Third-place play-off
France 4-6 England
England scored 4 goals in the first half and looked like they would win this easily.
But France scored 3 times in the second half and got within 1 goal, and the game turned into the wildest match of the whole tournament.
England won it 6-4 in the end, with a hat-trick from Bukayo Saka.
England win the 3rd place of the 2026 World Cup.
How the match went
There have not been 10 goals in a World Cup match since 1982.
So of course it happened in the game everyone said nobody wanted to play.
England beat France 6-4 in Miami, and it was the best match of the whole tournament.
We predicted France 3-1 in our preview, and England clearly had other plans and scored 4 goals before the first half was done.
We got this one completely wrong.
England started like a team that was angry about something.
Their midfielder Declan Rice scored in the 3rd minute.
Their defender Ezri Konsa made it 2-0 in the 18th.
Then their forward Bukayo Saka scored in the 37th minute.
And Saka scored again in the 1st minute of stoppage time, which is the extra time added at the end of a half for the minutes lost during it.
France looked finished.
Then the second half started and everything changed.
France forward Kylian Mbappe scored in the 48th minute.
6 minutes later their forward Bradley Barcola made it 4-2.
And Mbappe scored his 2nd of the night in the 66th minute to make it 4-3.
So France were 1 goal away with 24 minutes still to play.
But this time England did not give the lead away like they did when they lost 1-2 to Argentina in the semi-final.
In the 87th minute Saka scored a penalty, which is a free shot from the spot after a foul.
That gave him a hat-trick, which means 3 goals in one game.
It was 5-3.
France still would not stop.
Their forward Ousmane Dembele scored in the 6th minute of stoppage time to make it 5-4.
Then England midfielder Jude Bellingham scored in the 8th minute of stoppage time to finish it at 6-4.
And no 3rd-place playoff in the history of the World Cup has ever produced more goals than this one.
Mbappe's 2 goals also put him on 10 for the tournament, 2 ahead of Argentina forward Lionel Messi.
But the Golden Boot, which is the prize for the top scorer of the World Cup, is not settled yet.
Messi plays the final today, and he needs 2 goals to tie Mbappe and 3 to pass him.
And then there was Didier Deschamps.
This was his last game after 14 years as the France manager.
He is the only man to win this tournament for France as both a player and a manager.
He leaves after letting in 6 goals in a 3rd-place playoff.
That is not the goodbye anyone had written for him.
Key moments
- ⚽ 3' Rice (England)
- ⚽ 18' Konsa (England)
- ⚽ 37' Saka (England)
- ⚽ 45+1' Saka (England)
- ⚽ 48' Mbappé (France)
- ⚽ 54' Barcola (France)
- ⚽ 66' Mbappé (France)
- ⚽ 87' Saka (England) (pen)
- ⚽ 90+6' Dembélé (France)
- ⚽ 90+8' Bellingham (England)
Goals in the order they were scored.
pen = penalty.
Match highlights
Watch on YouTube- Date
- Saturday, July 18
- Kickoff Time
- 17:00 (New York time)
- Stage
- Third-place play-off
What's next for England?
So England end their World Cup with a win.
They go home with a bronze medal.
Their manager Thomas Tuchel is German, and he has just given England the medal they have been waiting 60 years for.
England's tournament is over, and the only game left at this World Cup is the final today.
It is over for France
France finish 4th, and their tournament is over too.
They won their first 6 games here.
Then came the 0-2 loss to Spain in the semi-final, and now 6 goals let in against England.
Kylian Mbappe still ends the tournament on 10 goals, which is more than any other player for now.
But the biggest change is that France now need a new manager, because the Deschamps era is over after 14 years.
Common questions
What was the final score of France vs England?
England won 6-4. That result means England finished 3rd at the 2026 World Cup and France finished 4th.
Who scored a hat-trick in France vs England?
England forward Bukayo Saka. His third goal was a penalty, and it put England 5-3 up with 3 minutes to go.
Did France vs England go to extra time?
No. All 10 goals came inside the normal 90 minutes plus stoppage time. A 3rd-place playoff only goes to extra time when the score is tied at the end, and this one was not.
Is Kylian Mbappe the top scorer of the 2026 World Cup?
Not yet. Mbappe has 10 goals after scoring twice against England, and Lionel Messi has 8. Messi plays the final today, so he can still catch him.