by bigfluffylemon » Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:37 pm
Looking at the bracket and standings, it's still far from impossible that whichever of England and Belgium wins the group will go into the half of the draw that also contains Brazil, Germany, France, Argentina, Uruguay, Colombia and one of Spain/Portugal (more likely Portugal, but could easily be Spain), while the other half will contain Russia, Denmark, Croatia, Switzerland, Mexico, Japan and the other of Spain/Portugal.
Plus by the time England play Belgium, all those permutations will have been played out and we'll know who's in each half.
So if we win we could get Colombia in the second round, which is probably the side I'd be least confident of facing from Group H (for the reasons durham said), followed by the winner of Brazil/Germany, followed by the winner of a possible Spain/France QF.
With all due credit to how Croatia and Mexico at least have played so far, it could be a game neither England nor Belgium particularly wants to win? Time for some tactical 'squad rotation/resting players'?