World Cup Expansion to 48 Teams (Update: FIFA Council Agrees 2026 Slot Allocation)

Unless the OFC has a playoff with AFC or CONCACAF? Depending on how many these Confeds get... the second place OFC team could be playing against Qatar or China or Syria or Caracao or St Kitts.

 

Even in that case I don't think there would be any real doubt as to the winner, which kind of kills whatever little appeal a Qatar v Tahiti match might have to begin with. But yeah... maybe if the OFC team parks the bus for 180 minutes they'll keep it under a 6-goal loss.

 

I didn't really mean time in the sense of "getting all the matches played", but more because each play-off stage needs to be separated by around a month. So, already in the AFC you need to finish the "main" bit of the qualifiers in September so you can play the AFC play-off in October and the intercontinental in November. That leaves the best AFC teams (ie, the ones that qualify in September) with the problem of what to do in October/November - these are critical times for getting the team together under competitive conditions but you can't organise big friendlies before you qualify and anyway they will only be friendlies.

If you add in another round of knock-outs here, or more in other confeds (how do you get 6.5, 9.5 spots?) then you have more teams wasting time in the year before the finals.

I'm not sure about your point on the lack of matches for mid-size teams - in Concacaf we only have 6 teams left, but 3 groups of 4 in the final stage would have 12 teams playing competitively. CAF wouldn't change effectively (5 groups with 2 going through rather than 5 with just 1) although obviously the pressure would be less (conversely, teams are less likely to be out of it after a couple of matches and hence might compete more). South American, Oceania and UEFA are unaffected.

And, even with lots of play-offs, the stage before is likely to be similar - and we then go into October/November with just 4-5 games going on, rather than the days with have now with 20-30.

In fact, thinking about "number of matches" if you don't need the 4 match days in October/November for play-offs, you automatically have the ability to change those groups of 4 - with 6 rounds - to groups of 6 - with 10 rounds.

J

 

Why did you use the ranking of May 2014 ? (one month before the WC).

the one that you should really use, was the one from June 2014, which came out right before the the WC started when it was actually played.

In this case :

Brasil (3) vs. Chile (14), although Brazil went through on penalties, was also an upset, as ranking diference was big in favour of Brazil, whom shoul've gone through without the need of a pk definition.
Costa Rica (28) v Greece (12) – CR advanced on penalties, UPSET
Uruguay (7) vs. Colombia (8), also UPSET, as Colombia with the lower ranking, won
Germany (2) v Algeria (23), Germany only went through after an over time (given their rankings diference, should've been an easy win, which at the end wasn't)
Netherlands (15) v Mexico (19)
France (17) v Nigeria (44)
Argentina (5) v Switzerland (6)
Belgium (11) v USA (13)

Now, to the issue in question here, the one fact you pretend to not really keep in mind (by cherry picking with a ranking, from a diferent date to the actual tournament, that serves your purpose, better), is that at group phase there were some very easy groups, while some others very difficult, which gives some teams a very easy and safer passage going through compared to others, where many upsets also happened according to the rankings of the teams that confronted each other (given how the "draw" put them against each other), where lots a big names lost their chances in going through against "suposedly" weaker opponents (that's one of the beauty's of the WC, as many times rankings may mean peanuts).

Such as :
Croatia (18), losing to Mexico (20)
Spain (ranked at top 1), losing to both Netherlands (15) and Chile (14)
Chile (14), losing to Netherlands (15)
Italy (9) and Uruguay (7), both losing to Costa Rica (28)
Switzerland (6), losing to France (17)
Bosnia & Herzegovina (21), losing to Nigeria (44)

worth mentioning some draws which also were upsets (given the diference in ranking between both opponents) :
Brazil (3) v. Mexico (20)
Greece (12) v. Japan (46)
England (10) v. Costa Rica (28)
France (17) v. Ecuador (26)
Germany (2) v. Ghana (37)
Portugal (4) v. USA (13)
Russia (19) v. South Korea (57)

With more groups, 16 in the case of the 3 team groups in the 48 team WC, chances to get some very easy groups are lots higher, where as a second down side effect of not having much matches in each group, will have lots of teams not really worthy of getting through to the knock outs, which also increases their chances afterwards to get through, depending on how "easy" or how "hard", the draw they get. In many cases, teams with very low rankings will get matched up against other teams also with very low rankings, while there will also be some top teams getting confronted one against the other, sooner into the tournament. So depending on how soft the draw may be, some teams can perfectly reach quarters without confronting any top team to get there (something that is less likely to happen in a 32 team WC, with less groups, at a group phase with more matches in it).

 

I didn't intentionally cherry pick. I just thought the FIFA rank came out at the end of the month not the beginning.

Now to clarify I think we should be talking about big upsets, because what we are concerned about are the top 16 ranked teams losing to teams ranked 32 - 45. I think to be a true upset you need a clear underdog beating a clearly better team. I think any team ranked 1 - 10 could beat any other team in this range and not be a consider a big upset. Same for teams ranked 10 - 25. What we are concerned about is the top 16 losing to teams ranked 32 - 45.

