{"id":95063,"date":"2026-06-19T06:58:27","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T06:58:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/95063\/"},"modified":"2026-06-19T06:58:27","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T06:58:27","slug":"canadas-ismael-kone-injured-what-happened-whats-next","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/95063\/","title":{"rendered":"Canada’s Isma\u00ebl Kon\u00e9 Injured: What Happened? What’s Next?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Canada midfielder Isma\u00ebl Kon\u00e9 suffered a gruesome injury in the second half of Canada’s 6-0 win over Qatar in Group B Play at the 2026 FIFA World Cup<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kon\u00e9 was substituted off the pitch on a stretcher after appearing to suffer a lower leg injury. His injury caused play to be delayed for several minutes, as it was an emotional scene in Vancouver.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kon\u00e9 has been an integral part of Les Rouges’ midfield, as he’s in his fourth year with the Canada national team leading into the World Cup. Here’s what happened and what we know.<\/p>\n

What Happened? What\u2019s The Injury?<\/p>\n

The injury occurred in the 50th minute of the match. Kon\u00e9 passed the ball to a teammate, and a late challenge from Qatar\u2019s\u00a0Assim Madibo left Kon\u00e9 with an apparent leg injury and had to be carted off. Canada’s medical staff also placed an air cast around Kon\u00e9’s injured leg. The severity of the injury was not immediately known, but coaches and players nearby were visibly shaken.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Madibo received a red card for his action, which was Qatar’s second red card of the day. Madibo was distraught prior to getting sent off the pitch, with multiple members of Canada’s national team consoling him.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I saw his leg. I saw that something wasn\u2019t right,” Canada captain Stephen Eust\u00e1quio said. He was among one of the first players to reach Kon\u00e9.<\/p>\n

Canada striker Jonathan David, who scored a hat trick, questioned the need for the tackle on Kon\u00e9.<\/p>\n

“If there\u2019s a play where you cannot win the ball, there\u2019s no point,” he said. “It\u2019s just to hurt people.”<\/p>\n

Shortly after the injury, Canada’s Nathan Saliba scored a goal in the 64th minute. Following the injury, he honored his teammate by holding up Kon\u00e9’s jersey.<\/p>\n

Canada\u2019s Nathan Saliba scores goal, honors Isma\u00ebl Kon\u00e9 who exited the game due to injury \"Canada\u2019s<\/a> What’s Next For Kon\u00e9?<\/p>\n

Canada head coach Jesse Marsch shared that Kon\u00e9 is set to undergo surgery, and that Madibo went to the Canada locker room to apologize after the match.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“[You] could hear the bone snap,” Marsch said at the post-game press conference. “Your heart goes out to him. Everybody’s shaken for him.”<\/p>\n

Marsch also shared his plans to visit Kon\u00e9 at the hospital later on Thursday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Everybody was crushed when it happened, but we had to find a way to stay focused. We knew that Isma\u00ebl wanted us to finish the job,” Marsch said. “There\u2019s a lot of thoughts that go through our heads right now, we\u2019re all thinking about him, but we\u2019re all very proud of what we are.”<\/p>\n

The details of Kon\u00e9\u2019s injury have not yet been disclosed. His lower left leg looked visibly broken in photos after the incident.<\/p>\n

“We\u2019re going to miss [Kon\u00e9],” Eust\u00e1quio said. “He has that X factor that our team really needs.”<\/p>\n

Isma\u00ebl Kon\u00e9\u2019s Career With Canada<\/p>\n

In 42 appearances with Canada, Kon\u00e9 recorded four goals. He also helped Canada earn a fourth-place finish at the 2024 Copa Am\u00e9rica tournament, made three appearances at the 2022 World Cup and has two consecutive Canada Soccer Young Player of the Year awards in 2022 and 2023.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Isma\u00ebl Kon\u00e9\u2019s Career With Club<\/p>\n

Kone\u2019s career originally started with CF Montreal in the MLS, where he recorded four goals and three assists in 32 appearances. After one season in Canada, Kone headed to Europe, where he spent time with Watford FC, Marseille and his current club, Sassuolo, of Serie A.<\/p>\n

The Associated Press contributed to this report.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Canada midfielder Isma\u00ebl Kon\u00e9 suffered a gruesome injury in the second half of Canada’s 6-0 win over Qatar…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":95064,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[17,10510,7724,27750,541,35002],"class_list":["post-95063","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-canada","tag-event_recap","tag-fifa-mens-world-cup","tag-ismael-kone","tag-qatar","tag-wc-canada-vs-qatar-06-18-2026"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=95063"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95063\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/95064"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=95063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=95063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=95063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}