In the first round of Group A in League D of the Nations League, Sensoli scored the only goal of the game, and San Marino defeated Liechtenstein 1-0, winning for the first time in 20 years. Post-match, a San Marino fan blogger celebrated with an Mbappe meme.
San Marino is the team with the lowest FIFA ranking, at 210th place, having previously won only one match in history, a 1-0 victory over Liechtenstein in 2004. On Wednesday night, Sensoli’s goal helped them defeat Liechtenstein, ranked 199th, again. This was their first win in an official competition, as the previous victory against Liechtenstein was just a friendly match.
The 19-year-old midfielder Sensoli, who plays for Sangiulianese in Italy’s semi-professional fourth-tier league, took advantage of a defensive error by Liechtenstein’s defender Sandro Wieser to flick the ball past goalkeeper Benjamin Buchel into the net, sparking jubilant scenes at the San Marino Olympic Stadium. Despite eight agonizing minutes of stoppage time and desperate defending in the final moments, this goal was enough to end their 140-game winless streak.
At the final whistle, San Marino’s coaching staff and substitutes rushed onto the pitch to celebrate, while some Liechtenstein players fell to the turf—possibly out of embarrassment and disappointment.
This result also means that, incredibly, San Marino currently sits atop their three-team Nations League group. The other opponent, Gibraltar, has yet to play any matches.
San Marino is an inland country surrounded by northeastern Italy, with a population barely exceeding 30,000 and an area of only 61 square kilometers. Due to their team’s difficulty in ending the winless streak, San Marino has almost become synonymous with footballing struggle.
Although Eritrea, which has not played a match since 2020, is informally unranked by FIFA, San Marino has been at the bottom of the world rankings since November 2023.
Their home ground, with a capacity of 6,600, is often only half full during matches, with visiting fans occasionally outnumbering the home supporters.
Since their first official match in 1990, San Marino has suffered some heavy defeats, including a 0-13 loss to Germany in 2006, and they have never won a single match in major tournament qualifiers.
However, they have caused some trouble for bigger nations; in a 1993 World Cup qualifier, Davide Gualtieri scored what was then the fastest goal in 8 seconds against England, although they eventually lost 1-7.
During this period, San Marino reached its highest-ever FIFA ranking of 118th, but their football story has since been filled with hardship—until tonight.