Belgium national football team players: Van Bommel’s 28, and four goalkeepers with six caps between them
Mark van Bommel’s 28-man Belgium squad for the Nations League, with every club, cap and goal, what has changed since the World Cup, the key players and how his first three games went.
Jul 30, 2026 · Updated Oct 4, 2026
The current Belgium national football team players are the 28 Mark van Bommel named for his first window as head coach: four Nations League matches against Italy, France and Türkiye between 25 September and 5 October. Thibaut Courtois is not among them, and that one absence reshapes the squad. Belgium’s four goalkeepers have six caps between them, while Romelu Lukaku and Kevin De Bruyne, both now in their thirties, have scored two thirds of the squad’s international goals.
Belgium’s full squad for the Nations League
Caps and goals are as they stood after the 3-0 win over Türkiye in Liège on 2 October. Clubs are this season’s, and the summer window moved a lot of them: Tielemans, Lukaku, Trossard, Moreira, Godts, Fofana, Fernandez-Pardo, Theate and Openda all changed clubs after the World Cup.
| Player | Pos | Club | Caps | Goals |
| Senne Lammens | GK | Manchester United | 6 | 0 |
| Maarten Vandevoordt | GK | RB Leipzig | 0 | 0 |
| Mike Penders | GK | Chelsea | 0 | 0 |
| Jari De Busser | GK | AZ | 0 | 0 |
| Timothy Castagne | DF | Fulham | 72 | 2 |
| Arthur Theate | DF | Bologna (loan) | 36 | 1 |
| Maxim De Cuyper | DF | Brighton | 28 | 4 |
| Zeno Debast | DF | Sporting CP | 26 | 1 |
| Brandon Mechele | DF | Club Brugge | 18 | 1 |
| Nathan Ngoy | DF | Lille | 11 | 0 |
| Koni De Winter | DF | AC Milan | 8 | 0 |
| Joaquin Seys | DF | Club Brugge | 7 | 0 |
| Kyriani Sabbe | DF | Club Brugge | 0 | 0 |
| Kevin De Bruyne | MF | Napoli | 127 | 40 |
| Youri Tielemans (c) | MF | Manchester United | 93 | 15 |
| Hans Vanaken | MF | Club Brugge | 43 | 8 |
| Nicolas Raskin | MF | Rangers | 21 | 2 |
| Diego Moreira | MF | AC Milan | 6 | 0 |
| Roméo Lavia | MF | Chelsea | 4 | 0 |
| Mandela Keita | MF | Parma | 1 | 0 |
| Romelu Lukaku | FW | Fenerbahçe | 134 | 94 |
| Leandro Trossard | FW | Beşiktaş | 58 | 14 |
| Charles De Ketelaere | FW | Atalanta | 38 | 9 |
| Dodi Lukébakio | FW | Benfica | 36 | 7 |
| Loïs Openda | FW | Lyon (loan) | 34 | 3 |
| Matias Fernandez-Pardo | FW | Newcastle United | 7 | 0 |
| Malick Fofana | FW | Sunderland | 6 | 1 |
| Mika Godts | FW | Paris Saint-Germain | 5 | 1 |
That is four goalkeepers, nine defenders, seven midfielders and eight forwards. Van Bommel kept Youri Tielemans as captain.
What has changed since the World Cup?
Rudi Garcia’s World Cup squad had 26 players. Six of them are not in this one, and eight new names have come in.
| Out | In |
| Thibaut Courtois | Maarten Vandevoordt |
| Thomas Meunier | Jari De Busser |
| Amadou Onana | Kyriani Sabbe |
| Axel Witsel | Roméo Lavia |
| Jeremy Doku | Mandela Keita |
| Alexis Saelemaekers | Loïs Openda |
| Malick Fofana | |
| Mika Godts |
Not all of the six were dropped. Courtois, now 34, asked to sit out the Nations League to manage his workload at Real Madrid, and Van Bommel agreed. Doku and Onana are injured.
What the numbers say about this squad
The 28 players have 825 caps and 203 goals between them, and both totals are badly lopsided.
Lukaku has 94 of the 203 goals on his own. Add De Bruyne’s 40 and the two of them account for 134, or 66 per cent. The other 26 players have 69 between them. Those two also hold 261 of the 825 caps, close to a third.
