The 16 qualifiers are now decided after a dramatic World Cup group stage. Here, the PA news agency looks back at the key statistics from the opening round.
Exactly half of the group games were goalless at half-time, a record for a 32-team World Cup, with only 36 per cent of goals (43 out of 120) coming in the first half.
Only seven of those were scored in the first 10 minutes of games, the earliest being Alphonso Davies’ second-minute header in Canada’s eventual 4-1 defeat to Croatia.
There were five goals scored in at least the fifth minute of injury time at the end of a game, three of them by Iran including 98th- and 103rd-minute strikes to beat 10-man Wales.
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