The FIFA World Cup returns in just about a year’s time, this time in Qatar. Here are 10 facts about the world’s greatest football tournament.
How many?
Including the most recent in 2018, the World Cup has taken place 21 different times in 17 different countries. First, hosted by Uruguay in 1930, with the Olympics beforehand being the most prestigious international tournament.
Two Continents
So far, the only teams to have won the World Cup have come from either Europe or South America.
Golden Oldies
The oldest player to have played in the tournament was Egyptian goalkeeper Essam El-Hadary at the age of 45 at the 2018 World Cup. The oldest goalscorer was Cameroon’s Roger Milla at the age of 42 who came out of retirement for the 1994 World Cup.
Blonde Romania
After beating Colombia and then England at the group stages of France 98, the Romanian squad all decided to dye their hair bleach blonde. The new style was unveiled before their final group game against Tunisia, and was supposed to bring greater team cohesion. Unfortunately, they were knocked out in the next round.
Biggest Losers
Mexico currently holds the record for most World Cup losses with 25. They do however have 14 wins and 14 draws to make up for that.
Biggest Scorers
The current highest-scoring active player in the tournament is Germany’s Thomas Müller with 10 goals. The all-time highest-scoring player in the World Cup is also a German, Miroslav Klose with 16 goals.
Biggest Scorer in One Game
Oleg Salenko of Russia has scored the most goals during a single World Cup match, when he scored 5 against Cameroon back in 1994. This was also the match Roger Milla scored in, and Salenko’s six goals left him as joint highest-scorer for that tournament.
New Format
For a considerable period, each world cup has had 32 individual teams competing, split initially into groups of 4. However in 2026, the World Cup will instead have 48 teams who will be split into groups of three instead.
Coaching Coincidences
Despite many national teams employing managers who don’t share the players’ nationality, every World Cup winner since the tournament’s formation has been won by a coach who holds the same nationality as the team they are coaching.
Little Fish
The smallest country by population to have ever qualified for the competition is Iceland. Iceland roughly has a population under 350,000. Iceland managed to draw with Argentina in their first game. However, they failed to win or get any further than the group stage in 2018.
