France v Denmark – what the stats say

This will be the fourth meeting between France and Denmark at the Fifa World Cup, all in the group stage of the competition. France have gone on to win the tournament on two of the previous occasions they’ve faced Denmark (1998 and 2018), with the other coming as reigning champions in 2002.

Denmark have won their last two meetings with France in all competitions, both in the 2022 Uefa Nations League. They've never won three in a row against them before, while no side has ever beaten France three times in the same calendar year.

This is the third time Denmark have faced the reigning world champions at the Fifa World Cup – they lost 3-2 to Brazil in the 1998 quarterfinal, before beating France 2-0 in the 2002 group stages.

France have won each of their last five World Cup games; they have never won six in a row at the finals, with the last nation to do so being Spain in 2010.

Each of Denmark's last four World Cup games has been drawn – only Belgium have ever had five consecutive draws at the tournament, doing so between 1998 and 2002.

After beating Australia 4-1 on MD1, France became the first reigning champion to win their opening World Cup match of a tournament since Brazil in 2006. Only four previous defending champions have won their opening two matches of a World Cup campaign: Italy in 1938, Uruguay in 1954, Brazil in 1998, and Brazil in 2006.

Denmark have kept a clean sheet in three of their last five World Cup games, just one fewer than they'd managed in their first 16 games in the competition (four). However, they've also failed to score in two of their last three at the World Cup, as many times as in their first 18.

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France have scored four goals in both of their last two World Cup games, the 2018 final against Croatia and on MD1 this year against Australia. The last side to score 4+ goals in three straight World Cup games were Hungary in 1954 (run of four).

Against Australia, Olivier Giroud levelled Thierry Henry to become the joint-top goalscorer for France, with both on 51 goals. Giroud could become only the second 36-year-old (or older) to score in back-to-back World Cup appearances, after Tom Finney for England in 1958 (36y 64d).

Christian Eriksen created more chances than any other player in Denmark's goalless draw with Tunisia on MD1 (5). Indeed, only Michael Laudrup (6 against Nigeria in 1998) has ever created more in a single World Cup match for Denmark.