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2026 FIFA World Cup
25JUL

Torres settles the final in the 106th

2 min read
11:57UTC

Ferran Torres came on in the 62nd minute and scored in the 106th. Spain beat Argentina 1-0 after extra time in front of 80,663 at MetLife Stadium.

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Key takeaway

Spain won the 2026 World Cup 1-0 in extra time through a 106th-minute substitute goal.

Ferran Torres came on for Spain in the 62nd minute and scored in the 106th. Nothing else went in. Spain beat Argentina 1-0 after extra time at MetLife Stadium on Sunday 19 July, in front of 80,663 people, to win the 2026 World Cup 1.

Argentina did not get an attempt away until the second half of extra time. Spain had taken the game's first 20 shots by that point 2. Enzo Fernandez was sent off in the 93rd minute for a second yellow card, a foul on Pau Cubarsi, and Argentina finished with seven yellows and a red. Slavko Vincic of Slovenia refereed.

Spain reached the final by beating France in the semi-final , the one knockout tie it settled without a goal in the closing minutes. Sunday reverted to type. Torres scored 16 minutes into extra time, having watched the first 62 from the bench, and Spain defended the lead for the rest of the night without conceding a shot on target.

Argentina's own press did not contest the result. TyC Sports said the side "did not have a good match". Clarin framed the night around the possible end of the Messi era, after four titles and five consecutive finals. Marca in Madrid went with "Los reyes de todos los tiempos", kings of all time 3.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

Spain and Argentina finished level after 90 minutes, so the match went to an extra 30. In the 106th minute, a substitute named Ferran Torres, who had only been on the pitch a few minutes, scored the winning goal. Argentina had barely threatened Spain's goal all match and lost a player to a red card near the end, which made the closing stages even harder for them. This meant Spain won the World Cup, the sport's biggest prize, for the second time (they also won it in 2010). Extra time and substitutes deciding a final is not unusual: Spain's first title in 2010 was also won this way.

Deep Analysis
Root Causes

Spain named a squad with eight Barcelona players and none from Real Madrid, and Luis de la Fuente rotated it hard through the knockout rounds rather than fielding a fixed first eleven. That depth is what let Ferran Torres, a 62nd-minute substitute, arrive with fresher legs than Argentina's back line deep into extra time.

The same rotation policy explains why Spain could sustain 20 shots without visibly tiring: squad members who had played fewer cumulative minutes across the tournament were available to replace those who had played more, a direct trade-off against selecting the notionally strongest XI in every match.

What could happen next?
  • Precedent

    Spain's win, secured via a bench player rather than a fixed front line, strengthens the case for rotation-heavy squad management over reliance on a settled best XI in future major tournaments.

  • Consequence

    A second title without a single player from Real Madrid marks a shift in the balance of Spain's national-team talent pipeline toward Barcelona's academy system.

Sources:ESPN·Wikipedia·Associated Press (via PBS NewsHour)
Mentions:Spain →Argentina →MetLife Stadium →Slavko Vincic →Italy →Madrid →FIFA →Brazil →Netherlands →Slovenia →France →Pau Cubarsí →World Cup →Eric García →Pablo Gavi →Leandro Paredes →Ferran Torres →
First Reported In

Update #44 · Spain win with one goal and one conceded

ESPN· 20 Jul 2026
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Backs the move to a 64-team 2030 tournament co-hosted across South America. Has not engaged publicly with FIFPRO's workload or heat-threshold objections drawn from this tournament's data.
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Points to its 30 June technical and officiating reviews as the authoritative account of the tournament's football, including Collina's rejection of bias claims. Has not publicly responded to the renewed compensation call or disputed FIFPRO's heat-threshold figures.
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Human Rights Watch
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