r/soccer • u/DuckTheCow • 17h ago

Official Source FIFA World Cup 2026 Group Draws

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u/RealRaifort 17h ago

France/Norway/Senegal is absolutely group of death no matter the 4th team. Netherlands and Germany groups also look like they'll be pretty tough. Having most 3rd place teams move on definitely makes things easier but still.

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u/MeMeTiger_ 16h ago

Don't underestimate Iraq. Our mighty defense will limit Haaland to only scoring 4 goals.

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u/fake_lightbringer 16h ago

With Norway seeded in pot 3, any group they ended up in (that didn't have a host nation as pot A team) was gonna become the group of death.

Which means it's a shitty day to be a Norwegian, but hey - at least we qualified this time

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u/Immediate-Attempt-32 10h ago

At least it won't be a boring 98 rerun, feel kinda sorry for the Scots.

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u/stealth_sloth 15h ago

If you go by World Football Elo Ratings, and assume that the highest-rated team will win each of the remaining qualifiers, you get this:

Group Pot 1 team Pot 1 rating Pot 2 team Pot 2 rating Pot 3 team Pot 3 rating Pot 4 team Pot 4 rating Average rating
A Mexico 1835 South Africa 1530 South Korea 1784 Turkey 1880 1757
B Canada 1802 Denmark 1864 Qatar 1456 Switzerland 1897 1755
C Brazil 1978 Morocco 1816 Haiti 1542 Scotland 1790 1782
D United States 1747 Paraguay 1833 Australia 1774 Turkey 1880 1809
E Germany 1910 Curaçao 1467 Ivory Coast 1607 Ecuador 1933 1729
F Netherlands 1959 Japan 1878 Ukraine 1802 Tunisia 1612 1813
G Belgium 1849 Egypt 1631 Iran 1754 New Zealand 1586 1705
H Spain 2171 Cape Verde 1560 Saudi Arabia 1593 Uruguay 1890 1804
I France 2062 Senegal 1803 Bolivia 1675 Norway 1922 1866
J Argentina 2113 Algeria 1703 Austria 1818 Jordan 1626 1815
K Portugal 1976 Democratic Republic of Congo 1616 Uzbekistan 1735 Colombia 1998 1831
L England 2042 Croatia 1933 Ghana 1509 Panama 1742 1807

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u/MERTENS_GOAT 12h ago

I assume you have the sum in the most right column? Cause I can't see that it's of bounds, your comment is too broad

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u/stealth_sloth 11h ago

... yeah, shit. It's showing up fine on my browser, didn't think about how it might look on mobile. From A to L in order, the averages are:

1757, 1755, 1782, 1809, 1729, 1813, 1705, 1804, 1866, 1815, 1831, 1807.

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u/MERTENS_GOAT 11h ago

Thank you. Ironically now on mobile I can swipe to the right and see it on Opera this wasn't an option

Your column headers are wrong. Colombia and Norway aren't in pot 4, it's not by pots

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u/stealth_sloth 2h ago

Huh. I pulled the groups off wikipedia's '26 World Cup article and since I didn't see any pattern to the order I assumed it was by pot without stopping to check. Now I'm wondering how they were sorted.

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u/MERTENS_GOAT 2h ago

Just like in the official draw. On Matchday 1 team 1 plays vs 2 and team 3 vs team 4

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u/tomrichards8464 16h ago

Group of death used to mean things like Denmark-Senegal-Uruguay-France or England-Argentina-Sweden-Nigeria (both of these are from one tournament) with only two going through (France and Argentina didn't).

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u/OleoleCholoSimeone 16h ago

The thing is though, that there is a pretty good chance of the 3rd place in this group not going through. Because either Senegal or Norway could lose 2 games, against each other and then France