General FIFA World Cup 2026 Discussion

Meh France will be limited by their coach who's been there for like a decade yet has won a single trophy despite having the most talent/depth. That and their players are extremely overrated based off club footy. Their isnt a single midfielder that breaks into the Argentina starting 11. Their defenders are all overrated relying mostly on athleticism. Saliba is great but after that nothing WC.

Keeping is what ever not sure who is their #1 now...

Their attack is better than it was in 2022 however they lost Greizzman who imo was what made that whole team tick.

There is no perfect team they along with Argentina and Spain will compete for the trophy.

 

https://archive.is/cKwkC

Advertising... Err.. cooling breaks in every half of every game regardless of the temperature

 

They fell in nations league and in the euros. They struggle in some euro qualifiers and in nations league and in world cup qualifiers. Meanwhile spain has been winning all their games, tournaments and beating France twice since 2024.

So i don't see how France are better with the same players or favorites over spain
Their midfield/ and defense has a lot ot be desire and is over hyped.

 

I wouldn't consider them prohibitive favorites but they made the last two finals and are deep so they're up there with the rest. Hard to fully discount them even if overrated. For whatever reason it clicks more for them at the WC than Euros.

 

I think this France is that kind of team that gets much better when the WC comes around., very inconsistent until the big thing comes

 

Germany is similar. If they get into KO stage, they tend to pass the QF. Its better to have them exited at group stage like in pass two WC. Germany also lost to Serbia at 2010 group stage. Also, any team wouldnt want to face them in penalty shootout.

The thing with France though, they have generational top talents like Mbappe and Dembele. If they hit the stride early on, they could be problem for any teams.

France and Germany has performed much better than the likes of Spain ,England and Portugal at KO stage throughout WC history. I'd be more cautious of them.

 

France's path to the final could be a bit more tricky.There is also a scenario that is not that far fetched where France could play Germany In the R32 and then Brasil in the R16. But just going by if France and Germany both win their groups, they are on a collision course for the R16. If one or the other slip-up, they avoid each other but then could play the Brazucas if they win their group.
It is a hot mess.

 

Out of curiosity, if we somehow finish 2nd the path would be:

Los Angeles - Indoors, NOT air conditioned*, 12 PM local time
Dallas - Indoors, air conditioned
Los Angeles - Indoors, NOT air conditioned*, 12 PM local time
Dallas - Indoors, air conditioned
New York - Outdoors, 3 PM local time

* It's designed to have some shade and be breezy, and the area normally isn't that hot, but if a heat wave hits that area it can still be hot

If we finish 3rd there's too many permutations, so let's not think about that.

 

France turn up for world cups, other than 2010, won it in '98, beaten finalists in 2006, winners in 2018, runners up in 2022. They are stacked upfront, Ekitike, Mbappe, Dembele, Doue, Barcola, for some reason they don't play well at the Euros under Deschamps, just my opinion but I would have them and Spain as my favourites.

 

They also flopped in 2002, but so did we

 

Lol, that's why I didn't mention it

 

Bro, I don't have time to watch Chelsea vs Bournmouth (or whatever the club is called).
The club fans are positive on Dibu and Romero. That's how I know.
You're right, RDP was poor in the first couple matches. I remember this. Still, the reaction to the Saudi Arabian game was unfounded. Overall, Argentina played well.

Anyway, to see if we are on the same page, I'd rate our team going into WC2022 as 9/10 and our team going into WC2026 as 6/10. What about you?

 

Lol 6/10 is crazy pessimistic. I'd say 8/10, definitely a step down but not mediocre

 

Well, I mean by our standards. Of course if we set 5-6/10 to be the average world cup side, we're better than that.

 

I have almost the opposite view. In the past we had specialists (Riquelme and Mascherano the prime examples) and always had trouble linking the defense with the attack, leaving us with the "short blanket" problem. Messi would have to drop back. Scaloni almost exclusively chooses all-arounder.

Midfield skills: field coverage, driving runs, long passing, short passing, ball retention, tackling, shooting

RDP - stellar in field coverage and driving run, decent to good in the other areas.
Lo Celso - very good in passing, decent in other areas.
Paredes - good tackler, coverage, ok in other areas
Enzo - extreme all arounder, best area is long passing
Mac - extreme all arounder, best area is short passing and ball retention
Palacios - good in coverage, decent in the rest
Guido - the exception that proves the rule. Too specialized, never given much play by Scaloni.

Shutting down counters is more about team organization and discipline, not about relying on specialists.

I do agree with you about needing a wide desequilibrante type player.

As an aside, I don't think I've seen any midfielder ever who was as good as RDP in making driving runs from deep. 2-5 times per game he would take the ball and blow through the mid, causing havoc in the opponents formation. He's obviously not a great dribbler but is very clever and could spot openings; of course, he had the legs for this. I rarely see him do this anymore. I did see it once in the final Miami played against Vancouver. An underrated part of Argentina from 2019 - 2024.

 

1. You should still watch club games to see how players are doing from time to time (at least the big matches like Chelsea vs Barca) for the reasons me and the others gave to you.

