Random World Cup Facts

To be fair, I think we should not include one-hit wonders.

Having said that, in the case of Wales, if we include "major tournaments", they are indeed a member of that club, but not the Republic of Ireland.

 

Argentina and Germany are the only non-seeded / pot 1 teams that have won the World Cup. Every other champion so far has been a seeded team.

Argentina won the 1986 World cup without being one of the six seeded teams (Mexico [Hosts], Italy, West Germany, France, Brazil)

West Germany wasn't a seeded team in their 1954 WC win, although it was due to the fact they were recently reinstated as FIFA members after WWII, if we use retroactive elo ratings they would have been a seeded team.

Important to note that from 1958-1970 the draw was done by continents without any seeded team.

 

I am kind of a fan of the 1954 as it resembles the #TwinPool48 format for a 48 team. world cup in a nutshell.

It is based on the so called "swiss system".

this takes into account, that with a limitation of provisioned matches and match days,, you wave good bye to a strict round robin format.

you need to take into account thar 1954, having round robin in all groups would have meant 8 more matches (24 instead of 32) = saves 25%. So as facilities and all were not that mature, such a dormat makes sense from the past persepctive.

with the twin pool format for 48, you have 88 instead 136 if round-robin at group stage would be applied.

 

Most people would agree that the OFC is the weakest confederation. However a team from OFC has never occupied the last position in a WC:

• Australia 1974 (Zaire got last place).
• New Zealand 1982 (El Salvador got last place).
• Australia 2006 (Serbia and Montenegro got last place).
• New Zealand 2010 (North Korea got last place).

They will continue to hold this record until 2026.

 

OFC have always had to qualify by playing teams from other confederations or regions. I'm not sure the teams that eliminated OFC teams to qualify have finished a world cup with the worst record either. Those teams going back are Peru (2018), Mexico(2014), Uruguay (2002), Iran (1998), Argentina (1994), Scotland (1986), Israel (1970), Noth Korea (1966). No OFC teams entered before then and in the years I've missed out OFC teams didn't make it to the final stages (1990 Israel played in the OFC group and won, then lost to Colombia in a playoff and 1978 Australia made it to the final group stage in AFC but finished 4th)

Another random fact is that Australia is the only country to have played teams from every inhabited continent in World Cup Qualifying.

 

We played Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in 1970 qualifiers.

 

No others with 3.
A few with 2.

1954: Turkey, South Korea
1974: Australia, East Germany
1994: Greece, Nigeria

I base this on FIFA's view on successor national teams where results/histories were passed on.
Yugoslavia... Serbia/Montenegro
Czechoslovakia... Czech Republic
etc.

 

Teams from all five big confederations but CAF. That goes to show how unforgiving CAF Qualfying is.

 

If I recall correctly, Chile either goes out in the group stage or is eliminated by
Brazil, and only Brazil in the knockout rounds. I wonder what they may have done if they did not always run into Brazil.

 

With the increase to 48 I can only see those streaks continuing for the immediate future. UEFA has only gone to 16 from 13 so maybe it will be a UEFA team to break their streak.

 

Yeah. And Brazil, Argentina, USA, Mexico will never miss a world cup. At least not for the next 100 years.

 

You never know. FIFA might suspend one of them.

 

You never know how deep Mexico can fall.

 

Speaking of Mexico, I just noticed that they topped their wc group every time they got grouped with Italy

I found it funny cause well you know, they have almost the same flag

 

In a Concacaf with 6/7 world cup places? They will never fail. Unless they make some crazy straight knockout format or something.

 

I mean look at 2010 World Cup Qualifying, Mexico only qualified for the hex via goal dif. I assume they would have taken their last game more seriously... but not out of the question.

If say 6 qualify and you have a final round of 3 groups of 4. you could have a Mexico, Panama, Jamaica group. While not likely, 1-2 bad results could doom you.

 

I think that head-to-head should be the first tiebreaker everywhere.

 

I disagree. In group or league play the overall results are the ones that should count first. The head to head could be affected by one off factors eg suspensions, injuries, conditions, dodgy decisions etc. If a team performs better across all the games then that should be the first decider.