www.silverguide.site –

C’EST FINI

We can all agree the Geopolitics World Cup has gone on far too long, so Football Daily is pleased to announce it is over. It monopolises everyone’s time, changes sleeping, eating and drinking patterns, leaving everyone tired and poorer. No one wants to stay up for further 2am BST kick-offs or attempt to watch a couple of games a day. Frankly, the process has been completely futile since the first ball was kicked.

France have won the tournament; no one can compete with their arousing front four who are, frankly, better than anything else on the planet. You can try to lie to yourself that it is worthwhile watching Harry Kane and Jude Bellingham do their bit, but it is all completely and utterly forlorn. Ending the GWC now will save a lot of needless heartache for every other team, the players will get some much-needed rest and travelling supporters can see their loved ones. No more press conferences when head coaches have to pretend they are “in it to win it”. Every team is playing for second, so why not just share the silver medals between those remaining now? Let Atlanta save on the air-conditioning units, allow the Mexicans to celebrate a 100% record in a home tournament and bring our brave boys home as – to some extent – winners.

Oh, but Paraguay are really good defensively, maybe their low block could be the thing to stifle that lad Mbappé and his mate who used to play for Reading. No, it will not, nothing will spare them from being prised open like a can of cheap tuna by the sharpest tools in the business. Michael Olise will spend the rest of his summer getting donkeys through the eye of the needle and Ousmane Dembélé will be producing sculptures out of clay with his feet. Olise pranging the post with a stunning overhead kick was almost the highlight against Sweden, in a match full of tricks and flicks. “It was a fantastic bit of skill. Unfortunately it didn’t go in, but people come to the stadium to see that kind of thing,” Mbappé purred. There is really no reason to consider outdoing them. Unless Ezri Konsa retrains as a bricklayer and builds a wall in the net, England have no chance of competing with Didier Deschamps’s side. “I did say that I wanted to enjoy this World Cup to the fullest,” Mbappé cheered.

This GWC is known for its on-pitch pragmatism. Mediocre teams are allowed to qualify, and stick everyone with the relevant passport behind the ball, to really drag it out and create more tickets to sell. There is nothing more logical, then, than choosing the best team now. If it was done on a points system no one would be able to catch up Les Bleus anyway. Senegal, Iraq, Norway and now Sweden failed to lay a glove, running around for 90 minutes desperately wondering if they could swap shirts at the end. They can tell the grandkids they were beaten by the best in years to come. And what a story they will have to tell.

LIVE ON BIG WEBSITE

Day three of, er, last-32 week. Join Scott Murray for England 2-0 DR Congo, 12pm local, 5pm BST. Rob Smyth will be on hand for Belgium 1-2 Senegal (aet), 1pm local, 9pm BST. And we’ll also bring you USA USA USA 1-0 Bosnia and Herzegovina, 5pm local, 1am BST.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“I used to have a cat called Bob. He jumped in the back of a Royal Mail van and we lost him. Sad really” – BBC co-commentary’s Danny Murphy leaves more questions than answers during a quiet phase of play in Norway v Côte d’Ivoire. Amad Diallo scored moments later.

FOOTBALL DAILY LETTERS

Please hand over the trophy to France and save some carbon emissions (and the embarrassment of other teams). Just one of Mbappé, Olise, Dembélé, Rabiot or Barcola would be enough for most teams. They are currently the Duplantis of the football world, ironic given their last victim was Sweden” – Krishna Moorthy.

Responding to Antony Crossley’s letter, as an American, I agree there are important reasons to berate our country, but chocolate?! There are a large variety of high quality dark, organic, and fair-trade chocolates available here if one knows enough to avoid the corporate swill. You could berate America for its almost universally over-salted restaurant food but folk from a nation that exalts Heinz baked beans for breakfast (so disappointing!) should be careful about starting food fights. OK, I’m tuning back into Telemundo now. Cheers” – Steve Plever.

Please don’t turn Football Daily into a poetry forum (yesterday’s letters). I find the old jokes and football ‘analysis’ difficult enough as it is, OK?” – Z Snook.

Stop the poetry” – Jon Millard (and 1,056 others).

If you have any, please send letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. Today’s prizeless letter o’ the day is … Steve Plever. Terms and conditions for our competitions, when we run them, are here. 

RECOMMENDED LISTENING

World Cup Daily marvel at France as they breeze past Sweden and explore Erling Haaland winning it late for Norway. Listen here.

