Key events
Starting line-ups
Senegal 4-3-3: Mory Diaw; Abdoulaye Seck, Ismail Jakobs, Krepin Diatta, Moussa Niakhate; Idrissa Gana Gueye, Lamine Camara, Habib Diarra; Sadio Mane, Ismaila Sarr, Ibrahim Mbaye.
Iraq 4-3-3: Ahmed Basil; Rebin Sulaka, Akam Hashim, Mechas Doski, Frans Putros; Ibrahim Bayesh, Zidane Iqbal, Amir Alammari; Ali Jasim, Ahmed Qasem, Ali Alhamadi.
Preamble
Daniel Gallan
It’s been a pretty good week for African football.
South Africa reached the knockouts of a World Cup for the first time. Morocco underlined their potential to go deep with a convincing win. And Côte d’Ivoire finished level on points with Germany to qualify in second spot from a difficult group.
Senegal could join their neighbours with a win today. Though they enter this game without a point having lost to France and Norway, the African champions (sort of) showed glimpses of their ability in those matches.
A victory over Iraq would take them to three points and improve their goal difference of -3. Right now Senegal are outside the top 8 of all the third-placed teams, but if all goes according to plan they could leapfrog Scotland and South Korea at least. According to Opta, Senegal have a 56.62% chance of reaching the next round.
First they have to win. Iraq will be organised and passionate. Their coach Graham Arnold promised before the tournament that his team was “capable of doing something that will shock the world”. Beating one of Africa’s best sides would do just that.
Kick-off from Toronto Stadium at 8pm BST/3pm local time.
Teams and other updates to come.
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