OK, that is your lot from me today. I will be back on Monday, by which time we will be halfway through the round of 16, and England will either be guaranteed surefire winners on their way to the title for definite this time, or we’ll be embroiled in a massive postmortem with every Tom, Dick and Harriet on Twitter saying that if only Gareth Southgate had played an extra three forwards in a 2-1-7 formation, surely England’s destiny would have been assured. I digress.
Rob Smyth is your man for Ghana v Uruguay.
Barry Glendenning is at the controls for South Korea v Portugal.
Enjoy the football, and have a great weekend.
Australia coach Graham Arnold has also been up before the media, and vowed his side will take on Argentina with “all guns blazing” in their World Cup last-16 showdown on Saturday.
“Look, the group games are past us and it’s a one-off game, anything could happen,” PA reports Arnold said. “It’s 11 v 11, a battle, a war and we’ve got to fight that. We’ll give it everything, all guns blazing.
“We respect Argentina, for sure, but we can’t focus solely on them. We respect them but we respect ourselves and what we bring to the table.”
Arnold feels Australia’s success is payback for a gruelling qualifying campaign, where Covid restrictions back home meant playing most of their matches away, including five in Qatar itself.
“The universe is paying us back for the hard work we put in,” he added. “We played four games out of 20 at home, and we had some hard journeys.
“But Covid helped unite this team together, these boys were in lockdown in hotels.
“The fact we played five qualifiers in Qatar gave us experience of being here, and now we’ve won six out of seven games in Qatar. For us, it’s a home away from home.
“One thing we have achieved is bringing light to the nation after Covid and reuniting our sport. We’ve seen the scenes of celebration and it really makes everyone proud, and we want more.
“We haven’t finished yet, we are turning up to win another game tomorrow.”
Argentina coach Lionel Scaloni complained about the limited recovery time ahead of his squad’s World Cup last-16 clash against Australia but promised his team would play out of their skins to ensure there are no more surprises at the tournament.
Argentina beat Poland late on Wednesday to book their spot in the knockout stages and must play Australia on Saturday, a turnaround time that Scaloni had previously described as “absolute madness”, Reuters reports.
Scaloni and midfielder Rodrigo De Paul said they have yet to train, instead focusing on down time and recovery over the past two days.
“Australia, who finished second in the group, played at 6pm and we finished first (in our group) but played at 10pm We went to bed at 4am and that has an impact when you have a game in 48 hours,” Scaloni told reporters on Friday.
“We will break our backs on this pitch to compete, we know how difficult this World Cup is, this is football.
“We saw what happened yesterday but this is not surprising. When you say big national teams deserve to be in the next stage, that doesn’t always happen.”
There were concerns winger Angel Di Maria was injured when he was taken off in the 2-0 win over Poland. Scaloni said they would assess player fitness before taking a call on the starting lineup.
“Di Maria is feeling fine, we hope he will be fine and is able to play. At the moment we don’t have a clear picture,” Scaloni said. “If you’ve seen our matches, you know I don’t always play the same players. I focus on every single match and adapt the team for the match. Very rarely have I repeated the starting 11.
“What’s important is everyone knows what they need to do. We will go match by match and won’t always play the same team if it isn’t necessary.”
Scaloni said Argentina must shed the “favourites” tag going into the contest, while De Paul said they had analysed the team that beat Tunisia and Denmark in the group stage.
“I think it’s a very fast team, focusing on wide players, and they have tall centre backs as well. I think we shouldn’t make fouls near the area. They have very fast wingers and their main strength is their counterattack, so we need to be very careful. We shouldn’t be on the back foot. It will be difficult for our midfield and defence so our forwards are free to roam.”
Tom Sanderson writes for us today that Brazil need Neymar to win the World Cup – even if some fans disagree:
Neymar knits the attack together and his absence was obvious against Switzerland. Brazil had 23 shots against Serbia, but this dropped to 13 against the Swiss. Brazil had a similar number of passes in both games – 581 against Serbia compared to 550 against Switzerland – but the gulf in shots and xG (2.43 against Serbia compared with 1.02 against Switzerland) suggests they spent a lot of time knocking the ball around without finding a way of opening up the defence. Neymar is the player in their squad who is best equipped to thread through the final ball.
Brazil do not have a perfect replacement for Neymar. Against Switzerland they brought the defensive midfielder Fred into the starting lineup to partner his Manchester United teammate Casemiro, and pushed Lucas Paquetá further forward to take on Neymar’s responsibilities. The West Ham man was hooked after a flat first half.
