One hundred and twenty-two minutes. A crossbar. A VAR check. A penalty. Youri Tielemans stepped up and Belgium were through — and Senegal were left wondering exactly what had just happened to them.
This was a World Cup last-32 tie that had everything — momentum swings, a comeback, and then, deep into extra time, the kind of finish that splits a stadium clean in half. With the match seemingly heading somewhere — anywhere — Dodi Lukébakio struck the crossbar, the ball stayed alive, and referee Saíd Martínez was sent to the monitor by VAR official Guillermo Pacheco Larios. The call: a foul by Lamine Kamara on Tielemans in the build-up. Penalty to Belgium.
Tielemans converted. Belgium advanced. Senegal went home.
The decision is the story. A VAR-awarded penalty in the 122nd minute of a World Cup knockout match — for a foul that happened moments before Lukébakio's crossbar strike — is precisely the kind of call that will be clipped, replayed, and debated long after the tournament is over. Whether Kamara's challenge on Tielemans was a penalty or a marginal contact that VAR had no business elevating to a match-deciding moment is a question with no clean answer, and that ambiguity is exactly what makes it burn.
Senegal had fought through a seesaw contest to get to the 122nd minute. To lose it this way — to a call that required a monitor review, in added time of extra time, after a shot had already hit the woodwork — is the kind of heartbreak that doesn't soften with distance.
For Belgium, the manner of the win will matter less than the fact of it. They came from behind in what the Guardian describes as a genuine comeback, which means this wasn't a side that sat back and nicked it — they had to work, absorb, and find a way. Tielemans, steady from the spot, was the man who delivered it when it counted most.
Lukébakio's crossbar strike — the moment that kept the move alive long enough for VAR to intervene — will be one of those small, strange details that defines how this tie is remembered. He didn't score. The post did the job anyway.
Belgium are in the last 16. The officiating conversation will follow them there. Saíd Martínez and Pacheco Larios will face scrutiny that no referee enjoys at a tournament of this scale. And Senegal — a side with genuine quality, a team that deserved better than a 122nd-minute exit on a disputed call — will have nothing to show for it.
Tournament football is fine margins. This one was a margin so fine it barely existed.
One hundred and twenty-two minutes. A crossbar. A VAR check. A penalty. Youri Tielemans stepped up and Belgium were through — and Senegal were left wondering exactly what had just happened to them.
Sources
The Guardian — Football
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