Garcia watched from the bench as Spain edged past Belgium in a game played at the Los Angeles Stadium on Friday.
By Kehinde Okeowo
Belgium head coach Rudi Garcia has blamed his team’s 2-1 defeat to Spain in the quarter-final of the 2026 World Cup on “two mistakes”.
He made this known while addressing journalists at the end of the encounter played at the Los Angeles Stadium on Friday.
Luis de la Fuente’s men opened the scoring in the last-eight tie through Fabián Ruiz in the 30th minute.
Dani Olmo’s effort was parried away by Thibaut Courtois, but it went straight to the feet of Ruiz, who was there to slam it home, although it took a slight deflection off Timothy Castagne.
However, despite Charles De Ketelaere cancelling out Spain’s opener, Garcia’s men were eliminated thanks to Mikel Merino’s 88th-minute goal.
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With the narrow victory, La Roja will now face France in the semi-final tie of the tournament, scheduled for Tuesday, 14 July.
Reacting to the loss, Garcia bemoaned the team’s two costly errors and injuries, pointing to them as the reasons why his team fell short.
He said: “We played very well against Spain.
”But at this level, you simply cannot afford to make any mistakes, and we made two.
”Tielemans picked up an injury before the match, and Courtois was injured during the match.
”Kevin De Bruyne was also unable to see out the game.
”We could have done more, but…”
