England saw an outstanding effort from Bukayo Saka in their third-place game against France. He scored a hat trick to take the win and end their World Cup journey on a high, but a moment before his third goal generated almost as much attention as the score itself, because as England prepared to take a late penalty, cameras caught Jude Bellingham holding onto the ball. Now, Saka has cleared the air.

“No, Jude was never taking it,” he told BBC Sport after the game. “He was the first one to say go and get your hat-trick, so none of them came to distract me. I was always going to take it.”

Here’s what happened. In the 87th minute, as France tried to close the one-goal gap between them and England, an offensive sequence saw Djed Spence being taken down by Malo Gusto, and the referee awarded the English side a penalty. Bellingham, who played this game as a second-half substitute, quickly grabbed the ball, with many assuming that meant he would take the shot, but he eventually handed it over to Saka – who then went on to become just the second England player to score a hat-trick in a World Cup knockout match, after Sir Geoff Hurst in the 1966 final.

This was easily Saka’s best game of the tournament, with him scoring his other two goals in the 37th minute and in first-half stoppage time, and eventually winning player of the match. England also got goals from Declan Rice, Ezri Konsa, and Jude Bellingham, and eventually secured a 6-4 win, marking their second-best finish in the World Cup after winning the title in 1966. Saka recognized what that meant for his country.

“It was a crazy, crazy game,” he said. “We’re both still quite disappointed to not be in the final, but it was about finishing strong and for us giving the country the best finish in the World Cup in 60 years, so we’re happy with the final result.”

And he’s not the only one happy with the team’s performance. Head coach Thomas Tuchel, who was the target of heavy criticism for his tactics against Argentina in the semifinals, made it clear that he viewed his team’s run as a success despite their loss to Argentina.

“I hope that the players can be proud of that in some time,” he added. “We are fiercely competitive, so we almost don’t allow ourselves to be proud of third place because 18 months ago we set the highest goal.”