Every player has his own way of trying to enter the history books, but how harsh are those moments when your name becomes historically linked to a negative incident, leaving you on the wrong side of football history. Despite dedication, perseverance, and training, a single decisive moment in a match can change everything.
The dark chapters of football history are filled with names that suddenly transform from heroes in the eyes of supporters to figures of scorn. The Paraguayan Damián Bobadilla may now be living through such a moment, after he deflected the ball into his own net, handing the United States national team the lead in the two sides' opening match at the 2026 World Cup — a game that ended in a 4-1 victory for the Americans.
Bad luck, misjudgement, or simply fate placing players in such a position — some have recovered from it, others have suffered the fury of their fans, while football history records that for some the consequences proved fatal. That darkest chapter in the sport came when Colombian Andrés Escobar was assassinated after scoring an own goal against his country's team — and, remarkably, against the same opponent: the United States, on a similar occasion when the Americans hosted the tournament in 1994.
That was a grim moment not just in football history but in the history of sport as a whole, and matters will certainly not reach that point this time. Yet the anger of Paraguayan supporters towards Bobadilla is likely to linger for a long time — especially if the Latin American side, returning to the tournament for the first time since 2010, fails to advance beyond the group stage.
Bobadilla thus joins his fellow Latin American Escobar as the scorer of an own goal in favour of the United States — a team that has now benefited from own goals on 4 occasions in World Cup history. The Americans also received two own goals from Portuguese defender Jorge Costa at the 2002 World Cup in Japan and South Korea, and benefited from a goal scored by Italy's Christian Zaccardo at the 2006 World Cup in Germany.
Germany and Italy are jointly second on the list of teams that have benefited most from own goals. This World Cup offers both the United States and Germany's "Mannschaft" a chance to surpass Italy's tally of 4 own goals — though Italy are absent from a tournament that features the team with the most own-goal beneficiaries of all: France, runners-up at the previous edition and champions of the 2018 edition.
Les Bleus' own-goal fortune began at the 1954 World Cup in Switzerland, courtesy of Mexico's Raúl Cárdenas, then continued at the 1998 World Cup through South Africa's Pierre Issa. France's match against Honduras at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil also saw Noel Valladares put the ball into his own net.
At that same tournament, Nigerian Joseph Yobo scored in his own net to benefit France. At the 2018 World Cup in Russia, Australia's Aziz Behich gifted France a goal, and the same happened in the final of that tournament when Croatia's Mario Mandžukić scored an own goal, in a match that ended 4-2 to France as Les Bleus claimed their second world title.
Moments of misfortune and misjudgement have placed players in the unenviable category of the condemned. Now we wait to see how far the fury of Paraguay's supporters towards Damián Bobadilla will go.