On came Rodrygo, the stand-in the masses in Brazil wanted to see, and the player who claims Neymar has told him the No10 jersey will be passed from one Santos academy graduate to another one day. Though excellent in the box – as he showed for Real Madrid when they won the Champions League last season – Rodrygo is not yet ready to fill Neymar’s boots.
Read more here: Tom Sanderson – Brazil need Neymar to win the World Cup – even if some fans disagree
Here is a little bit more detail on those teams via Reuters:
South Korea v Portugal (Group H, 3pm GMT, BBC1 in the UK)
Portugal make six changes to face South Korea
Captain Cristiano Ronaldo will lead Portugal’s attack against South Korea at the World Cup on Friday despite having to train separately from the rest of the team this week but Fernando Santos made six changes to the side that beat Uruguay on Monday.
Portugal, needing only a draw to be sure of top spot in Group H and mindful of the risk of yellow-card suspensions in the next round, have brought Diogo Dalot and Antonio Silva into the defence.
Matheus Nunes, Vitinha and Joao Mario come into the midfield in place of Bernardo Silva, William Carvalho and Bruno Fernandes – who scored twice in the 2-0 win over Uruguay – while Ricardo Horta replaces Joao Felix up front.
South Korea leave out injury doubt Kim Min-jae
South Korea’s Portuguese coach Paulo Bento left out central defender Kim Min-jae, who was an injury doubt, and replaced him with Kwon Kyung-won, while Lee Jae-sung and Lee Kang-in were drafted into midfield.
The Koreans, with one point so far, must beat Portugal and hope the result of Ghana’s match with Uruguay goes their way in order to reach the last 16.
Ghana v Uruguay (Group H, 3pm GMT, BBC2 in the UK)
Uruguay start veteran Suárez and drop captain Godin
Uruguay give a start to veteran striker Luis Suarez and have dropped captain Diego Godin from their defence for their must-win World Cup Group H decider against Ghana on Friday.
Suarez, playing in his fourth World Cup, will be at the centre of a three-man attack with Darwin Nunez and Facundo Pellistri, who gets a start for the second time, in a match the South Americans have to win to avoid their first group stage exit since 2002.
Ghana bring back Seidu and Rahman at the back
Ghana, who will go through to the last 16 with a win, make two changes to the team that beat South Korea 3-2, restoring Alidu Seidu and Baba Rahman to the fullback positions they played in during the opening game against Portugal, in place of Tariq Lamptey and Gideon Mensah.
Team news: South Korea v Portugal – Ronaldo starts
Here is the other team news …
South Korea: Kim Seung-gyu, Kim Moon-hwan, Kwon Kyung-won, Kim Young-gwon, Kim Jin-su, Lee Jae-sung, Lee Kang-in, Jeong Woo-yeong, Hwang In-beom, Son Heung-min, Cho Gue-sung
Portugal: Diogo Costa, Diogo Dalot, Pepe, Antonio Silva, Joao Cancelo, Matheus Nunes, Ruben Neves, Vitinha, Joao Mario, Cristiano Ronaldo, Ricardo Horta
Officials: Referee Facundo Tello, assistant referees Ezequiel Braislovsky and Gabriel Chade, fourth official Maguette N’Diaye
Barry Glendenning is in the big MBM chair for this one …
Team news: Ghana v Uruguay – Suárez and Nunez start
Here is the team news …
Ghana: Lawrence Ati-Zigi, Alidu Seidu, Daniel Amartey, Mohammed Salisu, Baba Rahman, Thomas Partey, Salis Abdul Samed, Mohammed Kudus, Andre Ayew, Jordan Ayew, Inaki Williams
Uruguay: Sergio Rochet, Sebastian Coates, Giorgian de Arrascaeta, Jose Maria Gimenez, Guillermo Varela, Mathias Olivera, Rodrigo Bentancur, Facundo Pellistri, Federico Valverde, Luis Suárez, Darwin Nunez
Officials: Referee Daniel Siebert, assistant referees Jan Seidel and Rafael Foltyn, fourth official Yoshimi Yamashita
Rob Smyth is your man for this on the old MBM …
Harry Kane was the most abused England player on Twitter during the World Cup group stages, accounting for nearly three out of 10 negative tweets directed at team members.
England players were sent 1,546 abusive tweets during the group stages of the World Cup, according to analysis by the Alan Turing Institute, accounting for 2% of the more than 75,000 tweets mentioning players for the national team.
