Ahead of England's crunch game against Croatia in Dallas on Wednesday, reasons of geography are the strongest motivation to top Group L. According to Thomas Tuchel, the avoidance of bouncing between time zones is a critical part of optimising England's performance.
The Football Association chose to locate the team's World Cup training base in Kansas City, close to the centre-point of this World Cup's enormous scope. This allows the team to stay in the same Eastern time zone for the majority of the knockout stages.
Finishing top of the group would also mean that England's total travel distance would be around 4,600 miles during the knockout stages, compared to 5,900 miles if they were to finish runners-up.
The path for Group L's runners-up involves a quarter-final over on the west coast in Los Angeles, which would negatively impact recovery time and involve a time zone shift.
England may have to give up their training base when the knockout rounds come around, but topping the group would give them a significant advantage in terms of performance and recovery.