It’s Crunch time for the likes of Germany

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African champions Senegal are fancied to knock hosts Qatar out of the World Cup this afternoon and revive their own chances of graduating from the group stage.

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Assuming Senegal win this afternoon, they will then need to beat Ecuador in their last Group A match on Tuesday in order to advance to the second round. Their predicament shows how vital it is for teams to get off to a positive start at the World Cup.

Senegal looked on course for a valuable point against the highly fancied Dutch in their Group A opener, but then conceded two late goals.

They are not the only team who find themselves in something of a pickle and needing to win this weekend when all the World Cup protagonists play a second group game.

It is a relatively quick turnaround time and if the likes of Argentina, Denmark and Germany are to progress, as expected, to the knockout stage, then they need a rapid change of fortune.

Germany are in the biggest trouble after losing to Japan on Wednesday. They next meet Spain on Sunday night and if that game produces another defeat they will need to change their arrangements and book early flights home.

Before the 2-1 loss to Japan, German coach Hansi Flick indicated with his surprising line-up that he still has not found his ideal World Cup formation. He made several unexpected choices and gave the appearance of some panic.

Resultantly, they fumbled defensively and were blunt in attack. Germany had 78% possession in the first half and made 25 goal attempts in the entire game, but still lost. They will not get the same dominance against Spain and certainly nothing near the same number of chances.

Argentina, beaten by Saudi Arabia in the other big upset of the opening days of the tournament, are fancied to restore their hopes at the expense of Mexico tomorrow.

Mexico’s low-scoring and injury-hit squad bore out pre-tournament pessimism in their first game, drawing 0-0 against Poland and only avoiding defeat thanks to a stunning save from veteran goalkeeper Guillermo Ochoa.

Denmark need to revive their Nations League form of earlier this year if they are to stay in contention. They meet France tomorrow, a side they beat twice in recent months but who looked a whole better than the Danes this week when they beat Australia.

Kylian Mbappe and teammates have the pressure off and will likely fire on full cylinders again.