The last place in the World Cup knockout stage came down, fittingly, to one of the group stage’s wildest matches.
Serbia and Switzerland let it all hang out in a game that featured swings on both the scoreboard and live table, but it’s the Swiss that prevailed, winning 3–2 to go through from Group G along with Brazil. The Seleção, which rotated its squad heavily for their group finale against Cameroon, wound up losing 1–0, but they still top the group on goal differential.
Serbia and Switzerland came in with some heated history. They met in the 2018 World Cup as well, and when Swiss stars Granit Xhaka and Xherdan Shaqiri made an Albanian nationalist gesture after goals in the game, it provoked an inflammatory moment between Serbia and ethnic Albanians (which both players are) due to the geopolitical nature of the region.
