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\n Romelu Lukaku <\/p>\n
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\n Romelu Lukaku
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Belgium coach Rudi Garcia named Romelu Lukaku in his World Cup squad on Friday despite saying Belgium\u2019s all-time record goalscorer was \u201cout of shape\u201d.<\/p>\n
Lukaku, who has scored 89 goals in 124 international appearances, has struggled for form and fitness at Serie A club Napoli this season.<\/p>\n
The 33-year-old former Inter Milan and Chelsea forward has only played 69 minutes of first-team football in 2026 and is currently sidelined by a hip injury.<\/p>\n
\u201cRomelu has recovered, but he\u2019s out of shape, and I\u2019m not sure he\u2019ll be able to start the matches. But he\u2019s our best striker, Belgium\u2019s all-time leading scorer,\u201d Frenchman Garcia told reporters.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have five weeks to get him back to full fitness so that little by little he can help the team.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lille forward Matias Fernandez-Pardo was given a maiden call-up after opting to switch nationality, having previously played for Spain\u2019s Under-21s.<\/p>\n
Lois Openda, who has played 33 times for Belgium, is a notable absentee after scoring just once in 24 Serie A appearances this season on loan at Juventus from RB Leipzig.<\/p>\n
There are few other surprises in Garcia\u2019s 26-man squad, with Kevin De Bruyne, Thibaut Courtois and Jeremy Doku all included.<\/p>\n
Belgium kick off their World Cup campaign against Egypt in Seattle on June 15, before taking on Iran and New Zealand in Group G in Los Angeles and Vancouver respectively.<\/p>\n
The Red Devils crashed out of the 2022 World Cup in the group stage, plagued by infighting as the \u2018golden generation\u2019 failed miserably in their final bid for a major title.<\/p>\n
They were knocked out of Euro 2024 in the last 16 by France after scraping through the group phase.<\/p>\n
Former Napoli, Roma and Marseille boss Garcia was named coach in January 2025 after the sacking of Domenico Tedesco.<\/p>\n
Squad<\/p>\n
Goalkeepers: Thibaut Courtois (Real Madrid\/ESP), Senne Lammens (Manchester United\/ENG), Mike Penders (Chelsea\/ENG)<\/p>\n
Defenders: Timothy Castagne (Fulham\/ENG), Zeno Debast (Sporting\/POR), Maxim De Cuyper (Brighton\/ENG), Koni De Winter (AC Milan\/ITA), Brandon Mechele (Club Brugge), Thomas Meunier (Lille\/FRA), Nathan Ngoy (Lille\/FRA), Joaquin Seys (Club Brugge), Arthur Theate (Eintracht Frankfurt\/GER)<\/p>\n
Midfielders: Kevin De Bruyne (Napoli\/ITA), Amadou Onana (Aston Villa\/ENG), Nicolas Raskin (Rangers\/SCO), Youri Tielemans (Aston Villa\/ENG), Hans Vanaken (Club Brugge), Axel Witsel (Girona\/ESP)<\/p>\n
Forwards: Charles De Ketelaere (Atalanta\/ITA), Jeremy Doku (Manchester City\/ENG), Matias Fernandez-Pardo (Lille\/FRA), Romelu Lukaku (Napoli\/ITA), Dodi Lukebakio (Benfica\/POR), Diego Moreira (Strasbourg\/FRA), Alexis Saelemaekers (AC Milan\/ITA), Leandro Trossard (Arsenal\/ENG)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Romelu Lukaku Belgium coach Rudi Garcia named Romelu Lukaku in his World Cup…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15840,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[10472,10471,10469,10466,10468,7,10465,10470,10467,10463,10464],"class_list":["post-15839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-belgium","tag-bangla-online-news","tag-bangladesh-latest-news","tag-bangladesh-news","tag-bangladesh-newspaper","tag-bangladeshi-newspapers","tag-belgium","tag-daily-new-age","tag-latest-bangladesh-news","tag-most-popular-outspoken-english-daily-newpaper-in-bangladesh","tag-new-age","tag-the-new-age"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@be\/116579669474406205","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}