Ahead of England’s second World Cup group game against Denmark on Friday, the travelling press-pack were invited to visit the enclosure where the Lionesses have set up home in Brisbane. Whereas the access of hacks covering the England men’s team on their travels is generally restricted to scheduled press conferences, the first 15 minutes of certain training sessions and the occasional game of darts with James Maddison, the Football Association are so proud of the “home away from home” they’ve designed for Sarina Wiegman and her squad that they organised a guided tour to show off their bespoke digs.

With its walls unsurprisingly festooned with photos of the players and the kind of twee motivational messages more readily associated with the Little Book of Calm or Jake Humphrey’s LinkedIn page, England’s base certainly does resemble a home from home. Not least for any players whose residences are plastered in giant branded pictures of themselves and boast broadcast studios, conference rooms named after Lioness legends, a games room, library and Nike craft station where visitors can make jewellery, gussy up their trainers or do some colouring-in.

With or without their pool and ping-pong tables, video games, endless amounts of Yorkshire tea and various other amenities that will almost certainly be used as a stick with which to beat them should they crash out of the tournament, boredom is often a factor for players cloistered away at a month-long tournament. Happily, England’s women will get to alleviate any tedium they may be enduring when they face the Danes on Friday.

Following a seriously underwhelming performance against Haiti which they just about got away with, Wiegman must now decide to stick or twist when it comes to team selection. Given the Dutch manager’s habit of sticking with a settled starting line-up, any alterations are likely to be kept to a minimum. Having watched her team fail to score from open play in three consecutive internationals and one behind-closed-doors friendly she may be tempted to make a change up front and in Rachel Daly has a striker champing at the bit to be involved from the first whistle.

“Nobody’s happy to sit on the bench,” said the Aston Villa striker and WSL Golden Boot winner following England’s opener. “If you are then you are not in the right place, not in the right career. But that’s the beauty of having a competitive squad; everybody’s digging for a position. It’s a headache Sarina has to have in multiple positions. I wouldn’t like to be in her shoes making such big decisions.” Heavy is the head that wears the crown made from cardboard, tin-foil, sticky-back plastic and costume jewellery at the Nike craft station.

“I’m fuming about it, I’ve got to be honest with you. It was a clumsy, reckless challenge in a pre-season game and I’m not happy with it at all. I haven’t seen the goalie and he’s probably best steering clear of us for the time being because we’re not very happy. It should have been a straight red. If it’s not denying a goalscoring opportunity it’s still a dangerous challenge so if you add the two scenarios together he should have been off the pitch” – in what will make for a dramatic episode of Welcome to Wrexham, fresh and funky manager after Manchester United goalkeeper Nathan Bishop’s challenge left Paul Mullin with a punctured lung in a “friendly”. It was quite the evening at the Snapdragon Stadium that featured a frenzy of yellow cards, one red, that injury to Mullin, a half-naked pitch invader and a 3-1 victory for the League Two side.

Can I be the first of 1,057 UNC graduates to note that Football Daily would have been hard pressed to enjoy shrimp and grits at Crook’s Corner instead of seeing Wrexham AFC play in Chapel Hill last week? Crook’s (which did offer absolutely world-class shrimp and grits) has lamentably closed. Chicken biscuits can still be obtained at Time Out, but I’d stick to their mac ‘n’ cheese and fried okra. Sunrise Kitchen does a better biscuit. Maybe takeaway to bring to a 21-time national champions UNC womens’ match?” – Patrick Connolly.

Commiserations to the poorly-advised Kyle Walker, who looks set to sign for little-known German outfit, Bayern Something-or-other. With better representation, he too could have tested his mettle in a real league like the Saudi Pro League or MLS. While one-time Galactico-bester Lionel Messi locks horns domestically with Baloo the Bear and Goofy, and CR7 carts home his Saudi doubloons after wowing audiences of up to 10,000 fans, poor Kyle will just have to make do with life in the Bundesliga. If only he had a little ambition” – Johnny Connelly.

Ed Taylor suggested in yesterday’s Football Daily that the Saudi Arabia PIF should get in the bin. I assume he means the Scrooge McDuck money bin that Edward Dean was telling us about earlier in the same letters column. In which case, may I suggest, they probably already have their own” – Richard Morris.