The institute’s online safety team found that 13% of those abusive tweets – or 205 posts – contained keywords that referred to a protected characteristic such as race, gender or sexuality.
The England captain received the most abusive posts, being tagged in 426 abusive tweets that made up 28% of the total of negative posts sent to players’ Twitter handles during England’s three group games.
Read more here: Harry Kane most abused England player on Twitter since World Cup started – study
We are about an hour away from getting team news for this afternoon’s matches, which as a reminder are:
Ghana v Uruguay and Portugal v South Korea at 3pm GMT
We will of course have MBMs for both of them running at the same time. The equation in this group is fairly straightforward. Portugal are through, and just need a point to top the group. Ghana go through with a win. A draw is probably enough for Ghana. Uruguay must win, and that would put them through.
All that changes though if South Korea can beat Portugal, at which point we are in abacus territory. South Korea need to win by a couple of goals and hope Ghana and Uruguay draw, or that Uruguay win by the same margin or less than South Korea have beaten Portugal. I would normally type out something smug like “but none of that is going to happen” at this point, but yes, I watched the football yesterday, so all bets are off.
Harry Maguire’s shot against Wales that ended up going out for a throw-in is sure to be a staple of comedy England montages for years to come – step aside Geoff Thomas – but fairplay to the lad he is not shy about doing his media duties. Maguire has been in the England equivalent of the Big Brother diary room talking about set pieces, saying:
We’ve got a really good record from set plays. The lads work hard on making space for myself, and obviously you’ve got to go and attack the ball. We’ve got players in the team, not just myself, who attack the ball really well from corners. So it’s a big threat of ours. It’s amazing these big games, they’re really tight, they’re realy edgy, and set plays, they’re crucial. They can separate you from having a bad game, to having a good game and winning a football match.
"It's a big threat of ours." 💪@HarryMaguire93 on the importance of set-pieces to the #ThreeLions throughout this tournament: pic.twitter.com/5GWyQLZUWs
— England (@England) December 2, 2022
Nick Roll is in Dakar, and he writes for the Guardian today that there is a buzz in the air in the bustling capital and a real belief the Lions of Teranga can beat England:
“They will win. The Senegalese team is the champion of Africa,” says Ousseynou Thioune, selling a variety of jerseys and wristbands on a busy boulevard. He predicts 2-0.
“They’re still the Lions, even without Sadio,” Thioune says, referencing star forward Mané, who was injured in a Bayern game just before the beginning of the World Cup.
When it was announced that the Ballon d’Or runner-up would have to sit out, drama and consternation among the football- and Mané-crazed populace ensued. In the aftermath, one man told France24 that “I cried when I saw” the news.
“With my friends, we were talking about it. There were some who had bought a television [to watch the World Cup] – and they sold it back,” he said.
Yet the Lions have more than persevered. Their opening game against the Netherlands, resulting in a 2-0 loss, was quickly pushed aside with 3-1 and 2-1 wins over Qatar and Ecuador, respectively.
Read more here, and it has got some great photos in it as well: Nick Roll – ‘Senegal is the best’: Dakar’s dreaming of World Cup upset
The good news for the US is that Christian Pulisic is said to be on track to play for the United States in its World Cup round of 16 match against the Netherlands on Saturday,
We last saw Pulisic in Tuesday’s final group stage match against Iran leaving at halftime after bruising his pelvic bone in a collision with the goalkeeper while scoring in the 38th minute.
AP reports US coach Gregg Berhalter said before Friday’s training session “It looks pretty good, but we’ll have to see him today on the pitch to get confirmation of that,”
Pulisic, a 24-year-old winger, had said on Thursday that he was feeling better.
Forward Josh Sargent also left the Iran match in the second half nursing an injury after hurting his right ankle.
“With Christian we’re hopeful, with him a little less so,” Berhalter said.
Ghanaian journalist Benedict Owusu has been on BBC Radio today, and he has backed up chaotic supervillain striker Luis Suárez that revenge should not be the order of the day when the African side face Uruguay later today. He told listeners:
Suárez is right. We had the opportunity to score with that penalty from Asamoah Gyan, which he missed. We made it to the penalty shootout but we missed as well.
We have to forget about the revenge, as it will go wrong. You always have to focus on what is ahead. I am very happy that the team and the players are not thinking about revenge.
They are focused on the game and doing everything possible to get a good win – a result which will make sure they get to the next stage.
We have some words for the media from US coach Gregg Berhalter ahead of their knockout match with the Netherlands tomorrow.
