Topic: The 2026 FIFA World Cup Thread!!!

@anjinh00 He's tied with Klose now on 16 and Mbappe is 2 behind. Klose will probably be a distant third by the time the tournament over.

I wonder what kind of England will turn up tomorrow. The slow ponderous sideways passing and back to the keeper England of past tournaments, where the excuses from the likes of Neville, Wrighty and Rio will be "conserving energy levels", after a "long Premier League season". It will be classed as a "A clever, tactical move by Tuchel, who is plotting to "go deep into the tournament" and won't be wanting to "peak too early".

Or will we get an England who do what England almost never do - impress in the group stages. Lay down a marker, with a confident, professional performance. One where the big players shine and some of Tuchel's controversial picks show why he took them.

I have never led a country into a World Cup campaign, but in my view, momentum is everything. Play well and it gives the country hope. The hype and the belief will build, and the confidence of the team will grow with it. Play poorly and the criticism and negativity comes quickly, and with it, pressure.

England may have made the final of the last Euros but bloody hell they were dull. The negativity surrounding that entire campaign from the first game to the last, was unlike anything I've ever seen. And it was obvious the players felt it.

There probably is some truth to not wanting to peak too early, if you hope to go deep into the tournament, but I still think it's best to get a big result in the group, so the fans, pundits and media are on side.

And in the context of the day, it's even better:

First game of the day, 27-year-old Mbappe gets a brace...huffs and puffs to get the hat-trick...but cannot.
Second game of the day, 25-year-old Haaland gets a brace...huffs and puffs to get the hat-trick...but cannot.

Third game of the dya, 38-year-old Messi gets a hat-trick (plus a marginally offside 5th minute goal)
...and substitutes off at 80'.

Captain Kane man!

The England game was great. I was expecting more from Portugal but it looks like Republic of Congo had them lock down with their defense.

Portugal need Ronaldo to get injured.

Portugal fans are praying Messi doesn't announce he's definitely playing in the 2030 World Cup.

Gareth Southgate at half-time England v Croatia:

Gareth Southgate in the 2nd half:

Absolutely disgusting playimg.by Qatar. What did they believe because they couldnt win they would just injure opposing players? I was cheering each red card they got.

@Tasuki I briefly looked away just before Kone was injured, and thankfully missed his lower leg snapping. It was very telling that FIFA never showed a replay of the tackle.

I can't imagine looking down at my leg and seeing that. I think the shock would be worse than the pain. Fair play to him applauding the crowd as he was stretchered off.

Here are the records broken (and a leg, yes) in Canada's 6-0 demolition of Qatar:

• Canada's first ever World Cup win (so glad I don't have to track the odds for that ever again!)
• First hat trick scored by a player in a World Cup host country, since Geoff Hurst in the 1966 final.
• First hat trick scored by a non-Europeon or non-South American player since 1930.
• Equals the record margin of victory for a tournament host, matching the six-goal wins for Italy in 1934, Brazil in 1950 and Argentina in 1978.

Jonathan David is currently tied with Lionel Messi for the golden boot, and Cyle Larin is right behind him, tied with a bunch of people for the bronze boot (stop the count!)

A draw with Switzerland next week would win us the group, and see us face a 3rd-place team in the Round of 32.

You might say "who cares, Qatar is crap"...but Switzerland couldn't beat them!

I'm not really surprised by Canada. I expected them to do well. They've got some quality players and Jesse Marsch is a good manager.

If they can win the group, then the last 32 and 16 ties are both at BC Place in Vancouver. That would be a huge advantage. If they come 2nd, then they wouldn't play another game at home.

@OorWullie

Yeah, I forget it would also earn us continued homefield advantage!

Career World Cup hat-tricks:
Jonathan David - 1
Cristiano Ronaldo - 0

As a long suffering Scot who has never seen Scotland make it out of the groups of any tournament ever, please let this tournament be the one. Let us experience a knockout tie for one time in my life. Any sort of win over Morocco would be the greatest result in our history, topping any win over England , and even our 3v2 over the Dutch at Argentina 78. As it would mean we're all but guaranteed us a last 32 tie.

This could well be the last World Cup we qualify for, for a long time, as the new qualification format coming in for 2030, is going to make it a whole lot harder for anyone but the biggest sides, to qualify.

It's going to be kind of similar to the new Champions League format. But instead of a single 36 team league, it will be split into 3 leagues of 12, with 4 teams from each seeded pot in each league. Each team will play 6 different opponents once. And the top 4 teams in each league will automatically qualify. With 5th and 6th going into play offs.

With every team playing 2 teams from each pot, Scotland's qualifying fixtures could look like -
Spain away - Norway home - Bosnia away - France home - Switzerland away - Greece home.
And it would be possible for one single league to contain Spain, England, France, and Germany.... And we'd need to finish 6th at minimum.

This has been done to help Italy and ensure the big sides no longer miss out.

But Cristiano did a Hat-Trick on Spain in the 2018 World Cup, im pretty sure.

@OorWullie

Holy ***** really?

As a Cannuck it was great to see Canada finally get their first world cup win. They tried very hard 4 years ago but just couldn't get a point. Granted, their group is a favourable one but I find that there are a lot of favourable groups this year because of how many teams qualify... Is there honestly a true Group of death this round?

As for Italy - *****. We were supposed to face them but they couldn't beat Bosnia (huge Kit swap in Toronto from the local Italians for Canadian ones after Italy failed to qualify was hilarious)- and neither could the Canadians on opening day despite them getting their act together in the second half and being all over them but it's football... Strange stuff happens.

But honestly, countries like Scotland have a hard enough time getting to qualify. It's very difficult in Europe and now they are making it tougher? Scotland making the world cup means a ton more than Australia... There has to be a better system now that more teams are qualifying.

Cheers Scotland.. I'm rooting for you. The team always tries so hard - no pansies among them either.

Scotland missed the chance to build up a good goal difference against Haiti. A draw in tonight's match would have been enough. That would have practically guaranteed qualification, at least as one of the best third-placed teams.
I’ll be rooting for Scotland today, and for Brazil right after, obviously.

Wil be nice to see all 3 host countries in the next round. Mexico made it yesterday with their win over South Korea. We will see if US can do it today.

On a side not I saw the video of the foul from the Canada/Qatar match where the foul took out that player from Canada. His leg was broken and you can see it was a deliberate attack on him, absolute disgusting. I dont understand why Qatar isnt kicked out of the tournament for that. Gotta love that blood money.

Beautiful showing by the US today.. Now to see how the Paraguay/Turkey game goes to see if US makes it to the next round.