Unbelievable Feats: Every Staggering Record Shattered at the World Cup

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For 44 years, German football held the most formidable psychological weapon in international sports: absolute invulnerability in penalty shootouts. Germany had contested four World Cup shootouts, against France in 1982, Mexico in 1986, England in 1990, and Argentina in 2006, and won all four, converting 17 of 18 penalties taken. That bulletproof mystique evaporated on June 29, 2026 in front of 68,000 stunned spectators.

Paraguay dragged the four-time champions through a scoreless 120 minutes of bruising defensive containment. In the shootout, Paraguayan goalkeeper Roberto Fernández denied two poorly struck German efforts before converting Paraguay's fifth kick to seal a 4, 3 shootout triumph. The defeat marked Germany's first shootout elimination in World Cup history. It cemented one of the tournament's most seismic knockout stage upsets and ended an aura of German spot-kick infallibility that had stood unchallenged across four decades.