“We deserve to be in the position we’re in and we want to keep going,” Berhalter said. “So for us, it’s about how we recover from this game and prepare to play against a very good Dutch team, very well coached, ton of quality all over the field, and we have to come up with an idea of how to beat them.”
“It’s going to be a pretty fun one, playing against the country I was born in,” he said. “I know almost every single guy over there,” AP report he told the media.
Berhalter turned professional in the Netherlands 28 years ago.
If the US can beat the Netherlands and reach the quarter-finals, it will equal their best campaign in modern times. The US reached the last eight in 2002, losing 1-0 to Germany.
Philip Oltermann reports for the Guardian from Berlin on reaction in Germany to the exit of the national team from the World Cup at the group stage:
It was a “winter nightmare” (Süddeutsche Zeitung), an “enormous embarrassment” (Bild), a “new low point” that revealed the four-times world champions to have shrunken into a “football dwarf” (Spiegel). The morning after the Nationalmannschaft crashed out of the World Cup at the group stage for the second tournament in a row, German front pages made for blunt reading.
On paper, Germany’s exit was a marginal affair. But that was not how the match has been digested in Germany the day after. Whether the ball had crossed the line in the Japan-Spain match was barely discussed in the TV postmortem and a secondary concern for most newspapers.
Instead, the time had come for soul-searching questions about the philosophy of the German football since its World Cup win in 2014, or the lack of one.
In the TV studio, Bastian Schweinsteiger said that the German players didn’t seem to have the same “burning” desire for success as others, explicitly naming Costa Rica but seeming to imply his own heroics at the Maracanã. The DFB, Germany’s football association, needed to train and produce more Führungsspieler or “leadership players”, he added.
Read more here: Philip Oltermann – ‘A football dwarf’: German media reacts to Die Mannschaft’s early World Cup exit
No VAR decision has sparked more debate than the award of Japan’s second goal against Spain on Thursday evening, when – to the naked eye – it appeared that the ball had crossed the line and gone out of play. It ended up sealing Japan’s qualification and effectively knocking Germany out of the tournament.
What happened? Ao Tanaka scored in the 51st minute to make it 2-1 to Japan, following a cross by Kaoru Mitoma. But the question is whether the ball crossed the goalline for a Spain goalkick first.
The bottom line is that whole of the ball has to cross the line to be out, and that includes any curvature of the ball that is over-hanging the line.
The angle you take a photograph of a ball on or near the line makes a difference to how the eye perceives it. We sent photographer John Windmill down his local park with a football to recreate the scene for us. More here …
Tunisia striker Wahbi Khazri has announced his retirement from international soccer, Reuters reports.
Khazri scored to give Tunisia an historic 1-0 win over holders France on Wednesday, joining Saudi duo Salem Al-Dawsari and Sami Al-Jaber as the all-time leading Arab scorers at World Cups with three goals each.
“After the Tunisia match, and in a meeting that included all the players and the technical and administrative staff, I told everyone that this moment is appropriate, and I thanked everyone and wished them success,” Khazri told Bein Sports French.
“I am proud of what I gave my country over the past years, and I believe that the future for this generation is bright.”
The 31-year-old Montpellier striker said: “To beat France, to score and be decisive, that is more beautiful.”
Khazri, who was born in France and played one game for the French national side in 2012, switched to play for Tunisia and won 74 international matches with them, scoring 25 goals along the way.
Adam White writes for the Guardian today to say that Didier Deschamps needs a better plan for France than just relying on Kylian Mbappé:
Didier Deschamps has looked indecisive for some time. Even though he had deployed wing-backs and a trio of centre-backs for much of the last two year, when announcing his World Cup squad, Deschamps surprisingly said he would switch back to a four-man defence – despite not having any warm-up games before the tournament to test the set-up. It was assumed this meant France would be returning to the asymmetrical 4-2-3-1 formation that served them so well at the World Cup in 2018. However, Deschamps opted for a more traditional 4-2-3-1 against Australia and Denmark, with Ousmane Dembélé operating on the right and Kylian Mbappé on the left.
The manager seems to be lurching from one idea to the next. Initially, he picked just 25 players in his squad – one fewer than everyone else – before adding Marcus Thuram a few days later, seemingly at random. The coach insisted he had planned the move all along and had wanted to see how the final round of domestic fixtures would play out. Yet, when Karim Benzema was eventually ruled out with injury, he then declined the opportunity to bring in another striker.
