Opta gives England a 73.9% chance of winning in normal time. Sébastien Desabre looked at that number and essentially said, “Good, they’ll underestimate us.”
The Democratic Republic of the Congo’s head coach has overhauled his tactical approach for the round-of-32 clash against England, switching to a compact five-man defense designed to neutralize one of the tournament’s most potent attacking sides.
The defensive blueprint
Desabre’s shift isn’t a last-minute panic decision. He’s been running this playbook against elite opponents throughout the tournament cycle, most notably deploying it against Portugal in the group stage, where the DRC held the European giants to a 1-1 draw.
The numbers back up the approach. Under Desabre’s management, the DRC have recorded 29 clean sheets in 57 matches. That’s a shutout rate north of 50%, which would be impressive for any national team, let alone one that missed the previous World Cup entirely.
