Chile s "Golden Generation" ends: Sanchez apologizes when sheds tears, World Cup dreams are broken

In a South American World Cup qualifier that ended this morning, Chile lost to Bolivia 0-2 at home, and announced in advance that it missed the 2026 World Cup finals. This is their third consecutive absence from the World Cup.

This loss caused Chile to fall to the bottom of the South American qualifiers. With this victory, Bolivia still retains a glimmer of hope to advance to the transcontinental play-offs and has the opportunity to compete for the 2026 World Cup tickets jointly organized by the United States, Mexico and Canada.

The Chilean team, once known as the "golden generation", won the Copa America championship trophy twice in 2015 and 2016, and was in the limelight. However, in this match against Bolivia, except for veteran Alexis Sanchez, who still sticks to it, the former main players of the national team such as Vidal and Vargas have faded out, and the lineup is almost always full of unknown new faces. After the game, Sanchez couldn't hide his loss. Facing the camera, he said in a low mood: "I am very sad and in a terrible mood. This is the first time in my career that I have experienced such a painful failure. We must apologize to all the fans who support us, and the entire team needs to continue working hard. Our 'golden age' is over, and I am the only one who is still persisting." In the 5th minute of the game, Bolivia's Miguel Selworth took the lead in breaking the Chilean goal. In the 90th minute of the game, Enzo Montero scored another goal, completely securing the victory for Bolivia. It is worth mentioning that this game was played in El Alto, a plateau stadium at an altitude of 4,150 meters. The Chilean team faced a huge physical test when playing away.

With this precious victory, Bolivia's points reached 17 points, which put a lot of pressure on Venezuela, which currently has 18 points. Later, Venezuela will challenge Uruguay away. The two teams are fiercely competing for the seventh place in the qualifiers, which will qualify for the Intercontinental play-offs. Currently, the sixth-ranked Colombia team has 21 points.