The Official Panama Match Thread (Sponsored by Trent Alexander-Arnold "for all your not selected needs")

England followed up their solid opening victory against Croatia with an underwhelming midweek performance against a Ghanaian side that came for a point and earned it with relative ease. Had their been a different set of officials in that game, England's qualification from Group L could still be in the balance, a couple of characteristic defensive moments of inadequacy threatening to reward the Black Stars for their own ruthlessly effective defensive performance that nullified our vaunted attack and left us playing in front of them in impotent fashion.

Still, it's not as though England don't have form for dreadful second match performances at tournaments, it's almost a rite of passage for our national side by this point, the spectre of poor draws against the likes of Algeria and USA loomed large in Wednesday. Should we progress to the latter stages of the competition, the Ghana game will swiftly be forgotten, especially if we can comfortably defeat another likely low block tonight in the shape of Panama, a side already packing their bags for the plane home following two single goal defeats.

Tuchel has a few selection headaches for this evening, despite already being assured of a place in the last 32 following last night's round of fixtures. Our one right back in the shape of Reece James, who arrived with an injury hit season behind him, is erm... injured. The decision not to include Trent Alexander-Arnold or A N Other in the squad now seems a little misguided. Who will replace him is anyone's guess, with Quansah, Konsa and Spence all in the frame. Saka and Rashford could well start in place of Gordon and Madueke, neither of whom have set the tournament alight (or even smouldering) so far.

The Panamanians have yet to register a goal in the tournament but won't be an easy ride. They lost in injury time to Ghana despite having the majority of possession and shots on goal and their match against Croatia saw them dominate their higher ranked opponent immediately after having gone behind early in the second half. This is certainly a much stronger team than the one we faced and thumped back in 2018.

On the subject of which, that was our only previous meeting, England running out 6-1 winners over the Central American side at Russia 2018, a Kane hattrick (2 pens and a lucky deflection), a belter from Lingard and a brace of Stones headers enough to see us through to the last 16 of that tournament.

You'd like to think that Tuchel and the players wouldn't allow tonight to be a rerun of the Ghana game. Panama themselves will want to end the tournament on a high and must surely be looking for that elusive first goal which could allow us space to exploit. However they line up, we need to be more ruthless and incisive with quicker passing and decision making than that shown earlier this week.

As things stand it looks like Senegal or DR Congo for us in the last 32, provided we stay top of the group. Senegal have the advantage on us already having beaten England under Tuchel only a few months ago and both sides will offer a tough, physical battle in a similar vein to Ghana. They say this England side is set up to beat the best but we need to grind past the lesser lights before we can start thinking of such matters.

Hopefully it's a little cooler this evening, with the later 10.00pm kick-off allowing the worst of the heat to finally start dissipating and the beers to start flowing in earnest.

Enjoy the game and...

COME ON ENGLAND!!!