How it works
The progress of the World Cup from match to match is determined from
the beginning: there are no further draws to decide who plays whom in
subsequent rounds.
To maximise the spectacle, the competition is structured, broadly, to
ensure that the “bigger” teams don’t face each other (and knock each
other out) too early in the competition, and to ensure that all 48
teams have an incentive to field their strongest side for every
fixture.
The top two teams from each group automatically qualify to the next
round. Because the winner of a group will face a second- or
third-placed team from another group, the hope is that France, for
instance, will not rest on their laurels once they have enough points
to qualify for the knockouts but will try to win their last game to
get what in principle are easier opponents in the next round, the last
32.
At the other end of the table, a team who know they will come at best
third in their group still have an incentive to give their all in that
last group game because the eight best-performing of the 12
third-placed teams also go into the last 32.
Let’s take the example of England, wholly arbitrarily. If England top
their group, they will face a third-placed team in the first knockout
round (technically any one of 20 other teams, but plausibly a team
such as Côte d’Ivoire or Algeria). If they come second, they will play
the runners-up from Group K, plausibly Colombia. And if they come
third but have a better points total or goal difference than four of
the other third-placed teams, they get a tougher fixture, against the
winners of Group K, possibly Portugal. The simulator includes the
predetermined routes for all 495 possible combinations of groups
yielding the eight best third-placed teams.
This simulator allows you to change the outcome of each group and see
the effect that those changes have on the last 32, and then to imagine
the winner of each knockout game to plot each team’s possible route to
the final.
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