England and USA advance to Round of 16

USA forward Christian Pulisic scores his team’s first goal past Iran’s goalkeeper Alireza Beiranvand.
Photo: AFP

England and USA will advance to the knockout stages of the FIFA World Cup while Wales and Iran have crashed out in the group stage.

In a group that proved harder to predict than many expected, Iran and Wales have been sent packing from the Qatar World Cup.

After an uninspiring first-half, England made easy work of their Welsh neighbours, notching two quickfire goals shortly through Marcus Rashford and Phil Foden shortly early in the second half.

Rashford then made it a brace with an impressive solo effort, cutting through the Welsh defense to smash it into the goal by way of deflection off the keeper.

The result secured top spot in Group B with seven points, they will face Senegal in the Round of 16 on Monday 5 December at 8am.

England forward Marcus Rashford celebrates with teammates after scoring a goal against Wales.
Photo: AFP

Meanwhile, Iran fell to a 1-nil defeat to the US in their final match of the group with Christian Pulisic scoring the decisive goal late in the first-half.

The second-half saw the US forced to defend aggressively as Iran threw everything at the game in the hopes of staging a comeback.

However, the Americans weathered the storm and survived several scares at the back to secure a Round of 16 meeting with the Netherlands on Sunday 4 December at 4am.