Johan Manzambi is 20 years old. He was born in 2006 — 68 years after Switzerland’s last World Cup knockout victory. He grew up in a world where the “Swiss curse” was just a fact of life, like gravity or the Alps.
And then, in the 10th minute of a Round of 32 match against Algeria, he decided that gravity no longer applied.
He picked up the ball on the left flank. He drove past one defender. Then another. He reached the byline and delivered a cross that was so perfect, so precise, that Breel Embolo barely had to move to turn it into the net. 1-0.
Manzambi has now been directly involved in five goals at this World Cup — three goals, two assists. He is the third player aged 21 or under to achieve that in a single tournament this century, joining Thomas Muller and Kylian Mbappe. His transfer value has reportedly quintupled. Scouts from every major European club are scrambling to file reports.
But none of that matters as much as this: a 20-year-old kid, who was not even born when Switzerland’s curse began, was the one who ended it.
The Coach Who Knew Too Much
There is a cruel irony at the heart of this match. Algeria’s coach, Vladimir Petkovic, managed Switzerland for seven years. He built the team that Yakin now leads. He gave Xhaka the captain’s armband. He gave Akanji his first senior call-up. He knew everything about this Swiss team — their strengths, their weaknesses, their habits, their fears.
And it didn’t matter.
Because the Switzerland that Petkovic knew was the Switzerland of the curse. The Switzerland that always found a way to lose. The Switzerland that Yakin has built is different. It is younger. It is faster. It is hungrier. And it is led by players — Manzambi, Ndoye — who were not part of Petkovic’s Switzerland at all.
Petkovic prepared for the team he remembered. He faced the team that had evolved beyond him.
The Miss That Made the World Laugh
In the 81st minute, with Switzerland already 2-0 up, Fabian Rieder missed an open goal from three metres. The cross was perfect. The goal was empty. Rieder shot wide.
The stadium gasped. Social media erupted. “My grandmother could have scored that” trended worldwide within minutes.
But here is the thing about that miss: it didn’t matter. Switzerland were already winning. The curse was already broken. Rieder’s miss was not a tragedy — it was a comedy. And for a team that has spent 88 years living through football tragedies, a moment of pure comedy felt like liberation.
The Tears at the End
When the final whistle blew, the Swiss players did not celebrate with wild abandon. They fell to their knees. They embraced each other. Xhaka, the captain, the man who had carried the weight of the curse more than anyone, had tears in his eyes.
This was not just a victory. This was an exorcism. Eighty-eight years of failure, of heartbreak, of being the team that everyone expected to lose — all of it was gone. In its place was something new: belief.
Switzerland will face Colombia or Ghana in the Round of 16. For the first time in nearly a century, they enter a knockout match not as the team trying to break a curse, but as the team that has already broken it.
And that changes everything.