RECOMMENDED LOOKING

Jonny Weeks has compiled an interactive gallery comparing the aesthetic of the 1994 tournament with this year’s affair. It’s a belter.

NEWS, BITS AND BOBS

Three people died ⁠from suffocation as thousands of fans crowded Mexico City’s streets during celebrations of victory over Ecuador.

Erling Haaland is so inevitable he scores even when simply trying to control the ball. His bundled winner against Côte d’Ivoire was enough to put Norway into the last 16.

Ronald Koeman has resigned as the Netherlands’ head coach in the wake of their defeat to Morocco on Monday. “Last night I took the decision to end my stint as head coach of the Dutch national team,” he roared in a statement on Instagram.

Iran’s football federation has responded to a senior US official celebrating their exit from the World Cup by accusing the co-hosts of peddling “lies”, saying they are “used to mistreatment”. 

The USA defender Chris Richards says the co-hosts won’t panic if things don’t all go their way against Bosnia and Herzegovina. “We’re not going to go crazy,” he wibbled.

TOO LATE TO SAY GOODBYE

Marcelo Bielsa was never likely to go quietly from being the Uruguay national team coach. Or concisely. His valedictory press conference lasted an hour and 40 minutes, with no hydration breaks, giving hacks in Montevideo a taste of what it’s like to play for “El Loco”. The key message was bleak. “What I have absolute certainty of is that nobody cares what I know,” Bielsa snarled. “I know when someone cares what I know. Nothing I tried to transmit was important, at any level. That was never important from my point of view. I don’t see anything bad in it. Other people aren’t interested in learning what I know. Case closed. Nobody was interested in what I transmitted, I don’t have the smallest doubt of that.” There was much else besides, including an apology for barking at a flash TV interviewer following his team’s exit being confirmed. “I reacted against the delay in the questions which I was obliged to answer and I reacted because they waited, waited and I was overcome with pain. That’s why I perhaps wasn’t as polite as I should have been.”

STILL WANT MORE?

Declan Rice gets his chat on with David Hytner.

The shadow of Iceland 2016 is all the warning England should need not to take beating DR Congo for granted, warns Jacob Steinberg.

“There are holes in England”: Ed Aarons hears from a DR Congo camp confident in their plan.

Remember when Didier Deschamps used to put the handbrake on? Maybe not now, says Leander Schaerlaeckens.

“I really didn’t appreciate them being called has-beens,” roars the Belgium coach, Rudi Garcia, ahead of the meeting with Senegal. Ben Fisher gets his eyebrows singed.

Who has scored the most goals at a World Cup without winning the Golden Boot? The Knowledge has done the delving. Plus: a nul points GWC special.

The Spain midfielder Fabián Ruiz gets his chat on with Sid Lowe.

And USA USA USA have more than just a chance to win against Bosnia and Herzegovina. They’re playing to win over their country, declares Leander Schaerlaeckens.

MEMORY LANE

1 July 1990 | England have never lost to African opposition at a World Cup – this was about as close as they’ve ever come. Cameroon were eight minutes away from victory in Naples before being pegged back by Gary Lineker’s penalty. Lineker then scored the winner from the spot in extra time. “At one time I thought we were on the plane home,” said the England manager, Bobby Robson. “They were the better team when they went ahead but it was a seesawing saga of a match.”

BEYOND THE GWC

Jérémy Jacquet has officially completed his £60m move to Liverpool, with the defender signing a five-year contract at Anfield.

The girlfriend of the late Sheffield United player Maddy Cusack has told an inquest that Cusack’s former manager, Jonathan Morgan, called her a “psycho” and that her eating habits changed after he allegedly made a comment referencing her weight.

The Inter and Italy defender Alessandro Bastoni is under investigation over alleged underage prostitution.

Forest Green Rovers have disbanded their women’s team for the 2026-27 season so that they can “concentrate their resources” on trying to return their men’s team to the English Football League.

Tottenham are poised to break their transfer record after beating Manchester United to the signing of Mateus Fernandes for £85m. 

And Newcastle have been fined €6m (£5.2m) by Uefa for breaching financial sustainability regulations, while Aston Villa and Chelsea have also been given fines for overspending.

In FD’s sister email, Moving the Goalposts, Ellen White speaks to Tom Garry about being inducted into the Hall of Fame at the National Football Museum, and life as a pundit.

BOB, SHORT FOR KATE