Switzerland striker Breel Embolo struck early and winger Dan Ndoye added a second as their side cruised ​to a 2-0 win over Algeria on Thursday (July 2, 2026) and into the last 16 at ‌the World Cup, where they will meet Colombia or Ghana ​back in Vancouver next week.

Murat Yakin’s Swiss side put ⁠on a tactical masterclass, shifting formations and laying traps for Algeria before hitting them with two sucker-punch goals that decided a contest short on excitement, but full of ‌intrigue and nuance.

Pitted against a familiar foe in Algeria coach Vladimir Petkovic, who had seven years at the helm of ‌Switzerland between 2014 and 2021, Yakin set his team up to ‌absorb ⁠early pressure and strike on the break, and that is ⁠exactly what they did.

Their opener was as simple as it was effective.

The Swiss won the ball in their own half and sent 20-year-old Johan Manzambi off down the left on ​the counter, and he squared ‌for Embolo to steer the ball into the net from close range in the 10th minute.

FIFA World Cup 2026 knockout schedule: Matches in Indian Time

The lead secured, Switzerland shifted to a five-man midfield out of possession, snuffing out the space and challenging the Algerians ‌to play through them, but Petkovic’s charges struggled to break their ​opponents down.

Algeria’s best chance came in first-half stoppage time when Ibrahim Maza dragged a snap shot wide of the near ⁠post, one of few efforts on goal they managed in the game.

The Swiss struck again almost immediately after the break, attacking down the right before ‌a half-hearted clearance from Rafik Belghali ended up at the feet of Ndoye and the winger placed his shot beyond the dive of goalkeeper Luca Zidane.

Algeria captain Riyad Mahrez could have pulled a goal back moments later but he fired straight at a defender from a central position, summing up a frustrating evening for the Algerians.

With Granit Xhaka steering Switzerland’s ‌defensive shape, they went back to their original game-plan of ceding possession and launching lightning-fast ​counter-attacks, but the Algerians were wary of committing players forward lest they concede again.

Despite the sell-out crowd at BC Place, ⁠the last 15 minutes were played in virtual silence, only broken by cheers ⁠and then groans as Swiss substitute Fabian Rieder somehow contrived to miss with the goal at his mercy, scuffing his shot ‌back across goal where a grateful Zidane was able to avert the danger.

Fortunately for Switzerland it had no bearing on the outcome as ​they celebrated moving into a last-16 clash on Tuesday.

The expanded field of 48 teams at this year’s World Cup means that not only do the top two teams advance ​from each of the 12 first-round groups but also the best eight third-placed finishers.

As the ‌weekend’s action across Canada, Mexico and the United States begins to ​give the group standings some shape, so the calculators will ⁠come out to start determining what the minimum requirement will be to advance to the last 32.

It is only the second time a tournament run by world football’s governing body FIFA ‌has featured as many teams, so past experience is limited to last November’s U-17 World Cup in Qatar.

But it is far from the ‌first time that third-placed finishers in the group phase of a tournament ‌have ⁠had an opportunity to advance.

This stretches back to the 1986 World ⁠Cup finals in Mexico, which was the first where the four best third-placed finishers from the six groups of four teams progressed to the knockout rounds along with the top two teams in ​each.

That was still in an era ‌when two points were awarded for a win, rather than three, but a survey of 38 FIFA tournaments and continental championships where there has been a 24-team field, and therefore four places available for the best third-placed finishers ‌to advance, gives some indication of what will be needed points-wise to ​advance to the knockout stages.

How the points tally up

Five points: Never has a team collecting five points from their three group games ⁠finished out of the first two places in the group stage.

Four points: Only twice has a team with four points in third place in the group not advanced, ‌and both instances were at the U-20 World Cup. But bizarrely, Norway finished bottom of their World Cup group in 1994 with four points, and Ukraine did too at the last European Championship in Germany two years ago.

Three points: There is a slightly less than 50% success rate for teams finishing on three points, but those sides almost all have a positive goal difference. Three points and ‌a negative goal difference leave a less than one-in-three chance of advancing. One exception was Norway ​at the 2019 U-20 World Cup, which, despite a positive goal difference of eight, was eliminated. That included a 12-0 victory over Honduras ⁠where Erling Haaland scored nine goals. At the 48-team U-17 World Cup in Qatar ⁠last year, four of the six teams who finished third in their respective groups with three points advanced.

Two points: In only two of the ‌tournaments surveyed, with three points for a win, did a side finish among the best four third-placed teams with a meagre two points, most recently ​Tanzania at the Africa Cup of Nations in Morocco late last year.