Spainvs
BelgiumFor most of the night, Spain looked like a team doing exactly what they were supposed to do — and then Belgium leveled before halftime, and suddenly nothing was certain. It took until the 88th minute, and a goal from Mikel Merino, to restore the order everyone at SoFi Stadium had expected.
Our pre-match read made Spain the favorite at 59%, and the match ultimately vindicated that call, though not without Belgium making them earn every bit of it.
Spain's Control, Belgium's Chance
The numbers tell a familiar story for this Spanish side: 67.8% possession, 665 passes completed at 90% accuracy, 17 shots to Belgium's five. They suffocated the game in the way Luis de la Fuente's teams do — not always with urgency, but with a patience that slowly squeezes the air out of an opponent. Belgium, for long stretches, simply couldn't get the ball.
Fabián Ruiz broke the deadlock at the half-hour mark, and it felt like the natural conclusion to everything Spain had been building. The goal was tidy and deserved.
Then came the 41st minute, and Timothy Castagne found Charles De Ketelaere, who sent a header past the Spanish goalkeeper to level things before the break. ¡Ala gran púchica! — Belgium had barely been in the game, and somehow they were level. The goal came from almost nothing, and it shifted the entire mood inside the stadium.
Two minutes later, Pau Cubarsí picked up a yellow card in the chaos of the closing minutes of the first half, a sign of how rattled Spain had become. They went into the break at 1-1, a scoreline that flattered Belgium enormously given how the half had actually played out.
The Long Wait
The second half was a grind. Spain kept the ball — because Spain always keeps the ball — but Belgium's goalkeeper was busy, finishing with six saves on the night. Spain's eight shots on target tell you they were creating, but converting was another matter.
Kevin De Bruyne picked up a yellow card in the 85th minute, a sign of Belgium's growing desperation to disrupt. Three minutes later, Spain finally found what they needed. Mikel Merino scored in the 88th to put his side ahead, and this time there would be no answer from Belgium.
Aymeric Laporte was booked in stoppage time, and Axel Witsel followed him into the referee's book in the fifth minute of added time, but none of it changed anything. Spain saw it out.
Cabal, that was the match: Belgium hung around far longer than their five shots and single corner suggested they should have, and Spain's five-game winning run never really looked in danger of ending, even when it briefly felt that way.
The question now is whether this Spain side can keep finding late answers when the early ones don't stick. They were the better team by a wide margin, but they needed the 88th minute to prove it. In a World Cup knockout, that margin for error only gets smaller.
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