Crystal Palace midfielder Daisy Kamanda had the final say in the opening Group 6 match of the 2026 World Cup between the Netherlands and Japan. The 26-year-old ace’s goal made the final 2-2 at Dallas Stadium, in a game that was played at a blistering pace in the second half. 

Ronald Koeman’s team needed 12 minutes in the second half to score twice against a very good team, such as the one Moriyasu Hajime has built, but in the end they failed to get the “three points”. 

After a first 45 minutes in which “Giannis was afraid of the beast and the beast was afraid of Giannis,” the second half at “Dallas Stadium” was a completely different match. 

The “oranges” turned up the tempo, the Asians… opened up, resulting in three goals before the 20th minute of the second half. Van Dijk put Koeman’s team ahead in the 51st minute, Japan responded in the 57th minute with Nakamura’s shot, and Summersville came in the 64th minute with an ideal placement to put the Netherlands back in the “leading position”.

The match had “opened” for good, with the team from the “Land of the Rising Sun” pressing for an equalizer and the Dutch searching for a third goal. Finally, Kamanda, with a nail-biting header in the 89th minute, made the final 2-2, not allowing the group favorite to take the win and everything was now open for qualification to the “32”.

Referee: I. Ilfath (USA)
Yellow cards: Summersville, Depay

The teams:

NETHERLANDS (Ronald Koeman): Verbrucken, Dumfries, Van Dijk, Van Hecke, Van de Ven, Hrafenberg (81′ Ake), Raiders (70′ Timber), De Jong, Somerville (70′ Koopmeiners), Hakpo (85′ Brombay), Mullen (70′ Depay)

JAPAN (Moriyashu Hajime): Suzuki, Taniguchi, Watanabe (75′ Tomiyashu), Ito (67′ D. Maeda), Kubo (75′ Ogawa), Doan (75′ Sugawara), Nakamura, Kamada, Sano, Ueda (84′ Shiogai)