[octothorp]

Yeah, I have a hard time getting a read on Brazil in the next round. I don't think they'll be a serious challenge, but I worry about them a lot more than Latvia.

An interesting thing to keep an eye on, if both Spain and Canada remain undefeated and win their groups, and then beat Latvia and Brazil respectively in their first group L games, it'll set up a situation where both teams have already qualified for the quarterfinals when they go head-to-head in the final group-stage game, and the winner of that game will have a potential matchup against the US in the semifinals, but the loser will avoid the US until the finals (assuming the US remains undefeated). Will either or both of the teams treat that as a bit of a rest game, with no real advantage to winning?

The group A games could be very interesting tonight. Maybe the boring thing happens and Italy and Dominican win their games and advance. But the points-differentials between the teams are really close, and there are a lot of different ways that group could finish.

The rest of the games tonight either look fairly one-sided, or are irrelevant to seeding. Japan vs. Australia is a win-and-advance game, but shouldn't be close. Lithuania vs. Montenegro for the top of group D might be interesting; Montenegro has had some good games against good european teams in qualifying.