England and France will face each other in the quarterfinal of the Qatar World Cup on Saturday night.
Both sides have been fluid in the attacking third, with England leading the goal-scoring chart, alongside Portugal, with 12 goals, while France is third with nine goals.
Kylian Mbappe has been the star for France, with his five goals helping him to the top of the golden boot list.
Though England has an upper hand in the overall head-to-head record (17 wins in 31 games), France has been the dominant force since the turn of the millennium, with four wins against one for the English.
Here we take a deeper look at England and France and their performance so far in the tournament, ahead of their quarterfinal clash:
ATTACKING STATS
As evident from the above stats, even though England has more goals, France has been the more defining attacking force.
The French dominate the number of shots per game. But the deviation is narrow when it comes shots on target per game, with the teams separated only by 0.5 shots/90.
This can be down to the average distance from which each team launches its shots. France makes its attempts from almost a meter farther than England.
As per Opta’s expected goal (xG) stats, France should have scored eight goals, while England’s numbers should have been 6.3. The Three Lions have outperformed their xG by a huge margin (5.7), while France’s deviance has been minimal. This is an indication of the better than usual finishing of English forwards.
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