Now even with the June 2014 ranking I still see 1 true upset. Costa Rica beating or drawing Greece. Maybe 2 if you want to include Brazil and Chile, although Brazil was not very good in WC 2014 and Chile is a very good team ranked 14th in the world.

Uruguay and Colombia, although technically an upset, but these 2 teams are so close that it's hard to justify a big upset. This could happen in any WC and it would not be shocking for the "weaker" team to win.

Now for the group stage draws... a draw in the group stage benefits both teams in a lot of cases.
Brazil (3) v. Mexico (20)... Mexico historically plays Brazil very well in tournaments, and it was still an OK result for Brazil and Mexico. After this match Brazil had 4, Mexico had 4, and Croatia had 3, with Cameroon on 0 points. Brazil goes through with a tie or a win in the last game. This to me is a minor upset... meaning this could happen in any WC and it would not be a big shock if it happened again.
Greece (12) v. Japan (46)... Yes UPSET, but Greece still advanced
England (10) v. Costa Rica (28)... Yes this was an upset, not a very big one especially in context... England were already eliminated, with zero points going into game 3. Since England were already eliminated it's hard to justify this as a big upset.
France (17) v. Ecuador (26) This was a good result for France in the last game of the group. No other team could catch them after this 1 point. It's not an upset if the result was beneficial to France.
Germany (2) v. Ghana (37). Yes an Upset
Portugal (4) v. USA (13). Yes an Upset, but not a very big one.
Russia (19) v. South Korea (57). Yes an upset.

So in this list there are 3 true group stage big upsets that ended in draws. Greece/Japan, Germany/Ghana, and Russia/S Korea. This is 3 big upsets in 48 games. 3 big upsets out of 48 games seems to match what I projected.

 

https://www.modernghana.com/sports/...-assures-africa-of-at-least-seven-places.html

Not sure if serious... Asia to get 8-9 slots, while Infantino wants to give Africa 7 slots??? CAF is a bigger Confed, has better results...

 

Don't get too hung up about it. The total numbers (when you add one for the host) in that article only come to 45.

 

48 is excessive

 

And for all those reasons it is really essential to have a 32-team KO bracket (not 16-teams).

What jumps-out at me in this mock example is how few group stage matches are mouth-watering encounters compared to what we have now in the 32-team format. What a bloated tournament this will be! No other sport has such a bloated world championship to my knowledge.

Rugby: 20 teams of which about 6 have realistic shot at reaching the final (30%)
Ice hockey: 16 / 6 (38%)
Basketball: 24 / 7 (29%)
Cricket: 14/7 (50%)

Soccer: 48 teams / 9-11 teams with realistic shot at reaching the final (21%)

You'd think that the most global sport would have the highest percentage. I mean, sports that are less global may be tempted to fill their tournaments with some cannon-fodder just to make-up the numbers and try to grow the game.

But nope. Its the sport that is most global that still has the highest percentage of their world cup filled with hopeless teams.

 

Don't know much about Ice Hockey and Basketball but both the Rugby and Cricket World Cups suffer from a bloated format and a large gap between the top and bottom teams. In Rugby the weak teams get 4 games, with at least two against established traditional test playing nations, and in cricket weak teams get 6 games, with at least 4 against established test playing nations. Group stage in the cricket in 2015 went for 4 weeks, and even though it was hosted by my country I lost interest and switched off in the middle stages and was happy just to watch nightly news highlites. The knockout stage went another few weeks so the total tournament was just over 6 weeks. That's too long for a 14 team tournament (the winner gets to play 9 games). Rugby has the problem that due to the physical nature of the game players need a bit more time to recover and its a big advantage to play a team that has had less than 6 days between matches when you have had more. This makes games more spaced out and the total tournament runs for the same length as the cricket tournament with the winner playing 7 games. The current format of the world cup maintains my interest for the 4 weeks but the expansion to 48 may struggle to hold peoples interest, particularly in the group stages.

 

This was not a mock tourney these are the actual results from 2014. I am also unclear if you are for or against expansion.

Just so we are all clear...
Current format:
32 team format with a 16 team KO bracket. 8 groups of 4. Top 2 advance
New 2026 format:
48 team format with a 32 team KO braket. 16 groups of 3... Top 2 advance

 

Right but that wasn't really the point of my post. I'm merely pointing-out the size of these different world championships and the proportion of legit contenders among them. Sure the cricket and rugby WCs are endless but England - a top contender in both - failed to get out of the group stage in both WCs in 2015. Thus its obviously still challenging from start to finish.

In rugby, because of the nature of the sport (i.e. 1 game per week) the WC is something one follows each weekend while the tournament is going on. But during weekdays fans carry-on with their regular life. In football, since teams can play every 4 days or so, the World cup keeps us glued to the TV constantly throughout the tournament. Or at least that's the case now

Get ready to say 'goodbye' to that.

