England to face Nigeria in the last 16 of the Women's World Cup

Up Greater Shore, non-stop protection. So a really busy day of action. Time for our World Cup expert Fadumo Ollo is here. Fadumo, as always, great to see you. Before we get on to how England will get on in the in the knockout stages, quick word about them today. Were they brilliant or were the Chinese rubbish? I think it's probably a mixture of both. China came away with a good win against Haiti and a few things that they needed to develop coming into this game against England and they didn't really have much of a game plan by the looks of it. But also England came into this game having only one beat in the previous two teams, 1-0. So it was a great show of dominance. Fluidity was there, you know, following on from Keira Walsh's injury, it was just great to see the team adapt the way they did, even as far as changing formations. So a lot of changes that we usually don't see from Serena, but it really worked in her favour today. Yeah, it really did. So Nigeria next. What sort of challenge will they pose? I think Nigeria is going to be a bit of a different challenge. Within their group themselves, Nigeria were up against Australia as the host, Canada the Olympic ranging champions and obviously Republic of Ireland's debut. And being able to hold off Canada in their opening game really gave them that confidence that they took in to have that thrilling game that we saw, a 3-2 against Australia. And one of those standout players is Barcelona's Oswala. She is absolutely phenomenal. The first African women's player to score a three consecutive World Cup, the first African women's player to win two Champions League, a lot of firsts for her. And she's someone that's really going to be going toe-to-toe against that defence and really pushing the likes of Millie Bright and Alex Greenwood, because she's such a phenomenal ball possession. She's so skilled. And if you leave her alone for too long, she can really exploit the team. So quite similar to Lauren James in that sense. But I think it was going to be just an absolute thriller of a game. And I'm really excited for it. Does it feel like there are echoes of the Euros, the way England have built through the group stages? I mean, in the Euros, they won 8-0 final group game, went on to win it. They hit seven today. Could they go on and win it? Does it feel like it's the same sort of thing? Yeah, it does. I mean, I don't want to be saying they're going to go ahead and win it. Why not? You're in the experts chair. We did this yesterday and I just about got it right. But no, if you look back at England as early as the start of this year, they'd only won most of their games 1-0 and sometimes even a 0-0 draw, a goalless draw. So to come away with the six ones today not only gives you confidence, but to have four different goal scorers. You've got Lauren James. She contributed to five of those goals, whether it was assists or actually scoring. So to have that depth and just have a system that clearly works for England is great coming into this stage. And the group stages are really great for finding your foundations. We saw that with the US now. We're probably going to have a different challenge coming into this round of 16s. They really need to do a huge shakeup to work out if they can progress beyond that because they've not had a very impressive opening few games. But I think England really need this to kind of be a bit more fluid, be able to create chances, have that creativity. And I think having Lauren James as a number 10 is honestly just a golden recipe for England. She's so creative. She's so good on the ball. And when she scores, it's never really a tough end. It's always a phenomenal goal. So I think for England, it's been a good, and I think they're going to take a lot of confidence from this game, but they have got a very difficult challenge against Nigeria. But as a whole, this World Cup with the US and how they played against Portugal, you kind of wonder, are they favourites anymore? But then you look at some of the other teams that have performed so well today, like the Netherlands, you saw Japan yesterday. It's just opened up for everyone. So I think it's anyone's game at the moment. Anyone's, but you're obviously going to say England are going to win it at a canter for Dumo. Of course. There it is. Of course. But don't hold me to that because when I come back next time and we're in the same position, Mike, my days are numbered. Faduba Olu, our World Cup expert. Thank you very much.