At the other end, 13 of the 28 have ten caps or fewer, and four have none: Vandevoordt, Penders, De Busser and Sabbe. Six of the squad are 21 years old. De Bruyne, at 35, is the oldest, followed by Hans Vanaken at 34.
The goalkeeping is the sharpest example. With Courtois out, the most experienced keeper in the group is Senne Lammens of Manchester United, with six caps. The other three have never played for Belgium.
Belgium’s own league supplies only four of the 28, all from Club Brugge. Eight play in England and six in Italy.
Who are Belgium’s key players?
Kevin De Bruyne is 35 and still the player Belgium are built around. His two goals against Türkiye, the second a curler into the top corner on the hour, took him to 40 for his country. He is also the vice-captain.
Romelu Lukaku is Belgium’s record scorer by a distance, and the window has been an awkward one for him. He moved from Napoli to Fenerbahçe in August, played seven minutes against Italy and stayed on the bench against France, with Van Bommel pointing to his lack of club minutes. He played in Liège and scored his 94th international goal there, 15 minutes from time.
Youri Tielemans keeps the armband under the new coach. He joined Manchester United from Aston Villa in July after United triggered his release clause.
Charles De Ketelaere was Belgium’s best attacker at the World Cup, with two goals against the United States in the last 16 and a header against Spain in the quarter-final. He is still at Atalanta.
Mika Godts is the newcomer who has made the quickest impression. Paris Saint-Germain signed him from Ajax in August in a deal worth up to €55 million, and he scored the opening goal in Rome, his first for Belgium.
How has Van Bommel started?
Two wins and a defeat from three Nations League matches, with no goals conceded except a late winner.
| Date | Match | Result | Belgium scorers |
| 25 Sep | Italy v Belgium, Rome | W 2-0 | Godts, Lukébakio |
| 28 Sep | Belgium v France, Brussels | L 0-1 | – |
| 2 Oct | Belgium v Türkiye, Liège | W 3-0 | De Bruyne 2, Lukaku |
| 5 Oct | France v Belgium, Saint-Denis | To play |
The win in Rome was the cleanest result of the opening round. Godts scored after Gianluca Mancini and Diego Coppola both went to ground in front of him, and Lukébakio added a low left-footed shot from 20 yards in the second half. The France game in Brussels stayed goalless until Michael Olise, on as a substitute, ran from inside his own half past four defenders and scored late. Our report on the 3-0 win over Türkiye has the detail from Liège.
After three rounds of Group A1, France lead on seven points, Belgium have six, Italy four and Türkiye none. The top two go through to the quarter-finals in March 2027. Belgium’s last two group games are away to Türkiye on 12 November and at home to Italy on 15 November.
Who is Belgium’s head coach?
Mark van Bommel, who took charge on 15 August 2026 on a deal that runs to Euro 2028. The 49-year-old Dutchman played for PSV, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Milan, and as a coach he won Royal Antwerp’s first Belgian league title in 66 years in his debut season there. Boudewijn Zenden and Maarten Martens are on his staff.
He replaced Rudi Garcia, whose 18-month contract ran out after the World Cup.
How did Belgium do at the 2026 World Cup?
They reached the quarter-finals and lost 2-1 to Spain, who went on to win the tournament.
The group stage was close to a disaster. A 1-1 draw with Egypt and a goalless one with Iran left Belgium third going into the last round, before a 5-1 win over New Zealand in Vancouver put them top of Group G. They came from 2-0 down to beat Senegal after extra time in the round of 32, beat the United States 4-1 in Seattle in the last 16, and lost to a late Mikel Merino goal in the quarter-final at SoFi Stadium. Our full report on Spain’s win over Belgium has the detail.
Belgium’s best World Cup finish remains third place at Russia 2018.
Who is Belgium’s all-time top goalscorer?
Romelu Lukaku, with 94 goals in 134 matches. He has held the record since 2017, and during the 2026 World Cup he also passed Marc Wilmots as Belgium’s leading scorer at World Cups, with six. De Bruyne, with 40, is the closest active player.
For more squad breakdowns in this series, see our guides to Croatia, Qatar and Cape Verde.