When they headed home from the brand-new Cote d’Or sports complex on Tuesday 11 June, the Mauritius team were elated and exhausted in equal measure after recording a historic win in the first round of FIFA World Cup 2026 qualification. Remarkably, that victory was Club M’s first in a World Cup qualifier in in 21 years.
“Not many people in the squad were aware of that,” said legendary midfielder Kevin Bru in an exclusive interview with FIFA. “To tell you the truth, I don’t think anyone really knew – not even me!”
With the players focusing on the present rather than casting a backwards eye, the squad only came to terms with the enormity of their achievement in the hours that followed the final whistle. “It wasn’t until I heard the stat after the match that I thought: ‘Really? Wow!'” said Bru with a smile.
The team’s most recent World Cup qualifying win dated all the way back to 16 November 2003, when they defeated Uganda 3-1 during the preliminaries for Germany 2006, before that long winless run began.
To give a little context, back then Lionel Messi was yet to make his professional debut for Barcelona, Kylian Mbappe was just five, England prodigy Jude Bellingham was a four-month-old baby, and Cristiano Ronaldo – now on over 200 caps for Portugal – had played just twice for his country.
The win over Uganda was back in another era, one where Bru was not even involved. Having had spells at PSG as a youngster and Rennes in his youth-team days, he only made his international debut in 2011, following in the footsteps of his big brother Jonathan.
Nowadays, he is a father figure for Club M and their most experienced player. For the 35-year-old, the win over Eswatini was the result of hard work, pure and simple, on the part of the whole squad and the Mauritius Football Federation.
“Things have been looking up for the past two years or so,” the Paris-born midfielder explained. “That starts with the pitch that we play on at the Cote d’Or – we’ve got everything we need now in terms of facilities. Previously, we used to play on an awkward pitch, but now we’ve got a new synthetic ground to play our football on. We need to make the ball do the work, because we’re not exactly known for being the most solid of people.”
With their standard of football improving, Mauritius had been unlucky a few days earlier in a 2-1 loss to Libya (despite Bru getting on the scoresheet). They finally reaped the reward for their efforts in front of their home fans who, as always, provided vocal support. “We’ve been putting in some good displays for a while now, but the results weren’t reflecting that,” the emblematic midfielder said.
This highly anticipated World Cup qualifying win may turn out to be important for Bru in a different way, however, with the much-travelled 35-year-old not ruling out retiring from international football for good. The former Levski Sofia and Ipswich Town player has been out of contract for the past couple of months and does not appear particularly keen on signing on for a new club. “I don’t really want to move that far away from Paris,” he said, citing family projects and a move into coaching.
If he were to hang up his boots, Bru would leave a huge gap to be filled, but the midfielder is convinced that there are plenty of people ready to step into the breach. “There’s a new generation arriving, Lindsay [Rose, the captain] is no youngster anymore and the main players are nearer the end than the beginning of their careers. I hope we can attract a lot of expats – there are plenty in Australia, in England… Whether we can manage to do that is another issue. There are talented local players, but it’s difficult to get them to move. So I’m not going to lie, there are lots of things we need to improve.”
A few months ago, Rose explained to FIFA what he was hoping for in terms of the World Cup 26 qualifiers, saying: “we want to beat Eswatini, home and away”. Club M are therefore half-way there, and whatever happens now, Bru and his team-mates will have had a successful campaign. And if he does head into retirement, the veteran can do so with a sense of achievement.
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