Read more here: Adam White – Didier Deschamps needs a better plan than just relying on Kylian Mbappé
It looks like Qatari television pundits were not so sad to see the back of the Germany national team after last night’s set of results. This video clip doing the rounds on social media appears to show television presenters mocking the German team’s gesture of covering their mouths in their team photo to say they had been silenced over human rights issues while waving them goodbye.
Pundits on Qatar’s top football programme celebrate as Germany is knocked out of the World Cup https://t.co/i4vHGtDX8f
— David Harding (@DM_Harding) December 2, 2022
The German Football Association (DFB) will next week launch a round of talks to identify the reasons for their second consecutive World Cup flop, after the team were eliminated in the group stage again on Thursday night, Reuters reports.
“You can imagine that today there is deep disappointment,” DFB President Bernd Neuendorf told reporters on Friday at Doha airport as the team prepared to return home.
“This elimination is extremely painful. But we have to look ahead and so we will lead a process on how to deal with this.”
“The expectation is for the sporting direction to have a sporting analysis of this tournament and to also develop a prospect for after the tournament and the Euros on home soil,” Neuendorf said.
“It must also include the development of the national team since 2018. This is the demand and claim that we have. Then we will have more talks.”
The Germans suffered a similar first-round exit at the 2018 World Cup in Russia, their earliest departure in over 80 years at the time.
“I am a strong supporter of clear processes and expect to hold these talks with respect and in private. We are taking the first step before the second step,” Neuendorf said. Germany qualify automatically as hosts for Euro2024.
If you prefer to watch your podcast rather than listen to it, here is an excerpt of yesterday’s daily edition of Football Weekly, with some lively discussion and analysis – and more than a few laughs – about last night’s stupendous action in Group E.
Nick Ames is in Doha for the Guardian, and he previews today’s clash between Serbia and Switzerland:
Four years ago, hostilities had been publicly stoked. Yet much of the buildup to their latest showdown has resembled a convention of the saints. It was clear on Tuesday, when Sergej Milinkovic-Savic and Dusan Tadic took questions at Serbia’s Al Arabi training base, that nobody was of a mind to dangle bait.
“There’s no doubt it was big pressure four years ago but we need to focus on football and show we can play better than them,” Tadic said when asked how Serbia would handle the occasion this time. His teammate matched the answer virtually word for word. Neither player expected emotions to run high: the priority was simply to look at themselves.
Mitrovic struck a similar note, saying: “It was a different game, we’re not thinking about what happened before.”
The problem is that the wider context tends to lurk beneath the surface and undermine any well-scripted words. Serbia are under Fifa investigation for displaying a flag showing Kosovo as part of their country, along with the words “We do not surrender”, in their dressing room before their opening game against Brazil. That did not go unnoticed in Kosovo.
Read more here: Nick Ames – Switzerland and Serbia feel the weight of history before high-stakes clash
Tomorrow we will be in the thick of the knockout stages, and Saturday evening’s fare in Qatar will be Argentina v Australia. The Socceroos have been talking up the awe they hold their opponents in, while for Argentina, it has been about avoiding complacency.
Steve Douglas at AP writes that Australia’s players speak in glowing, almost reverential terms about Lionel Messi. “He just does things that, you know, no one else can do,” forward Mathew Leckie said. Milos Degenek went even further. “Probably,” the Socceroos defender said, “the best footballer ever to grace the game.”
“I think they’re obviously driven by the motivation that it could be Messi’s last World Cup,” Degenek said, “and he wants to win the World Cup and end it on a high. For us, it’s about stopping that. Unfortunately, I’m a big fan of his, but I’d love to win the World Cup probably more than him.”
“No one expects us to win,” Leckie said. “So let’s shock the world.”
Argentina have already weathered the storm of their shock opening defeat to Saudi Arabia. “We know, at the moment, everything is very difficult,” said Messi, who is bidding to win the World Cup in his fifth and likely last attempt. “All the opponents are complicated. We know it as well as anyone.”
“We went back to being what we were for a long time,” Messi said after Argentina’s 2-0 win over Poland that secured a place in the last 16, “and how we were looking to be at the beginning of the World Cup, which for different reasons we could not manage. “It gives confidence for what is coming.”
Group H: What do Ghana, South Korea and Uruguay have to do to join Portugal in the next round
Group H – Ghana, Portugal, South Korea, Uruguay
Final matches Friday 2 December, 3pm GMT: South Korea v Portugal, Ghana v Uruguay
Portugal have qualified. A point will guarantee they win the group.
