A 90-minute preview: friendlies between 2026 group opponents
Some of the teams that will face each other in the group stage have already played warm-ups against each other. Here's what those friendlies looked like. And what they don't tell us.
LitStreak Blog
Expert streak analysis and insights from the world of sports. Data-driven takes you won't find anywhere else.
Meet the World Cup 2026 debutants
Forty-eight teams means countries who've never been to a World Cup will finally play in one. Who they are, who they're drawn against, and how the new format gives them a path past the group stage.
World Cup penalty shootouts: who chokes, who delivers
Germany have never lost one. England have rarely won. Every World Cup penalty shootout since they were introduced in 1982, the team records they've built, and why 2026's larger bracket guarantees more of them.
Disciplined and dirty: the World Cup's card kings
Argentina rack them up. Switzerland barely get them. The national teams with the worst (and best) World Cup discipline, the players with the longest rap sheets, and the matches that still hold the record for sheer chaos.
The Group of Death, then and now
A 'group of death' is a group where every team has been there before. And the World Cup wins to prove it. The historical groups with the deepest combined pedigree, and which of 2026's twelve groups deserves the title this time.
Hungary 9-0, Brazil 1-7: anatomy of a World Cup blowout
The biggest goal differences in World Cup history. And what makes 2026's expanded knockout bracket more likely to produce another knockout-round humiliation.
Why second-half goals dominate modern World Cups
Before 1990, World Cup goals split roughly evenly between the two halves. Since then they haven't. The data on every tournament going back to 1930, and why the second-half share keeps creeping up.
Each country's top World Cup scorer. And who's chasing them in 2026
Messi sits on thirteen for Argentina. Ronaldo sits on eight for Portugal. Mbappé has twelve for France. Five countries whose all-time WC scoring record could fall in 2026. And one where the ghost is untouchable.
Hosts in the World Cup opener: 8 unbeaten, then Qatar
Mexico opens 2026 against a South Africa returning after sixteen years. Nine times a host has played their tournament's opening match. Eight times they didn't lose. Then Ecuador beat Qatar.
Four World Cup records 2026 could break (and one that won't)
48 teams, 104 matches, and a generation of scorers within striking distance. Four records to watch in 2026, and one that isn't going anywhere.