While England’s narrow 1-0 win over World Cup debutants Haiti earlier in the day suggests the contest for a place in the knockout rounds might be closer than expected prior to the tournament, Shui will rue the three dropped points.

China take on Haiti in their second Group D game in Adelaide on Friday and the Steel Roses must win that encounter to have any hope of maintaining their record of advancing to the knockout rounds every time they have appeared at the Women’s World Cup finals.

The Chinese will end their group phase campaign against the English, currently ranked fourth in the world and among the favourites for the title, on August 1, also in Adelaide.

“I told the players that they played very well,” Shui said. “They played to the best of their abilities and I’m very appreciative of them for their performances. It’s a pity we lost that goal in the last few minutes.

“Throughout the game, and especially in the second half, the physicality and other factors as well as our focus weren’t good enough for me.

“We were faced by all kinds of different situations so in the future and in other games when there are problems I’m accountable. I will look to do more in the future.”

Backed by most of the crowd inside the Perth Rectangular Stadium, who bellowed out a rousing rendition of March of the Volunteers before kick-off, Shui’s side made a bright start to keep Denmark goalkeeper Lene Christensen on her toes.

Chen Qiaozhu had an early view of goal, thumping her left-foot effort from distance wide of the target while a bobbling strike by Zhang Linyan from 20 yards after a neat turn wrong-footed the Danish midfield was gathered at full stretch by a diving Christensen.

The Danes began to assert themselves in midfield with Janni Thomsen seeing her speculative attempt blocked by the Chinese defence as Lars Sondergaard’s side edged closer to goal.

China, though, were unruffled, asserting themselves in the centre to control the game and it was the Asian champions who looked the more likely to register in the lead-up to the interval, threatening on the counterattack.

The second half introduction of Wang Shuang sparked a response from the Steel Roses, her centre from the right creating panic in the Danish defence before Li Mengwen thumped her shot off target metres from goal. Wang herself was then denied by a sprawling Christensen.

China’s energy after the resumption prompted a reaction, with Josefine Hasbo guilty of a glaring miss six minutes into the second half when she nodded over the bar from 10 yards out having seen Nicoline Sorensen’s cross from the left headed into her path.

Sorensen was finding more space on the wing and threatened to prize open China’s backline with another promising delivery, only for Chen’s perfectly timed header to prevent Pernille Harder from pouncing.

The Chinese went closer still to conceding with 15 minutes remaining as captain Wang Shanshan almost put the ball in her own net, heading Sorensen’s deep free kick across the face of goal with Karen Holmgaard arriving just too late to drive the ball over the line.

But with barely a minute on the clock the winner came, Vangsgaard meeting Harder’s corner from the left to leave China’s qualification hopes already hanging in the balance.

“We realise we might have had some issues in the details, but overall the strategy was fine and we should be able to form our tactics according to this game and improve in the future,” said Shui.

“All in all we did gain some opportunities and we hope we can improve ourselves through our constant effort so that the China team can have better results and improve in the future.”