Qatar 2022. An exciting World Cup. How much equality exists between the teams?

Qatar 2022 is being an exciting World Cup. Like all world cups, good football fans are enjoying the great matches and the approaches and events of the different teams. And also, and how could it be otherwise, the uncertainty and emotion of some results that make me reflect on the equality that exists in modern football today.

In the GROUP PHASE, we could already see that for the first time in history, no team out of the 32 participants was able to win all the matches. At the same time, and as a historical anecdote of parity, it is the first time that teams from all continents were represented in the round of 16. Compared to the last World Cup in Russia 2018, the number of points and victories per team can be seen in the following table:

GROUP PHASE POINTS	WORLD CUP RUSSIA 2018	WORLD CUP QATAR 2022
9	3	–
7	2	3
6	5	8
5	4	2
4	2	3

All of us who have been involved in the preparation of teams for the World Cup are aware of the equality, difficulty and complexity involved in firstly qualifying for the big event, and then qualifying for the next phase after the groups.

In the LAST SIXTEEN we probably had the biggest qualitative differences between teams with 2 match profiles:

1) Differential profile: 5 games out of 8, in which the score was equal to or greater than a difference of 2 goals, where some games stand out with wins such as Portugal’s 6-1 against Switzerland and Brazil’s against Korea from the South 4-1;

2) Equality profile: on the other hand, 3 games out of 8 with minimal differences and 2 extensions and a penalty shootout.In the QUARTER-FINAL, absolute equality between teams arrived, being decided by small details, with two extra times and penalties and two games decided by the minimum until the last moment. What are the characteristics of the teams that have surpassed this level? What are the reasons why the matches have been decided?

In the QUARTER-FINAL, absolute equality between teams arrived, being decided by small details, with two extra times and penalties and two games decided by the minimum until the last moment. What are the characteristics of the teams that have surpassed this level? What are the reasons why the matches have been decided?

A few weeks ago, in an interview in La Vanguardia, professor Seirulo told us that “Football is not just numbers, it is interactions. It is anticipating, being intelligent, attacking and defending, and helping your teammates. And that is not measured. If we all use numbers, football becomes too even”. And it really is like that: the technical differences between players and teams and the tactical approaches are being equalized and optimized a lot due to the level of information and analysis of the technical bodies where it is already very difficult to surprise the rivals. Regarding the physical or conditional, the teams have good players, but also great athletes. In the World Cup statistics we already see numerous players who in game situations exceed the maximum speed of 35 km/h. We have been able to see games of much more than 90′ and also extensions that together with the discount periods have gone to more than 130-135′ in total play. Despite this, and the congested calendar that a championship like this entails, we have not seen ostensible drops in performance by any of the teams. As a consequence, I believe that, in future calls and preparations for national team championships, due to this technical, tactical and physical equality, very robust players should be taken into account who could maintain that high pace of competition for many games and in a short space of time.

In principle, some exciting SEMIFINALS AND FINAL are presented for the last 3 games. Will we continue to see this evolution of the championship with equal teams? What for you have been the differentiating aspects in the performance between the teams? And above all, and what may be most interesting finally, what characteristics do the players who are shining the most in this new version of modern football have?