Ghana: A win against Uruguay will put Ghana through. A draw will be enough unless South Korea beat Portugal, in which case Ghana must hope South Korea pull off only a one goal victory, otherwise the Asian side will pip them on goal difference.
South Korea: They must beat Portugal, and hope that Ghana do not win. If Ghana draw then their hopes depend on their goal difference compared to Ghana. If Ghana lose, then South Korean hopes depend on their goal difference compared to Uruguay.
Uruguay: Uruguay must win, and hope that South Korea do not win against Portugal. If both Uruguay and South Korea win, then their relative goal differences will decide who qualifies. Uruguay start with a goal difference one worse than South Korea, so would have to beat Ghana by more than South Korea beat Portugal.
Group G: What do Cameroon, Serbia, Switzerland have to do to join Brazil in the next round
Group G – Brazil, Cameroon, Serbia, Switzerland
Final matches Friday 2 December, 7pm GMT: Cameroon v Brazil, Serbia v Switzerland
Unless Cameroon can beat Brazil, the match between Switzerland and Serbia looks like being a straight knockout tie.
Brazil have qualified and just need a point to guarantee top spot.
Switzerland: A win ensures Switzerland go through. A defeat means they go out. If Switzerland draw, they will still progress unless Cameroon have beaten Brazil, in which case goal difference will come into play.
Cameroon: Cameroon will progress only if they can beat Brazil and Switzerland do not win. A draw between Serbia and Switzerland – or a Serbian victory – would leave second place being contested on goal difference between Cameroon and one of the European sides.
Serbia: Serbia will progress only if they can beat Switzerland. However, if Cameroon also beat Brazil, then second place will be contested on goal difference between Serbia and Cameroon.
Karen Carney’s latest column is up for us. She says England have a plan to take them to the final but warns that high-quality Senegal are a danger:
England have not lost in their 20 matches against African opposition, which is an impressive record. There have already been shocks in the tournament and the important thing is for England to maintain their focus. Kalidou Koulibaly scored Senegal’s winner after a free-kick was crossed into the box against Ecuador, a sign of how dangerous he is.
England will be favourites but they should not have one eye on the quarter-final because they will be punished. I have played in tournaments where we were tipped to win, lost concentration, conceded two goals from set pieces and were on the next plane home.
Senegal have lost some key players: not only Gueye and Kouyaté but also Sadio Mané before the World Cup began. Selfishly, as an England fan, this is good news because they will be very hard to replace. Senegal do, though, have plenty of quality. We have seen at Watford how dangerous Ismaïla Sarr is and he proved that by winning and scoring a penalty against Ecuador.
Read more here: Karen Carney – England have a plan to take them to the final but high-quality Senegal are a danger
Over 17 million people tuned in to German broadcaster ARD’s coverage of the World Cup match between Germany and Costa Rica on Thursday, according to data from audience measurement firm AGF, Reuters reports.
The survey sadly doesn’t specify how many people threw their shoes at the telly in disgust at the end of the game.
We will be coming to how that Japan goal was allowed to stand shortly, but late last night it was one of the main topics of conversation in the pod with Max and the gang. Barry Glendenning, Lars Sivertsen, Jonathan Fadugba and Archie Rhind-Tutt were with Max Rushden to assess the fallout from an extraordinary night of drama. Get it in your ears.
Preamble
Well then, Morocco and Japan topping their groups was a coupon-buster yesterday and no mistake. Will we get anything similar today as our final groups, Group G and Group H, come to a climax/shuddering halt [delete as appropriate]?
The evening matches see an already qualified Brazil Reserves XI take on Cameroon. Brazil need a point to top the group, Cameroon need to build on their spirited comeback against Serbia with a win or they are not going any further. Serbia and Switzerland could be tasty. The winner probably goes through, a draw is enough for the Swiss, and they met at this stage in 2018 and it was a bad-tempered affair.
Before that, South Korea need a win against already qualified Portugal to stand any chance of progressing. Portugal need a point to guarantee top spot and avoid playing full-strength Brazil on Monday. Uruguay and Ghana have a rematch of that contentious 2010 quarter-final, with both sides knowing a win will probably see them progress.
Ghana v Uruguay and Portugal v South Korea at 3pm GMT
Cameroon v Brazil and Serbia v Switzerland at 7pm GMT
Before then I will be bringing you reaction to yesterday’s matches, words from the people paraded in front of the press in Qatar today, and all the other World Cup bits and bobs you need. You can contact me at martin.belam@theguardain.com.