A Ewen Anderson’s friend (yesterday’s letters), he didn’t have to buy a phone, has he kept the receipt? Not wishing to defend Fifa but their ticket app, does let you store multiple tickets for a game. We used only one phone to get into a very entertaining Italy v Argentina game in Auckland. However you both need to be at the ‘turnstile’ with the phone at the same time” – Iggy.

Send your letters to [email protected]. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’ the day is … Johnny Connelly.

Canada 2-1 Republic of Ireland. Skipper Katie McCabe scored Ireland’s first ever World Cup goal – direct from a corner no less – but the early strike wasn’t enough as Big Sports Day champions Canada fought back to win. “I’m heartbroken for the girls because I think we deserved so much better from this game,” said McCabe.

Japan 2-0 Costa Rica. It’s now seven unanswered goals for the 2011 winners. Hikaru Naomoto and Aoba Fujino scored twice in two first-half minutes to make it six points out of six in Group C and send Japan into the last 16. “We did what we needed to do, and we did it well,” trilled Japan coach Futoshi Ikeda, using words you would never hear Football Daily uttering.

Spain 5-0 Zambia. Contenders for glory? Spain are looking that way after doubles from Jenni Hermoso and Alba Redondo along with a cracking opener from Teresa Abelleira put them through to the knockout phase. It’s been a miserable tournament debut for Zambia having conceded 10 times in their first two matches. “Even though we scored five, we looked for a sixth. That’s the ambition I like to see in the team,” roared Spain coach Jorge Vilda.

Joe Lewis, the billionaire owner of Tottenham, has been charged with orchestrating “brazen” insider trading by federal prosecutors in New York. “This is a legal matter unconnected with the club and as such we have no comment,” said Tottenham.

Lionel Messi’s move to USA! USA!! USA!!! couldn’t have started better. The little World Cup winner netted twice in the opening 22 minutes of his full debut for Inter Miami - a 4-0 win over Atlanta United - and now has three goals in two games. Did Pelé hit the ground running like this?

Sticking with a very American run of bobs, Phil Murphy, a high-ranking World Cup 2026 suit, has floated the idea of a Premier League Game 39 again. “I would assume that Man Utd and Arsenal view this as a good brand, putting your best players out there, 82,000 fans in New York/New Jersey. I’d love to think that it would happen,” he honked.

Having raided Southampton for numerous players down the years, Liverpool aren’t finding it so easy to prise Roméo Lavia away from St Mary’s. Saints want a £50m package for the Belgian midfielder, leaving Liverpool’s opening offer of £35m plus add-ons some way short.

Manchester United want £40m for midfielder Scott McTominay and West Ham - who have Declan Rice-money to burn - have lodged an interest.

Liverpool’s new £80m Anfield Road stand will not be fully open for the first home game of the season as planned and is not expected to be reach 100% capacity until October.

And in a minor victory for Remainers, British players will be treated as EU citizens in Italy following a request made by Serie A to allow Italian teams to free up space to sign non-EU players.

The latest edition of our sister email is out today and features Anita Asante on the story of the World Cup so far: the underdogs. Sign up for the full version here.

After becoming the breakout star of Ted Lasso, Jonathan Wilson is writing a European footb … sorry, soccer newsletter for fans of the game in USA! USA!! USA!!! (Canadians, Australians and Tuvaluans may also enjoy it). You can sign up here, along with asking him some questions about the game too.

Suzanne Wrack goes inside England’s state of the art World Cup base in Australia and finds a host of activities – including retro video games – to put Sarina Wiegman’s trophy contenders in the best headspace.

Which footballer has scored the longest-range hat-trick and who were the last team to wear Nos 1-11? The Knowledge knows.

Will Kyle Walker swap Manchester for Munich? And what of Bayern’s bid for Harry Kane? David Tindall exposes the latest transfer fluff in the Rumour Mill.

It’s July 1979, and David O’Leary appears to be resting on the FA Cup in a break from Arsenal pre-season training in a picture with his new teammate John Hollins.