2. I don't think we played that great vs Saudi. We didn't play our usual game play and Scaloni got his tactics wrong where he didn't play with close combinations and via the midfield. Sure, there was an offside goal that should have been given to us, but performance wise, not that great. Especially with Lo Celso's injury, there was still doubts even after the Mexico game. For me personally, the Poland game was the game that got my belief back in the team.

3. Did you really think 9/10 right when Lo Celso got injured? There was a lot of doubts in terms of shaping our team because of his injury. Not sure if the WC win unconsciously gave you some bonus points for the 9/10

4. 6/10 is incredibly low, I don't think you are giving this team enough credit (well, since you don't watch the games then I can understand you for that lol). For me, it's 8/10 for the WC26 - only because there are some players like Soule, Barco, Anselmino and V. Gomez that needs to be added to our squad + form of Molina to which my rating will increase or decrease. We currently have a much better depth in squad quality compared to WC22 although our starting XI in WC22 is stronger. Also our players are proven, more experienced, mentally strong and has a winning mentality.

 

The problem with Saudi game was the team went panic after the third or fourth offside call in a row. We should just stay calm and playing the short passing game, eventually its going to be an onside pass. We looked like we're going to score all the time in first 30 minutes by playing that simple through ball. Lautaro & Messi were just narrowly offside.

Instead, at some point we started to gave the ball di Di Maria all the time and let him whipped a direct long pass to the box for our midgets.

Also, Papu gave the worst WC performance I've ever seen for Argentina since Palacio.

I wont judge the team from the last 4 qualifier games since they could just sleep at the hotel and still top the table.

 

Lo Celso injury didn't worry me too much cause I knew that McAllister and Enzo were killing it; they were pretty young and thus underrated. Nico's injury was a bigger worry cause I didn't think Di Maria could play a full tournament, as was the case.
-
It's interesting that our most impressive performance in WC22 was against Croatia. It was the only team that could match us in midfield. Scaloni started 4 mids but not to control the ball, rather to play 2 moderately deep solid lines against Croatia. Let them control the ball, knowing that they lacked the attackers to puncture our formation. Modric commented that Croatia was controlling the match until the penalty. Not the case at all, they were controlling the ball, but it was going just as Scaloni planed. Genius.
_

I put far less importance on experience than you. Maybe that explains most of the diff. I'd say:
2010: 6/10, we came in so shaky but had such great players all in form. Anything could have happened. Bizarre
2014: 8/10, counter attacking tactics to make up for deficient mid. Impressive in run-up but one dimensional.
2018: 3/10, terrible momentum, players out of form, roles unfilled
2022: 9/10, huge winning streak, copa win had released a lot of pressure
2026: 6/10, lots players aging and out of form, lacking desequilibrante attacker, but ballsy proven team

2002, 2006 sides came in very strong but I'm not going to go that far back lol.

 

The prices are disgusting. They are turning the sport of the working man into one for those who very wealthy.

There should be a mass fan boycott if FIFA do not lower ticket prices. £130 for a group game ? GFY FIFA. Fans make the atmosphere and sport. Every year that passes the sport gets further and further removed from it's origins thanks to the likes of Conehead and company. Disgusting.

 

I wouldn't pay too much attention to club football fans here. They are incredibly fickle. Indeed so are most fans worldwide. A hero one week a villain the next. Enzo is playing well enough. He just needs to take care of his knees. He's been playing almost 2 games every week now for the last three weeks.

Facu should leave there. He really has wasted his time over the last two years. Should have joined a mid table club and made a name for himself.

Paz wasted a year. Perrone a year. But they then made the right decision to move on. Echeverri wasting his time at the moment as well. Prestianni too.

 

I was the exact opposite to you as Nico injury meant that we didn't had to start him as a LW all games in the tournament, which is always a plus. I wouldn't say MacAllister was killing it (who basically replaced Lo Celso) before the Poland game, but the introduction of Enzo helped him massively.

I disagree about aging as the majority of the starters are right in their prime. The only player out of form is basically Molina and Montiel which is a problem for our RB. For MacAllister....not sure if it's actually a form problem or a coach problem, but we'll keep on monitoring.

 

It's hard to believe that Lo Celso injury didn't worry, because the thing that made the differece coming the 2022 WC was the trio Lo Celso - Paredes - De Paul, I don't know if it was a miracle or Scaloni's work that the subs could replicate what the starters did.

I think we miss Nico Gonzalez in 2022, against Netherlands and France he would have been the perfect sub.

Aging is a "problem" with only a few players, the 2022 team was young in general. The oldest are Messi and Otamendi, one is not a starter and the other one is Messi.
Then Tagliafico who seems age is not a problem for him, Dibu who is a GK so age is not a problem either.
The trio I mentioned before are all subs now aside from De Paul who I think the problem is not the age but his low level. Then the rest are under the 30s.

 

Di Maria is same age as Otamendi, but age definetely not an issue for him. He was MOTM in Copa 2024 final and still able to run for 115 minutes in that game.

I dont think Nico G would make much difference in those two games. Both Netherlands goals were from deadball situation. One of them could have been prevented though, but in ET we almost scored 4-5 times (hit the post twice). Its only by luck they're able to take the game into penalties.

The 2 penalties we conceided vs France were pure individual errors, it has nothing to do with tactic.