Raul Jimenez ends his World Cup drought in a poignant Mexico breakthrough

Mexico striker Raul Jimenez, 35, scored his first World Cup goal on Thursday night at Estadio Azteca, and his 47th for the national team, in Mexico’s opening match of the 2026 tournament. The goal, a header, sparked celebrations across the country and was described locally as a moment that ended his World Cup curse. Mexico are expected to advance from a group that also includes South Korea and Czechia, and could still finish first.

The moment carried special weight because Jimenez’s career nearly ended in 2021, when he suffered a severe skull injury in a collision with Arsenal defender David Luiz while playing for Wolves at the Emirates Stadium. He was hospitalized unconscious, underwent several brain surgeries, and spent six months in rehabilitation without training alongside teammates. Jimenez said, “I always believed I would return as a player,” but added that he had not understood how dangerous the injury was and that “the noise in the stadium” still haunted him.

His mother told a BBC documentary that she turned on the television and saw him lying unconscious, and she feared the worst. Jimenez later said he remembered nothing of the clash or his treatment. Astonishingly, he resumed training three weeks after the injury and returned to action eight months later, though he became a substitute at Wolves and later had to rebuild his career.

The Mexican press said he had changed his style, moving away from his old reliance on aerial power and physicality and becoming more of a deeper-lying, ball-moving forward. After criticism when he was called up for the 2022 World Cup, he rediscovered form at Fulham, where he scored nine goals last season, and then returned to Wolverhampton to help them try to get back to the Premier League. Jimenez also dedicated the goal to his late father, who died at 62 after a battle with cancer and was a major influence on his career.