Why The World Cup Was Better Than Expected

Before a single ball was kicked this summer, it felt like every supposed expert told us the exact same thing. A 40-18 World Cup would be an absolute disaster. They swore the group stage would be completely diluted and void of quality, that we'd see dull knockout games played in absurd heat after long travel days, and that it was all just to fill FIFA's bank accounts. Now, part of that might actually be true, but don't act like you're surprised. However, having witnessed some brilliantly entertaining football, some all-time World Cup shocks and the big hitters all showing up, I'm asking myself the question, has the World Cup actually been good? And in my humble opinion, yes. And here's why. Now, the biggest argument against this World Cup expansion was that welcoming 48 countries would fundamentally lower the bar of international quality, and when you look at the team quality index from Opta, you can kind of understand that claim. They rate every team out of 100, based on a variety of player factors, and with Cape Verde getting 64 points out of 100, it would place them as an average team in the Chilean second division, the 158th best league in the world. Meanwhile, Panama's 71.4 would see them comfortable in the Bosnia and Herzegovina Premier League, the 63rd best league in the world. You get my point. This led to the prevailing belief that group stage matches would turn into utterly unwatchable one-sided training sessions that would almost make a mockery of the tournament build as the best in the world. But from the evidence we've seen on the pitch, that script has been completely flipped. The group stage had the drama of any World Cup tournament I can remember, and then some. And the first reason for this was, of course, the individual performances. Who would have backed Virginia and Cape Verde to pull off the miracles they did and go through to the knockout stage unbeaten? Or all three host nations to cruise through with exceptional records? Sure, there were a few bigger teams that did what was expected of them, most notably Germany thrashing Curaçao 7-1, but the idea that lesser teams would lead to lesser games just didn't seem to be the case. The other reason I think the group stage wasn't a waste of time was because of the drama that came with the third place slots being up for grabs, as it meant that some teams still had it all to play for on the final day. Take a look at Paraguay, for example. They looked completely broken, hopeless in their first match, suffered a 4-1 heavy loss to the US. In previous tournaments, the structure of the groups would have almost seen them booking an early flight home. Instead, because the pathway remained open, they regrouped, they beat Turkey, they ground out a draw versus Australia and they scraped through. It also gave us the drama of Austria versus Algeria in the final game, where a draw was needed to see both sides through. So when Algeria took a lead in the 92nd minute, Austria knew they only needed one goal and not all hope was lost. They got it and they went through in third place. The payoff of this structure was that some smaller nations, although not all, didn't turn up just to collect a participation medal or swap jerseys with a bape, but turned up knowing that a single moment of magic could put them in the history books. Overall, I'd say the group stage was good. The quality wasn't diluted to the point it made the games boring and there were enough storylines being written by the smaller nations that it didn't feel as though they were just making up the numbers. In fact, some of those underdog fairy tales will be exactly what we think of defining this World Cup when looking back on it in the weeks, months and years to come. Now on paper, the quarterfinal brackets look perfectly normal, but if you assume their path here was a comfortable stroll, you are completely misreading the narrative. Now, if you couldn't tell by this point, I love an underdog story and a bit of a cup upset. Most football fans do. I don't think that's in any way near considered a hot take, but the fact we've had a few of the big guns sweating and even being knocked out early puts this World Cup in a pretty high ranking for me. As I mentioned, Cape Verde not only made it out of the group, but then really showed their teeth in the round of 32, taking Lionel Messi's Argentina all the way through extra time before eventually succumbing to the insane quality of their opposition. The beauty of this was in the unknown quantity that a lesser side brings, even after three games of mixing it with the bigger sides in a group that contained Spain and Uruguay. I mean, which football fan doesn't want to see that? I promise this isn't a hit piece on Argentina, but they actually did have to produce one of the World Cup's greatest comebacks to still be in the competition in their last 16 tie against Egypt. Paraguay wouldn't have been given a chance by Manning to go through yet. After a one-all draw, they were the ones who kept their nerve, and unusually for Germany, a penalty shootout did not go in their favor. Brazil, definitely