World Cup qualification
The embarrassment briefly escapes top nation
Updated on 08.09.2025 – 07:38 a.m.Reading time: 1 min.
After four qualifying days, the Netherlands are fully on the course of the World Cup. The duel with Lithuania soccer gnome became a tremor for “Oranje”.
The Netherlands celebrated an important but extremely tight victory in the World Cup qualification-and Memphis Depay wrote history. In the 3: 2 (2: 2) in Lithuania, the striker scored his international gate number 51 and 52. The 31-year-old is the sole record goal. So far, he had shared the record with Robin van Persie, who had scored 50 goals for the national team.
The BondScoach Ronald Koeman team now runs ten points in the table of group G. Only the group’s first qualifies directly for the 2026 World Cup in the USA, Canada and Mexico.
Depay put the Dutch in the lead in the 11th minute. Quinten Timber added 2-0 after 33 minutes. But Lithuania came back before the break: Gvidas Gineitis (36th) and Edvinas Girdvainis (43.) placed 2-2. After the change of sides, it was again Depay, who was in the service of Corinthians São Paulo, who scored the winning goal in the 63rd minute. The narrow 3: 2 then rocked “Oranje” over time and thus escaped the stark outsider of a embarrassment.