SAN FRANCISCO — Nestory Irankunda had held the record for twelve days. On Thursday night at San Francisco Bay Area Stadium, the 19-year-old stood next to Lucas Herrington before kickoff and told him: “Stay calm, do your thing.” Then he watched Herrington take the record, Australia’s youngest ever to start a World Cup match, and play like someone who had never needed the advice.
Australia drew 0-0 with Paraguay in their Group D finale, earning the point that sends them to the World Cup Round of 32 for only the third time in their history. The 2006 side reached the last 16 and lost to Italy on a penalty in stoppage time. The 2022 side went the same distance before losing to Argentina. The 2026 version faces Iran at AT&T Stadium in Arlington on July 3. Whether that match will feature Herrington is now the most interesting question Tony Popovic has to answer.
Popovic made six changes to the lineup that lost to the United States, resting starters including veteran Mathew Ryan in goal, with one eye already on the knockout phase. The move could have read as a signal that this was a game to survive rather than win. Instead it produced the Socceroos’ most disciplined performance of the tournament, a clean sheet against a Paraguay side that had conceded four goals to the USA and absorbed 32 shots from Turkey in their previous two matches. The calculation proved correct: Paraguay, for all their improvements in this game, could not find the breakthrough.
That version of Paraguay did not arrive in San Francisco. A more organized and physically committed side came instead, compact through the middle and alert to Australia’s attempts to build from the back. The match produced just 0.83 combined expected goals, the first time at this tournament a game had finished below 1.0 xG, as Sky Sports noted. It suited both sides. Australia needed a point. Paraguay, calculating that a draw would likely carry them through as one of the better third-place finishers, were content not to lose it.
The clearest chance of the night fell to Jordan Bos in the 90th minute, his shot from the right of the box drifting wide when a harder placement would have found the corner. In stoppage time, Patrick Beach got down quickly to smother a low effort from Mauricio that lacked pace but required concentration. Jackson Irvine hit an angled shot straight at Orlando Gill from a Carlo Volpato assist. A full house of 68,827 watched the final whistle settle it.
The numbers Herrington produced across ninety minutes were not those of a teenager borrowing the occasion. He completed 62 of 69 passes, made seven clearances, two tackles, five recoveries, and an interception. Harry Souttar, the Socceroos captain, called him a “Rolls Royce.” Irankunda, who had taken the record for youngest Australian to start a World Cup match during Popovic’s opening-match gamble against Turkey, had given Herrington the same instruction before kickoff. He delivered on it for ninety minutes in a match that would send his country to the World Cup knockout rounds. That does not happen without real quality.
Popovic’s decision to start Beach ahead of Ryan for a second consecutive game added another subplot. The 22-year-old has now kept two clean sheets in his first two World Cup appearances. Ryan, with 82 international caps and the authority those bring, offers something different in the big-game context, and the likelihood is he returns against Iran. But Beach has given his manager a dilemma he did not expect to be carrying into the knockout rounds.
This is only the third time Australia has reached the knockout round of the World Cup. In 2006, a side built around Harry Kewell and Mark Viduka made the last 16 before losing to Italy on a penalty in the final minutes. In 2022, they beat Denmark in that round before Argentina ended their run. The 2026 version carries a different character: younger, rotated, built around clean-sheet discipline and tournament management rather than a single defining performance.
The 2026 World Cup expanded to 48 teams to create evenings like this one, matches where both sides need not to lose and tactical concentration defines the result. Not every game in the format has justified that arithmetic. Thursday in San Francisco did. Al Jazeera noted the full-house crowd was the fifth time the Bay Area venue had reached at least 99 percent capacity in five games. Turkey’s 98th-minute winner over the United States elsewhere on Thursday had already settled Group D’s final shape, confirming Australia needed only the draw. The six changes, the teenage debut, the goalless discipline: all of it was in service of July 3 in Arlington.
Iran await. Paraguay wait to learn whether their clean sheet was enough to carry them through the third-place standings. Australia already know their answer. What the Socceroos cannot confirm yet is whether the youngest player ever to start a World Cup match in green and gold will be starting the next one.
