Goal feast: Canada 6-0, Switzerland 4-1 and Sweden 5-1
Canada steamrolled Qatar in Vancouver, Switzerland dispatched Bosnia and Sweden overran Tunisia in Guadalupe.
The second matchday produced a genuine flurry of goals across several venues. The headline act was Canada, one of the three hosts, who ran over Qatar with an emphatic 6-0 at Vancouver's BC Place, their Pacific home with a capacity of around 52,500. The half-dozen goals boost Canadian confidence and their goal difference in a tightly contested Group B.
In that same Group B, Switzerland dispatched Bosnia 4-1 at the SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, a game the Swiss settled early and which completely reshapes the qualification picture. The win puts Switzerland in a direct fight with Canada for the top places in a group that also features Qatar.
The goal feast was completed in Mexico. Sweden posted a resounding 5-1 over Tunisia at the Estadio BBVA in Guadalupe, in the Monterrey metropolitan area, in Group F. The Scandinavians showed their firepower at one of the host country's most modern arenas and shape up as a team to watch in a group they share with the Netherlands, Japan and Tunisia.
Three routs on a single matchday that not only shake up the tables but send a clear message: in the 48-team format, every goal counts. Goal difference will be one of the decisive criteria in deciding which teams sneak into the eight best third-placed spots that join the winners and runners-up in the Round of 32.
The wide scorelines confirm the pattern of an open tournament, in which the gaps between the big teams and some debutants still show. The sides aiming to advance already know that winning is not enough: it pays to do so by the widest possible margin.
For Canada, Switzerland and Sweden, the matchday brings a morale boost and, above all, a cushion of goals that could prove valuable in the final reckoning. For Qatar, Bosnia and Tunisia, by contrast, comes the need to react quickly if they are not to run out of room early.
With the group stage in full swing, this matchday's scorelines paint a picture in which no team can afford complacency and in which attacking consistency is starting to separate the contenders from those who will fight to the very end for a ticket to the next round.