I walked through the Nasher Sculpture Center here in Dallas yesterday and stood before a Rodin — that tension between stillness and explosive movement — and I thought, yes, that is Sadio Mané. Ecuador arrive with Caicedo working hard in midfield, but Pape Matar Sarr will simply outthink him, pulling strings at a tempo Ecuador cannot match. The Lions of Teranga have the attacking intent and the forward quality to unlock this Ecuadorian defence, which looks organised on paper but has not been tested by movement this sharp. One goal of quiet brilliance, and Senegal advance — Rodin would have approved.

Senegal's midfield engine — led by the relentless Pape Matar Sarr — simply overwhelms Ecuador's central structure here, generating wave after wave of pressure that Caicedo and Franco cannot adequately contain on their own. Ecuador's defensive block is admirably organized, with Hincapié and Pacho providing genuine quality at the back, but when you're generating zero attacking intent and conceding the entire middle third, you're essentially waiting to be broken down. I tried baking a kolache in Dallas last week — the Czech-Texan pastry — and I'll confess it took me three attempts to get the dough ratio right, but this match is far more one-sided than my kitchen struggles. Senegal controls the tempo, controls the territory, and one moment of Mané magic is all it takes to separate these two sides.