Thank goodness this is Dallas and not Gijon. There was ultimately no disgrace in a draw that served everybody, even if one might have forgiven Graham Potter and Hajime Moriyasu for shaking hands at half-time. At that point most onlookers may have fancied calling it all off too but a much sparkier second half served up two moments to cherish and left Sweden, who had risked throwing such a promising campaign away, certain of a spot in the last 32.
Japan were already confident of theirs and, as runners-up, will face Brazil in Houston on Monday. It is a mouthwatering knockout clash that surely has no business being contested at so early a point in the competition. In fairness a lower finish may have served them no better and they can be spurred by the precedent set by recent history. Back in October, after all, they thrillingly beat Carlo Ancelotti’s side in Tokyo. They will feel able to do it again and there was no point risking the third-place lottery here.
To emphasise that they roused themselves after a sterile first half that had, once the Netherlands had extended their lead against Tunisia, seen their designs on winning Group F slip away. They took the lead with a marvellously worked goal from Daizen Maeda, the recalled Celtic forward, and for a spell Sweden could not handle their head-spinning interplays. But a piece of long-range brilliance from Anthony Elanga meant everyone got what they came for and Potter could embrace his staff delightedly by the end.
“I’d have snapped his hand off, yeah!” he joked when asked how he would have reacted if Moriyasu suggested a draw. But he was happy with the serious business, which saw his team finish the stronger and almost snatch their own date with the Seleçao when Alexander Isak’s late header was turned on to the bar.
“Over the course of the game I think it was a fair result and arguably we were slightly better in the second half,” he said. The opening period could not have been much worse for neutrals, who absorbed a strange match that bore the illusion of openness while barely raising the pulse. Keita Nakamura’s shot just before the whistle, which brought a stretching save from Jacob Widell Zetterström, was the only action of note and it was impossible not to think time was being played out.
Widell Zetterström was a surprise choice in goal by Potter, who had also drafted in Elanga after the winger’s goalscoring contribution against the Netherlands. Sweden’s 5-1 defeat in that game had undone the good work of their identically emphatic win over Tunisia and at least they had managed to tighten the margins here. An apparent hamstring injury to the centre-back Isak Hien, heavily criticised after being bullied by Brian Brobbey, was an early setback that may have longer-term repercussions but they were steady enough until Japan turned up the dial.
Then Ritsu Doan, the Eintracht Frankfurt winger, woke up and created a rapier-like opener. Doan took a return pass from Ayase Ueda, who had held the ball cleverly, and zipped it first time into the path of an alert Maeda. The finish was unerring and now Potter, who certainly could not afford anything heavier than a one-goal reverse, found himself in a spot.
He was hauled out of it within six minutes by a stunning intervention by Elanga, who took possession on the right after Viktor Gyökeres had shuttled away from Ao Tanaka. It was Gyokeres’s presence of mind, drawing Tanaka further from the action with an unselfish run, that allowed Elanga to cut inside and take aim. The shot, from an ambitious angle, swerved devilishly and Zion Suzuki appeared to see it late as it bent around him.
Potter singled out the contribution of Gyökeres, who put in the hard yards throughout. “An outstanding performance from a centre-forward with his back to goal,” he said. But it was the largely quiet Isak’s near-post flick from a corner, snicked on to the woodwork by an increasingly busy Suzuki, that almost stole the show in added time.
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Sweden could yet be paired with Germany, France or even Norway in the next round, complicating Potter’s preparations while they wait. There is greater clarity for Japan and Moriyasu, who could not hide his excitement about the task in hand.
“This is proof of the growth in Japanese football,” he said of the reunion with Ancelotti and company, clearly taking confidence from last year’s 3-2 success. “Of course [Brazil] are perfect but we do believe there is a chance for us to win. We proved to Brazil that we’re not a pushover and that’s a great advancement for us.”
Japan had their own chance to make the point even more emphatically when the substitute Koki Ogawa scooped over but their fate, and that of this game, had only occasionally been in genuine doubt.
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