in the same boat as well. They arrived to a multi-billion pound squad full of superstar individuals led by one of the most successful managers of all time, entirely underestimated the structural intensity of their opposition, and got clinically dispatched by an Erling Haaland-led Norwegian side featuring at their first World Cup since 1998. At this point, I should also mention that I was going to put Morocco in there beating Netherlands on penalties, but honestly, that's not an underdog shock. If anything, you could argue the favourites went through in that tie, but I'll leave that for you guys to debate in the comment section below. And lastly, of course, we have to address the England-sized elephant in the room and their performance, or lack of, against the Archongo in the round of 32. I don't think I've watched a more disappointing 75 minutes of football in recent memory, and the team I support have been nothing short of diabolical in the past few years. Sure, England and more specifically Harry Kane turned things around late on, and England have gone from strength to strength since, but honestly, the Archongo putting up a good fight shouldn't be something that we want erased from a competition such as the World Cup, is it? Like I said, made me feel crap for over an hour, but it proved that tournament football, especially in the World Cup, the playing field is and can be level. But much like with all fairy tales, things have to come to an end, and the way that this happened isn't actually a bad thing, despite the fact it's in stark contrast to everything I've just been prattling on about. Video aside for a second, here's a hypothetical question for you. Imagine you're on your holidays during the World Cup, or travelling somewhere for work, and you can't get your World Cup fix. You've got your TV licence sorted to watch coverage in the UK, but not abroad. So what do you do? Well, our office friends at Tom's Guide have the answer, because they've tested a wide range of VPNs, and Norton VPN stands out as a strong option. Fast, reliable, and it comes with a 60-day money-back guarantee, enough to cover the entire World Cup tournament, so you can try it risk-free. And the best bit, for all 442 viewers, there is an exclusive offer available. All you have to do is click the link in the description to learn more. So the reason that these fairy tales reach a conclusion? Individual quality. In true US of A style, this tournament has been largely about the individuality of the world's best players, and it has actually been a really cool dimension to proceedings. In the same way that the big names made up the last eight, the goalscoring chart also reads like a who's who of footballing royalty. Lionel Messi, having broken the World Cup all-time scoring record, is up there with Kylian Mbappe hot on his heels. Erling Haaland single-handedly fired Norway into a quarterfinal of seven goals. Harry Kane is in the mix too, with Jude Bellingham as well. These are all the names you'd expect to see, because they're the ones we speak about week in, week out in domestic football when it comes to the most valuable, the best players, the highest goalscores. And I kind of like that. It feels like we are genuinely seeing these players go goal for goal with each other. The big hitters have come out swinging and are prepared to drag their teams through the gauntlet in the search for eternal glory. The analogy I'd use here actually is imagine if you get all the biggest heavyweight boxers in the world together for a competition like this, and nobody landed a knockout blow. Just hot-stepping around the canvas, swings and misses, underperforming, overpaid, and in the end it's won in the split vote without seeing someone whacked in the face. I told you this would be in contradiction to what I said about seeing the little guy wanting to win, but watching some of the world's best do it on the big stage is truly something to marvel at. Let's face it, if there was no competition and the golden boot winner or tournament winner just cruised to the trophy, most people in comment sections and message boards across the globe would be devaluing the achievement due to the lack of a true test. On paper, Argentina's run to the semi-final, consisting of Cape Verde, Egypt and Switzerland, doesn't exactly sound like the toughest, but as I mentioned earlier, they absolutely were made to work for it. Let's be real here, FIFA didn't expand this tournament to 48 teams because they wanted to share the love in global football or help smaller nations grow, despite what FIFA president Gianni Infantino may say. They did it for the pure, unadulterated corporate greed. They wanted more matches, more stadium tickets, more sponsorship, and more broadcasting hours to But football has a funny way of surviving its own lawmakers. They wanted a bloated corporate circus, but what we actually got on the pitch was a beautiful, chaotic roller coaster that threatened to dismantle the sport's traditional superpowers at every twist, turn and loop de loop along the way. And honestly, isn't that exactly what football is supposed to be about?