By Eduard Bănulescu
Looking to make some quick, smart choices for World Cup fantasy football team? These are the players you need for Matchday 3’s second batch of games.
The matches are part of the free FootballCoin contest starting tonight.
World Cup Fantasy Picks: Matchday 1 Guide (June 24–25) – Win XFC Rewards
The “Locks”
Curaçao vs. Ivory Coast
-
Les Éléphants Attacks (Ivory Coast):
-
Ousmane Diomande: Essential target for an expected high-intensity attacking match.
-
Beni Traoré (or Bonny): Deserves attention as a primary focal point in the frontline.
-
Amad Diallo: Highly recommended attacking threat to load up on.
-
-
The Engine Room (Ivory Coast):
-
The Clean Sheet Specialist (Ivory Coast):
-
The Shot-Stopper Volume Pick (Curaçao):
-
The Lone Star (Curaçao):
Ecuador vs. Germany
Japan vs. Sweden
-
The Stats Monsters (Japan):
-
Daichi Kamada: Lock for midfield possession points based on underlying stats (48 successful passes in Matchday 1).
-
Ko Itakura: Elite defensive value target backing up his place with heavy metrics (76 successful passes, 8 successful tackles).
-
-
Tactical Discipline Picks (Japan):
-
Takehiro Tomiyasu, Ayase Ueda, & Junya Ito: Highly recommended pieces due to Japan’s clinical tactical structure and superior form.
-
-
The Pure Quality Outlets (Sweden):
The “Enablers”
Tunisia vs. Netherlands
-
The Possession Accumulators (Netherlands):
-
Virgil van Dijk, Jan Paul van Hecke, Tijjani Reijnders, & Ryan Gravenberch: Primary targets explicitly chosen for their elite ball control, projectable passing metrics, and high baseline for possession-based points.
-
-
The Focal Point (Netherlands):
-
The Lone Tunisian Options (Tunisia):
The “Wild Cards”
Paraguay vs. Australia
Türkiye vs. USA
The Matchday 3 Slate
| Date | Kickoff Time | Matchup | Group | Venue |
| Thu, 25 Jun 2026 | 21:00 | Curaçao vs. Ivory Coast | Group E | Philadelphia Stadium |
| 21:00 | Ecuador vs. Germany | Group E | New York New Jersey Stadium | |
| Fri, 26 Jun 2026 | 00:00 | Japan vs. Sweden | Group F | Dallas Stadium |
| 00:00 | Tunisia vs. Netherlands | Group F | Kansas City Stadium | |
| 03:00 | Paraguay vs. Australia | Group D | Las Vegas Stadium | |
| 03:00 | Türkiye vs. USA | Group D | San Francisco Stadium |
Set-Piece & Penalty Matrix
| Matchup | Team | Penalties | Free Kicks | Corners |
| Curaçao vs. Ivory Coast | Curaçao | Leandro Bacuna | Juninho Bacuna | Juninho Bacuna, Leandro Bacuna |
| Ivory Coast | Vakoun Bayo | Clement Akpa | Clement Akpa | |
| Ecuador vs. Germany | Ecuador | Enner Valencia | Kendry Páez | Pervis Estupiñán, Kendry Páez, Gonzalo Plata |
| Germany | Joshua Kimmich | David Raum | David Raum, Florian Wirtz | |
| Japan vs. Sweden | Japan | Ayase Ueda | Takefusa Kubo, Daichi Kamada | Takefusa Kubo, Ritsu Doan, Junya Ito |
| Sweden | Viktor Gyökeres, Alexander Isak | Mattias Svanberg, Anthony Elanga | Mattias Svanberg, Anthony Elanga | |
| Tunisia vs. Netherlands | Tunisia | Ali Abdi, Ismael Gharbi | Hannibal Mejbri | Hannibal Mejbri, Ali Abdi |
| Netherlands | Memphis Depay | Frenkie de Jong, Cody Gakpo | Denzel Dumfries | |
| Paraguay vs. Australia | Paraguay | Julio Enciso | Julio Enciso, Miguel Almirón | Julio Enciso, Miguel Almirón |
| Australia | Martin Boyle | Nestory Irankunda, Ajdin Hrustic | Ajdin Hrustic | |
| Türkiye vs. USA | Türkiye | Hakan Çalhanoğlu | Hakan Çalhanoğlu, Arda Güler | Hakan Çalhanoğlu, Arda Güler |
| USA | Christian Pulisic | Christian Pulisic | Giovanni Reyna |
Who are your fantasy football picks?
Do you opt for many budget-friendly players?
Have your say by playing FootballCoin. You can be rewarded daily for your choices.
Start playing
PakarPBN
A Private Blog Network (PBN) is a collection of websites that are controlled by a single individual or organization and used primarily to build backlinks to a “money site” in order to influence its ranking in search engines such as Google. The core idea behind a PBN is based on the importance of backlinks in Google’s ranking algorithm. Since Google views backlinks as signals of authority and trust, some website owners attempt to artificially create these signals through a controlled network of sites.
In a typical PBN setup, the owner acquires expired or aged domains that already have existing authority, backlinks, and history. These domains are rebuilt with new content and hosted separately, often using different IP addresses, hosting providers, themes, and ownership details to make them appear unrelated. Within the content published on these sites, links are strategically placed that point to the main website the owner wants to rank higher. By doing this, the owner attempts to pass link equity (also known as “link juice”) from the PBN sites to the target website.
The purpose of a PBN is to give the impression that the target website is naturally earning links from multiple independent sources. If done effectively, this can temporarily improve keyword rankings, increase organic visibility, and drive more traffic from search results.