Australia stunned T\u00fcrkiye in Saturday\u2019s World Cup nightcap at Vancouver Stadium, riding a first-half goal by Nestory Irankunda and another by Connor Metcalfe after the intermission to win just the second World Cup match ever played in Canada 2-0 and upend the expected pecking order in Group D.<\/p>\n
Here are four quick takeaways from the Socceroos\u2019 surprising yet fully deserved victory.<\/p>\n
(Photo by Sarah Stier – FIFA\/FIFA via Getty Images)<\/span> <\/p>\n Coming into Saturday\u2019s match, T\u00fcrkiye was the obvious favorite. It wasn\u2019t just the bookies who said so, either.<\/p>\n “I think we will dominate the game, because we have more qualities and a more talented team,” T\u00fcrkiye\u2019s captain Hakan \u00c7alhano\u011flu said in an on-camera interview on the eve of the match at the home of the Vancouver Whitecaps. “We\u2019ll see what happens.”<\/p>\n Clearly, most experts agreed with \u00c7alhano\u011flu\u2019s assessment. The comment was still an obvious own goal. The Aussies \u2014 who narrowly lost to eventual champ Argentina in the last World Cup\u2019s round of 16 \u2014 probably didn\u2019t need any extra motivation in their 2026 tournament opener. \u00c7alhano\u011flu gave it to them anyway, and Tony Popovic\u2019s team was intent on making him eat those words.<\/p>\n Who cares if the favorites did in fact dominate, badly out-chancing and out-possessing Australia. The latter stunned the Turks with a ruthless counterattack that was expertly finished by Irankunda, forcing the former to take risks going forward in search of the equalizer. It never came. While T\u00fcrkiye sent its best two chances of the contest straight at keeper Patrick Beach, Australia made no mistake with its opportunities, taking advantage of the space it was afforded to double their lead and seal just its fifth ever World Cup victory on Connor Metcalfe\u2019s strike with about a quarter of an hour left to play.<\/p>\n (Photo by Ercin Erturk\/Anadolu via Getty Images)<\/span> <\/p>\n Although he\u2019s not the youngest member of the Aussies\u2019 26-player World Cup squad \u2014 that would be 18-year-old\u00a0 Colorado Rapids defender Lucas Herrington \u2014 Irankunda, 20, <\/strong>is undoubtedly their most exciting. Born in Tanzania and a former prospect for German titans Bayern Munich, Irankunda scored 16 goals as a teenager for A-League mainstay Adelaide United before being signed by the perennial Bundesliga champions.<\/p>\n Despite never making a senior appearance for Bayern, English second tier club Watford thought highly enough of\u00a0Irankunda to ink him to a five-year contract last year. He played in almost 40 Championship matches for the Hornets in his debut campaign in 2025-26, scoring four times. Now he\u2019s a World Cup goalscorer, too. It will be fascinating to see what he can do in the Socceroos final two group games.<\/p>\n With each of the four teams now has played one time, the table is beginning to take shape. The USA sits first on goal difference following Friday\u2019s 4-1 drubbing of the Paraguayans, with the Aussies now right behind. The two leaders will face off next Friday in Seattle, but the other match is significantly more intriguing following the first round of results.<\/p>\n T\u00fcrkiye pretty much must beat the Paraguayans on Thursday at San Francisco Bay Area Stadium in Northern California to maintain their chances of advancing to the knockout stage. The same can be said for the South Americans. That\u2019s the beauty of the World Cup, which just saw its first major upset of 2026.<\/p>\n Doug McIntyre<\/i> is a soccer reporter for FOX Sports who has covered\u00a0<\/i>United States<\/i> men’s and women’s national teams at FIFA World Cups on five continents. Follow him @<\/i>ByDougMcIntyre<\/i>.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" POPULAR SEARCHES BROWSE BY Australia stunned T\u00fcrkiye in Saturday\u2019s World Cup nightcap at Vancouver Stadium, riding a first-half goal by Nestory Irankunda and another by Connor Metcalfe after the intermission to win just the second World Cup match ever played in Canada 2-0 and upend the expected pecking order in Group D. Here are four […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":4746,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-soccer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4747","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4747\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4746"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}