 

There were people many years ago who thought more than 16 was excessive.

Heck, there are people in this very thread who think more than 16 is excessive.

Let's see how things play out before coming to judgment. The futbol landscape can look different in the future.

 

Not sure that's a good counter-argument. If 32 is borderline-excessive then surely 48 is excessive.

 

Except it's hard to argue that the expansion to 32 was not a success.

The game has grown a bit since 98 and the WC keeps getting more and more popular every 4 years. And elite teams continued to advance to the final rounds, making for an exciting quarters, semi's and finals.

For the 32 expansion to qualify as a failure... the game would be less popular and weak teams would need to be in the final stages... these things didn't happen. And I bet these things were predicted back in the expansion phases from 16 to 24 and then to 32.

 

I believe @BocaFan already has made this point, the expansion to 32 teams was successful because there are at any given year since the turn of the century, about 27 strong NTs in place. However, a 27-team tournament is difficult to stage, so the tournament expanded to the very accommodating exponent of 2 number of 32. There are not 32 strong NTs around even now, just quickly watch Greece, Cameroon, Honduras play to validate that. Much less there are going to be 48 NTs worthy to be in the most elite tournament of all sports.

 

I must of missed this post...

So back in 98 (or 94 when they made the decision to expand) there were 27 strong NTs, and since 94/98 this number has not changed?

I find this hard to believe and also hard to quantify.

 

Why is it hard to believe? Name more than 27 strong NTs at the moment.

 

This is true, many of the smaller nations, and some big ones, have variability within a time frame. For me it's best to define it year by year. Right now for the year 2016, I would list the following NTs as being strong:

Germany
France
Spain
Belgium
Portugal
Italy
Croatia
Poland
Brazil
Argentina
Chile
Uruguay
Colombia
Nigeria
Egypt
Ghana
South Korea
Australia

I could be missing another half dozen at most, but it's clear that the total won't get near 32 let alone 48. The World Cup has not yet justified 32 teams other than that number giving the perfect format. But the expansion has been a success because there are enough strong teams, in the range of 24 to 28, that they can carry the tournament despite a handful of weak entrants. With 48 sides there will be as a best case scenario 20 teams of poor quality, over 40% of the field, too high a figure for the tournament to overcome.

 

I would add Wales to that list - Euro semi-finalists. If you're including Belgium, then Wales beat them comfortably in the Euros quarter-finals as well as winning and drawing against them in qualifying.

But your point is correct to me. There aren't quite enough quality teams for a 32 team tournament, but with that number you get the benefit of the perfect format. 48 doesn't meet either of those criteria.

 

Maybe there are 27 now or maybe there are 37... strong is subjective, and as @Paul Calixte mentions it needs to be defined before you make a list.

My main point is that for 20 straight years I find it hard to believe that this magic number of 27 stayed consistent. Teams go up and down in quality all the time... at any point during this 20 years there could of been 20 to 40 "strong" nations. This fixed number of 27 is impossible to quantify over time. I also think the game has progressed since 1998, and during this time more nations have become better.

Take the US for example... prior to 1998 the US has advanced past the group 2 times in the WC (1930, and in 1994 when 3 out of 4 teams advanced in each group). After 1998, the US has advanced 3 times and made it to quarters once. Is the US consider strong or not?

Mexico was also inconsistent before 1998... making it out of the group 3 times in 10 WCs. Since 1998 they have advanced out of the group in all 5 WCs. Are they strong or not?

 

Maybe there are 37...so why don't you list them then?

Strong is not as subjective as you want to make it, for example if you argue that Honduras was strong in 2014 then you are wrong and I am right. Same if you mention Hungary or Venezuela as strong the past year, again you would be wrong.

It's not that 27 is a magic number, it's a ceiling for the number of strong NTs in any given year that I challenge you to break, for any given year from 1900 to present.

Sure, the USA would make the list of strong in certain years and it would not in others since 1990, or really since any year in football. But the USA being strong in 2002 does not matter for WC 2026, just like Hungary being super-strong in 1950 does not matter for WC 2026. A 48-team WC needs to justify enough strong teams to carry it.

 

Yes, there may be 37 (depending of course on one's interpretation of 'strong') but not all 37 will qualify for a 48-team WC since 20 of those 37 might be in UEFA.

For instance, I can say fairly comfortably that there are only 7 strong teams in CONCACAF and AFC combined, even if I set the bar pretty low for what is considered 'strong' (i.e. teams at least capable of being competitive). So anything beyond the 3.5 and 4.5 spots, respectively, will consist of nothing but NTs that are weak af.

 

It's not thust the number of teams, it's the format.

Out of 48 teams, 16 will play only two matches and 16 will play three matches.

With 3-team groups, multiple odd combinations may happen that will result in an unfair third match.