Every football fan remembers where they were when Brazil suffered humiliation at the hands of Germany during the last World Cup on their home turf. The 7-1 loss in the semifinals was undoubtedly one of the darkest days in the nation’s sporting history.
Every once in a while it pops back into Omar Gonzalez’s head. A night of terror for all U.S. soccer players and fans.
Omar Gonzalez was on the field the night the USMNT shockingly lost 2-1 to Trinidad and Tobago and — thanks to results elsewhere — failed to qualify for the World Cup for the first time since 1986. It was off his leg that the Soca Warriors scored their first goal, one of the flukiest own goals you’ll ever see.
When Argentina manager Jorge Sampaoli announced his final 23-man roster for the World Cup, he didn't call on one of the hottest strikers on the planet. Inter Milan's Mauro Icardi tied Lazio's Ciro Immobile for golden boot honors in Serie A, scoring 29 goals in 34 games during the 2017-18 season. Instead of being rewarded for a stellar season, Icardi joined the unenviable list of World Cup snubs.
Hope Solo has often been a figure of division throughout her playing career, and she has only added to that with her latest remarks. Solo believes that the joint bid consisting of the United States, Mexico and Canada should not win the hosting rights for the 2026 World Cup.
When Germany announced its final roster for the World Cup, the exclusion of Leroy Sane vaulted the Man City winger to the top of the list of the best players not going to the World Cup this summer. Whether a player was snubbed from a loaded World Cup roster or plays for a country that didn't qualify, there is some great talent that will be missing out on the action in Russia.
*WARNING: READ THIS OR YOU WILL BE BUTT HURT*
I too know the obvious favorites based off the readily accessible odds that are available to everyone. But upsets do happen at the World Cup. In fact, they happen every single tournament. Every. Single. Time.
So if you want to see traditional power rankings with all the countries lined up entirely how you’d expect them to be, go to ESPNFC or something. Have fun reading that.
Soccer, unlike pretty much every other sport, regularly features massive upsets. Because sports like American football and basketball are higher scoring, typically the better team wins in the end. Soccer is low scoring, meaning an underdog can often hold off an opponent for an unlikely result.
In terms of glamour, no group stage game comes close to matching Portugal vs Spain on June 15 at Fisht Olympic Stadium in Sochi. This is, after all, a meeting between the last three European Champions (Spain in ’08 and ’12, Portugal in ’16), and a clash between arguably the world’s best player, Cristiano Ronaldo, and a who’s who of talent concentrated at the mega clubs of the world’s two best domestic leagues.
When it was confirmed that Russia would be opening the 2018 FIFA World Cup with a match against Saudi Arabia at the Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow, the general response was one of deep cynicism: here was a bit of home cooking on FIFA’s end; certainly this was the worst opening match in the history of the tournament.