BREAKING. And I use that word in the most dramatically appropriate sense possible, like a goalkeeper's knees during a penalty shootout. Sources close to sources who once shared a lift with someone who knows a FIFA delegate tell me that six teams are currently experiencing what can only be described as 'peak football anxiety disorder' as they battle for the final World Cup spots.

Now, I've covered transfer windows where grown men have cried over failed medicals, but this playoff business is something else entirely. Sweden versus Poland, Czech Republic versus Denmark, Kosovo versus Turkey - it's like someone took all the stress of deadline day and condensed it into 90 minutes of pure, concentrated terror.

My sources, and by sources I mean a bloke who once sat behind Gareth Southgate at a Greggs, tell me that the atmosphere in these stadiums tonight is 'electric.' Which is football speak for 'several people are going to need medical attention before this is over.' Pristina, Solna, Prague - three cities where dreams will either soar or die a very public death.

The thing about winner-takes-all matches is they expose the beautiful lies we tell ourselves during regular season football. 'We'll get them next time.' 'It's just one game.' 'Form goes out the window in cup ties.' Well, congratulations lads, form just got yeeted out of a very tall window because there IS no next time. This is it. The full monty. Win or spend the next four years explaining to your grandchildren why you're not on the telly with Messi.

I've been tracking the emotional journey of these six nations through social media analytics (don't ask me how, even I'm not sure), and it's fascinating. Poland fans have gone through the five stages of grief approximately seventeen times since kick-off was announced. Danish supporters are stress-eating pastries at unprecedented rates. Kosovo - bless them - are just happy to be here, which is the kind of dangerous optimism that either wins World Cups or gets brutally crushed by Turkish efficiency.

Sources suggest - and I cannot emphasise enough how unreliable these sources are, we're talking people who think VAR stands for 'Very Angry Referee' - that some players have been spotted doing things like 'visualisation exercises' and 'eating properly.' Revolutionary stuff. One unnamed midfielder reportedly spent three hours yesterday just staring at a football, which is either elite mental preparation or a complete psychological breakdown. Could go either way.

The beautiful cruelty of it all is that while these six teams are battling for World Cup survival, somewhere else Kylian Mbappé is probably choosing between his seventeenth different types of protein shake, secure in the knowledge that France qualified ages ago. Football, eh? It's the hope that kills you, but also the hope that occasionally resurrects you in the most glorious fashion possible.

Done deal or fever dream? For three of these teams, it's about to be the sweetest deal of their lives. For the other three... well, there's always the Nations League. Sources close to sources tell me that's definitely not the same thing, but sometimes you've got to take what you can get.