It took just two minutes for Switzerland prodigy Johan Manzambi to announce his arrival at the .
Subbed on after 72 minutes in his country’s second Group B game against Bosnia and Herzegovina, the youngest player in the Swiss squad made an instant impact when he converted a spectacular high volley to give the Nati the lead. In the 90th minute, he added the 3-0 to round off a.
“Honestly, it’s incredible – it’s the first brace of my career, and at the World Cup on top of that,” Manzambi said after his performance. “Scoring two goals in front of the fans and my family, that’s very, very nice. I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep tonight."
The 20-year-old impressed all season long at SC Freiburg in the German Bundesliga and was voted Switzerland’s best young player of 2025. His versatility is crucial to his game – while naturally more offensively minded and a gifted attacker, Manzambi has spent most of the latter half of the season in Freiburg’s defensive midfield.
There, he played a key role in taking the club to their first-ever European final. Manzambi scored in the semi-final return leg to take Freiburg through to the UEFA Europa League final and was crowned Discovery of the Season as the competition’s best young player.
In an established Nati team with , Manzambi has so far been mostly used as a substitute, scoring three times in his first 13 appearances. His speed and box-to-box abilities made him the perfect candidate to pressure on a tired Bosnian team at Los Angeles Stadium.
“Johan is a happy guy with incredible footballing skills. We can use him flexibly, more defensively, in midfield, but also on the wing as a striker,” Swiss coach Murat Yakin said of his young star’s qualities. “He’s a street footballer, the kind who needs to be given freedom. Offensively, he has complete freedom. You saw that today – he can apply pressure, he has good dribbling skills and he can finish.”
“[Yakin] gave me some tactical and technical tips and then he told me to just play my game,” Manzambi revealed when speaking to FIFA after the game.
Almost instantly, he became the youngest Swiss player to score in a World Cup game since 1950 – and further wrote himself into the history books by becoming both the first Swiss player to score a brace after being subbed on, and becoming the country’s youngest two-goal scorer in World Cup history.
Even two hours after his heroics, Manzambi wasn’t able to stop laughing and smiling. “For me it’s incredible,” he kept repeating. “It’s a childhood dream!”
Back in May, Manzambi spoke about the role the Swiss national team played in his coming of age as a football player and said that he was . After being reminded of that in his post-game with FIFA, he revealed that he’d actually been dreaming of more: “My goal was to score two goals at the World Cup – and now I’ve already got two goals! But I hope there will be more.”
With a performance like this one in the books, it’s hard to imagine Manzambi isn’t a strong candidate to make Switzerland’s starting line-up for their final, decisive game , where he can further add to his tally and build his reputation as one of the most exciting young players in the world.
There remained just one final question – is this the best day of Manzambi’s life so far? “Yes, I think so,” he said with wide smile. But who knows – maybe he was still holding back, and dreams of scoring even more goals at this World Cup and beyond.
Sources: FIFA Official
