saturday to finish third at the 2026 FIFA World Cup. It was the country's best tournament finish since winning the competition in 1966.
Declan Rice opened the scoring after just three minutes, calmly slotting into the bottom right past a static Mike Maignan. Rice then contributed an assist in the 18th minute, with his corner headed in by Ezri Konsa to make it 2-0.
Bukayo Saka added two more goals before half-time to put England 4-0 up at the break. The first was set up by Marcus Rashford following a counter-attack; the second came from a turn and pass by Eberechi Eze.
France hit back early in the second half through Kylian Mbappe, with Bradley Barcola and a second Mbappe goal reducing the deficit to 4-3. Saka then completed his hat-trick from the penalty spot after Djed Spence was fouled by Malo Gusto in the area. Ousmane Dembele and Jude Bellingham added further goals in stoppage time.
Speaking after the match, Saka said: "Of course I'd love to have played a bigger part [in the tournament] but it's too late for that. I try to do my talking on the pitch but it's time to move on. I'm fit. We built and built across the tournament. We had some amazing results and in the end we fell short against Argentina. It hurts a lot to all of us and I'm sure it's the same to the fans back home but we have to hold our heads high and focus on the next one."
Rice said: "I think we can be proud as a group. Best place finish since '66. I think after the first half performance, we were just gutted that we lost in the semi-final. That feeling at half-time was just that the attacking threat we showed, what we did with the ball, it's obviously playing on your mind still. When you come and play a team like France today you know it's going to be tough. The motivation is probably not as much there as you thought, but as soon as we arrived and started playing, the motivation was there, the hunger was there, and in the end I thought it was a really good performance."