Data | Potential upsets and close games in 2022 FIFA World Cup’s group stage

The biggest possible upset in this World Cup would be Cameroon beating Brazil

The first round of the FIFA World Cup is considered to be the least thrilling in the tournament given the potentially wide gap in quality between the competing teams. The groups are designed such that two strong teams don’t feature in the same lot. However, such matches can be exciting too. Some David versus Goliath matches lead to stunning defeats of the giants of the game. And when a lower-ranked team plays against a similarly ranked nation, the game may turn out to be gripping, given that there are no favourites to start with. Such encounters may also take place in the 2022 FIFA World Cup’s group-stage games. We look at each contest in the group-stage matches to assess the possible competitiveness based on Elo ratings.

Elo ratings are used to measure a team’s relative strength. The Elo system assigns a rating to each nation, using the results of previous international games. It adds weight based on the opponent’s strength and makes adjustments for the home team advantage and the goal difference. For this analysis, the Elo ratings at the start of each World Cup were considered.

For instance, the group-stage match between England and Iran on Monday would have been considered an “upset” had Iran won the game. This is because Iran’s Elo rating was 1,797 — 123 points less than England’s rating of 1,920 — at the start of the tournament. However, England won emphatically, scoring six goals in the game against Iran’s two. In other words, this was not an upset, but an expected win.

Table 1 shows the difference in the Elo ratings of teams that are playing against each other in the group stages. A higher number corresponds to a bigger difference in Elo ratings between two nations — in other words “predictable” fixtures. A smaller number points to closely fought battles as the Elo difference is lower.

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The biggest possible upset in this World Cup would be if Cameroon won against Brazil on December 3 in the Group G game. Cameroon’s rating of 1,610 was 559 points behind that of Brazil (2,169). If Saudi Arabia beats Argentina in today’s Group C game, that would count as the second biggest upset in terms of the Elo difference (508 points).

Group B games are expected to be close encounters as the U.S., Iran and Wales are closely ranked — all of them have relatively low ELO ratings. On the other hand, Group H games are expected to be more predictable, given the wide variation in rankings.