Tunisia’s World Cup campaign is over. A 4-0 defeat to Japan on Saturday in Mexico, coming just days after a 5-1 hammering by Sweden, has made the Eagles of Carthage the first African team to be eliminated from the 2026 tournament. Nine goals conceded across two matches means that no result in their final group game against the Netherlands can save them. Tunisia are going home.
The scale of the collapse has been difficult to witness. The opening loss to Sweden was painful enough, but it carried with it the hope that a response was possible. Saturday’s defeat to Japan removed any doubt. Tunisia conceded four without reply, a performance that reflected a team short on confidence, short on organisation, and short on the resilience needed to compete at this level. The combined tally of nine goals conceded in two matches tells its own story.
The crisis within the camp had already prompted a dramatic response before Saturday’s kick-off. The heavy defeat to Sweden cost coach Sabri Lamouchi his job, with Hervé Renard brought in at the last minute to try to arrest the slide ahead of the Japan match. It was an extraordinary gamble, asking a new manager to prepare a shaken squad in a matter of days for a must-win World Cup fixture. Tunisia fan Samih Kadry, who had travelled to support his team, was candid about the impact. “I think that there are a lot more things that should be changed. It’s a disappointment actually. We came from Paris, we came from Tunisia, from all over the place to support the team but it’s a bit of a disappointment.” His words captured the mood of a fanbase that had invested deeply in this tournament and received very little in return.
The managerial change did not provide the spark Tunisia needed. Renard’s appointment was bold but the circumstances were almost impossible. Integrating a new manager’s ideas, rebuilding team morale, and finding a tactical identity in the space of a few days against a well-organised Japanese side proved beyond the squad. The result was another evening to forget.
Tunisia’s final match against the Netherlands will now serve a different purpose entirely. With qualification mathematically impossible, the game offers nothing but an opportunity to sign off with some dignity and to give supporters, who have followed their team across continents, something worth remembering. For a group of players who came to this World Cup with genuine ambitions, it is a bitter way to spend their last 90 minutes in the tournament.
Africa’s remaining teams will be watching closely. Tunisia’s early exit is a reminder of how unforgiving the group stage can be, particularly in an expanded tournament where the margins between advancement and elimination can come down to just a handful of performances. The Eagles of Carthage arrived with hopes. They leave as a cautionary tale, and the inquest into what went wrong will begin the moment they board the plane home.
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