Panama coach says team is excited ahead of Ghana World Cup clash

Panama stepped into a daunting Group L opener against Ghana with something larger than points at stake: proof that one of football’s smaller nations could belong on the World Cup stage again. Thomas Christiansen’s squad entered Toronto Stadium carrying the momentum of a November 19, 2025, qualification win over El Salvador, a 3-0 result that sealed first place in Concacaf and sent Panama to only its second World Cup.

Christiansen, Panama’s longest-serving coach since taking over in 2020, said the country had been “gripped by excitement” after securing its berth and that the goal of the cycle had been to reach this tournament. For Panama, that mattered beyond the draw sheets and the standings. A team that missed out on Qatar 2022 had to absorb disappointment, regroup, and then prove that the breakthrough was not a one-off but part of a longer climb toward global relevance.

The scale of the task was obvious from the rest of Group L. England and Croatia, both with deep recent World Cup pedigrees, stood in the way of Panama and Ghana, and the group began June 17 with England against Croatia in Dallas and Ghana against Panama in Toronto. Panama’s schedule only grew more demanding from there, with a meeting against Croatia on June 23 in Toronto and a rematch with England on June 27 in New York/New Jersey.

That England game carried a heavy memory for Panama. It was a repeat of their meeting in Russia 2018, when England won 6-1, a result that still frames how Panama is judged on the sport’s biggest stage. For Christiansen and a squad that includes familiar names such as César Blackman, Éric Davis and José Luis Rodríguez, the challenge was not simply to compete, but to show that Panama’s football has advanced since that first World Cup appearance.

Ghana arrived with its own history and its own ambitions. The African side’s best World Cup run came in South Africa 2010, when it reached the quarter-finals, and a meeting with Panama offered an early chance to take control in a group where every point mattered. With England and Croatia looming, the opening match in Toronto felt like the kind of defining moment smaller programs live for, where visibility, belief and progress can be measured in a single result.