Trápala Ecuménica. Trampullada Nos Confíns Do Destino Manifesto.

"Money, Money, Money" Football World Cup 2026

Okay, let's get this out of the way from the off. FIFA is corrupt, the competition should never have been given to US. This is simply about money. On that basis I hope it's a total financial flop of catastrophic proportions. Having said that will I be watching as many games as possible? Damn right, I love the big footie events. Another issue is the number of teams who have qualified. Far too many. Some of these teams are no better than a pub team and will be forgotten as soon as the next round begins and the competition starts "proper" with the round of 32, consisting of first 2 in each group and 8 of the "best of the rest" The timings of many of the games are certainly not Euro friendly with many being played between midnight and 5am. Not sure if the pubs will be open for any of these, though I remember in a previous World Cup going to the pub around 6 in the morning and staggering into the Kebab shop around tea time. Not sure there will be a big crowd for the Ecuador v Curacao game with a 3am kick off time. As I said the real thing will start later once, to quote Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, they "separate the wheat from the chaff" on this basis I don't intend to comment on every team of the group stages, just too many. I will do a separate post for each stage of the competition with comments on each team making the next stage of the competition.

For this stage I will simply list the teams in each group in the order in which I expect them to finish. Hang on to your hats it's gonna be a long ride:

Group A
MEXICO
South Korea
Czechia
South Africa

Group B
SWITZERLAND
Canada
Bosnia
Qatar

Group C
BRAZIL
Morocco
Scotland
Haiti

Group D
TURKEY
USA
Paraguay
Australia

Group E
GERMANY
Ivory Coast
Ecuador
Curacao

Group F
NETHERLANDS
Japan
Sweden
Tunisia

Group G
BELGIUM
Egypt
New Zealand
Iran

Group H
SPAIN
Uruguay
Saudi Arabia
Cape Verde

Group I
FRANCE
Senegal
Norway
Iraq

Group J
ARGENTINA
Algeria
Austria
Jordan

Group K
PORTUGAL
Colombia
Uzbekistan
DR Congo

Group L
ENGLAND
Croatia
Ghana
Panama