Iceland v France: Women’s Euro 2022 Group D – live!

Hello and welcome to live coverage of Iceland v France in Rotherham. We’re all friends here, so let us speak frankly: this could get complicated. Iceland, Italy and Belgium are competing for the final quarter-final place at Euro 2020, and there are a gazillion permutations.

I’ve already written about this in The Fiver, our free and spasmodically funny teatime email, so I may as well cut and plagiarise myself.

France are through as group winners, and will play the Netherlands, the holders, in a humdinger of a quarter-final on Saturday. The other three teams are competing for the right to probably, no offence, lose to Sweden at Leigh Sports Village on Friday. That’s kind of by the by: for all three teams, but especially Belgium, qualifying for the quarter-finals is an end in itself.

Iceland have two points, Belgium and Italy one. Iceland will be through if they beat France, but that’s unlikely. If it doesn’t happen, either of Belgium or Italy will go through with a win. Where it really starts to swell the noggin is if – and this is hardly beyond the realms – Iceland lose and the other two draw. In that scenario, a 0-0 would put Iceland through (don’t ask us to explain, this is hard enough as it is) and a 2-2 draw or higher would put Belgium through.

If it finishes 1-1, Belgium and Iceland would be split by overall goal difference, then goals scored, then a sudden-death spelling bee in which players on each side have to spell the word “canicular”. Confused? Splendid. Now all we need are the three digits on the back of the card.

One difficulty for Iceland is that they don’t know what result they need. They could lose and go through or draw and go out. The team must also be a bit frustrated that they aren’t already through. They led against Belgium and Italy before drawing both games 1-1.

Iceland might benefit from some French rotation tonight, but even a France B team – Melvine Malard, Selma Bacha and the rest – would be extremely difficult to beat.

Some players will always be irreplaceable. France have cruised into the last eight, as expected, though they suffered a serious blow when Marie-Antoinette Katoto was ruled out of the rest of the tournament with a serious knee injury. Ouleymata Sarr came off the bench to replace her against Belgium, and it will be interesting to see how France configure their attack tonight.

Just one more thing: it’s 35C in Rotherham.

Kick off 8pm.