Coach says his players can take a more positive approach to last-16 game now that tension of the group stage has been lifted

It is perhaps the most famous piece of graffiti in Danish football history. The question had been spray-painted in downtown Copenhagen. “What if Jesus comes back?” The answer would appear the following day. “Then we’ll move Elkjaer out wide.”

It was 1986, the Mexico World Cup was being played, and it was one of those vignettes that resonated widely, capturing the mood in a heartbeat. The tone was lighthearted but the pride was evident. Preben Elkjaer, the national team’s striker, could not be supplanted – even by the son of God.

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Sepp Piontek’s lineup, which also featured Michael Laudrup, Frank Arnesen and Jesper Olsen, would reach the last 16, but it was not where they went but how they got there. The class of ’86 played a Danish version of total football. It was fast, fluid and forward-facing and the team have remained the benchmark for this nation of romantics. Laudrup said at the time that Denmark played like “the Brazilians of the north”.

Åge Hareide and his current squad have made it back to the World Cup last 16 – they play Croatia in Nizhny Novgorod on Sunday night – and it is only the fourth time that Denmark have got this far. Yet the fans are split and the debate is framed by 1986 and all that; the notion of how a Danish team is supposed to play.

Everybody would probably agree that, in stylistic terms, it is not as they did at the group stage, where even Hareide admits they were lucky to have beaten Peru 1-0 in the opening game. They were underwhelming in the 1-1 draw against Australia while both teams were booed off after the 0-0 with France.

Denmark have managed nine shots on target in Russia – only Iran, who have been knocked out, had fewer – and they have been an awfully tough watch: heavy on perspiration, low on inspiration.

There are some supporters who believe the results justify everything and Hareide can point to an unbeaten run which now stretches to 18 games. With Kasper Schmeichel, in outstanding form in goal, they have conceded only once in 2018 – a sequence of seven matches. For Hareide, the result is all that matters and he has the country on the verge of history. Only once previously – in 1998 – have they reached a World Cup quarter-final.

But to others, Hareide’s direct and pragmatic style is akin to a betrayal or an embarrassment. Denmark are a small country who are not going to win the World Cup, so why not play with a little joy and beauty? That way, the world might talk about them positively. There are some Danes who would rather have played attractively and gone out at the group phase.

Hareide has lamented how difficult they are to please and it feels as though there is a cultural issue at play. He is Norwegian and it is fair to say that a lot of Danes look down on Norwegian football, particularly the long ball stuff from the 1990s with Tore André Flo.

The style discussion has felt like the only one in town and it was significant to hear Hareide promise “a different Denmark to what you have seen”. He made the point that they need to attack more and also that he expected the tension that looked to have suffocated his team in the group games to dissipate.

“There is always tension,” Hareide said. “Most of our players have not played the World Cup before. But this game will be different. We will release energy because we need to win. We will take a positive approach.”

Can Denmark cast off the shackles? One thing is clear. They will have to do a better job of creating a platform for Christian Eriksen, their creative fulcrum. His personal battle with Croatia’s Luka Modric should be fascinating.

Denmark can be at their best when nobody expects them to deliver. The most relevant case in point comes from the 1998 World Cup, when they were poor in the group stage only to advance. They even played France in the third game, losing 2-1. But, rather abruptly, they broke out to hammer an excellentNigeria team 4-1. It could take only one stellar performance to transform perceptions. Hareide senses opportunity.