England - Iran breaks record for longest World Cup game
By 90min Staff
If England weren’t already celebrating a fantastic win, they are also now record breakers at the World Cup - and not just on possessions stats.
Due to a stoppage of play at the start of the match. because of an injury to the nose of Iranian goalkeeper Alireza Beiranvand following a violent collision with his partner Majid Hosseini, the referee Raphael Claus indicated 14 minutes of additional time at the end of the first half.
A duration never seen in a World Cup, at least since these statistics have been tracked.
14 minutes - the record for the longest added time in one half of a World Cup match
The Three Lions cruised to their first win of the tournament with dazzling displays from Jude Bellingham, Bukayo Saka and Raheem Sterling.
However, despite the first half being glittered with great class, it will instead go down in the history books as the longest first half of a World Cup game in history. An additional 14 minutes of added time has not been seen in the last 21 editions of the World Cup.
27 minutes of additional time in total - the longest World Cup group stage game of all time
England vs Iran had then broken an additional record in the second half - the longest World Cup group stage game in history. With an additional +13 minutes of added time in the second half, the total length of added time was 27 minutes. This took the actual playing time of the game to a staggering 117 minutes - almost the same amount of time as a standard game with extra time.
Nevertheless, this game between England and Iran does not exceed the League Cup meeting in September 2019 between Burton Albion and Bournemouth which reached a total of 28 minutes of added time. The cause? Multiple power cuts inside the Burton Albion stadium.