Ousmane Dembélé scored one of the earliest hat-tricks in World Cup history as France swept aside a heavily rotated Norway side 4-1 on Friday in Foxborough, near Boston, to finish the group stage with a perfect nine points from three games. The Paris Saint-Germain forward, who won the Ballon d'Or this year, scored three goals in the space of 25 first-half minutes — the second-earliest hat-trick in World Cup history, behind Austria's Erich Probst, who completed his treble inside 24 minutes against Czechoslovakia in 1954. Désiré Doué added a fourth in stoppage time to complete a commanding victory that sends France through as Group I winners with ten goals scored in the tournament.
The match had been billed as a potential duel between Kylian Mbappé and Erling Haaland, but Norway coach Ståle Solbakken made 10 changes to his starting lineup, resting Haaland, captain Martin Ødegaard and striker Alexander Sørloth, having already secured qualification before kick-off. Mbappé, who came close himself after his angled shot hit the bar inside the first 30 seconds, instead played the role of creator, providing two assists for Dembélé. The PSG winger opened the scoring in the seventh minute, cutting in from the right and firing across goalkeeper Egil Selvik, then curled a low left-footed shot into the far corner in the 20th minute. Thelo Aasgaard, of Scottish club Rangers, pulled one back immediately from kick-off, but Dembélé completed his treble in the 32nd minute with another precise left-footed finish. Goalkeeper Mike Maignan then denied Jørgen Strand Larsen from the penalty spot early in the second half, before Doué headed in Barcola's cross in added time.
The game carried an emotional charge for the French squad. Head coach Didier Deschamps, who has led Les Bleus for 14 years and has announced he will step down after this tournament, flew back to France to attend his mother's funeral and was absent from the touchline. His assistant Guy Stéphan took charge, and France's players had pledged to deliver a winning performance in tribute. "As for the game, we did what we needed to do. There was a lot of enjoyment in the way we played, plenty of intensity and plenty of chances," Stéphan said, while also acknowledging there were moments where the side "fell into complacency" that will need to be addressed in the knockout rounds. Deschamps is expected to rejoin the squad on Saturday.
Dembélé now has four goals in the tournament, level with Mbappé, who is chasing Lionel Messi's all-time World Cup scoring record of 18 goals. The hat-trick hero becomes only the third France player to score three goals in a single World Cup match, after Just Fontaine — who did it twice in 1958 — and Mbappé, who scored a hat-trick in the 2022 final. Norway, who advance in second place with six points, will face Ivory Coast in Dallas on Tuesday. France, who will be based in the northeastern United States, travel to MetLife Stadium in New Jersey on Tuesday to face a third-place finisher — a shorter trip that assistant coach Stéphan acknowledged was a key motivation for finishing top of the group. "We wanted this first place to avoid a long journey," he said. "New York is just 45 minutes by plane from Boston, our base camp."