Match report
Late Olise strike gives France win over Belgium in Nations League
France edged Belgium 1-0 in a UEFA Nations League League A Group 1 fixture at Roi Baudouin, with the only goal arriving deep into the second half to settle a tight contest between two sides near the top of the standings.
AI-assisted match report written from official match data.
The first half finished goalless, with neither team able to break the deadlock inside the opening 45 minutes. The breakthrough finally came in the 88th minute when Michael Olise converted an assist from Rayan Cherki to put France ahead, a lead the visitors held onto until the final whistle.
France dominated large spells of the match, holding 65 percent of possession and outshooting Belgium 18 to 12, with seven shots on target compared to Belgium's two. Belgium picked up three yellow cards to France's none, though neither side had a man sent off. The result lifted France to six points from two matches at the top of the group, while Belgium sit second with three points from the same number of games.
Michael Olise scored the decisive 88th-minute goal, assisted by Rayan Cherki, and was rated the top performer of the match with a 7.7 rating.
France's dominance was reflected in the shot count, with 18 attempts to Belgium's 12.
France won 1–0 away against Belgium (half-time 0–0).
Belgium met France in the UEFA Nations League (League A - 2). Kick-off was Monday, 28 September 2026, 18:45 UTC at Roi Baudouin. Referee: Rade Obrenovič.
Team pages: Belgium · France · UEFA Nations League
Key moments
- 88' Goal: Michael Olise (assist: Rayan Cherki) — 0–1 · Watch Michael Olise's goal video (88')
Starting line-ups
Belgium (4-2-3-1)
France (4-3-3)
Sirius · Why these numbers
Before kick-off Sirius gave Belgium 34%, the draw 25%, France 41%. It finished Belgium 0–1 France.
France's rating edge outweighs Belgium's home ground — France are the stronger side on our strength rating, and that is most of France's 41%. The draw at 25% is held down by a high-scoring environment.
Why France at 41%?
France sit 124 points higher on our strength rating — 1948 to 2072. Sides with a 80–160-point rating edge on the road won 40.1% of 13,717 such games. The 300 most similar past games finished 29–21–50.
Why only 41%?
No scored evidence points the other way. 41% is what this rating gap has been worth in games like these; the rest is the draw at 25% and Belgium at 34%.
Why the draw at 25%?
With a rating gap this size the draw starts at 27.5%. These teams' recent games average 3.6 goals — a high-scoring environment. Games in that environment drew 23.0% of 16,960. The goals environment takes 2.3 points off the draw.
What did we measure but not count?
France scored +0.57 goals per game beyond chance-quality lately — hot streaks like that have cooled off. Measured across 2,820 games at this rating gap, hot-finishing sides won 41.6% vs 42.5% class-expected — inside the noise band, so it scores 0 until the receipt clears its evidence bar. Belgium are 1 game into a new manager (M. van Bommel), appointed 27 days ago. The famous new-manager bounce doesn't survive its receipt: sides with a new manager beat their rating by 0.9 points over 33,420 games — but sides on an equally bad run who kept their manager beat it by 2.4 over 31,777. The other measured facts on this page scored nothing either.
Sirius probabilities, frozen at kick-off. Analysis, not betting advice. How Sirius is doing this season · Full breakdown, evidence cards and squad news in the Match Insights tab
About this match
On this page: the Belgium vs France final score and result, goal highlights and video clips of every goal, who scored, starting lineups, match stats and the full match report from this UEFA Nations League fixture.
- Who scored and when — a goal-by-goal timeline of the match.
- Match stats — possession, shots, expected goals (xG), corners and cards.
- Starting lineups and player ratings for both teams.
- Head-to-head record and recent form for both sides.
Watch the goals: goal highlights and video clips of every goal from Belgium 0–1 France. Explore more on the Belgium and France team pages or the UEFA Nations League page.