FIFA World Cup Betting Tips

About FIFA World Cup

The FIFA World Cup, often referred to simply as the World Cup, is an international association football competition involving the senior national teams of members of the FIFA, the world governing body of association football. Every four years since 1930, the championship is held, except for 1942 and 1946 due to the Second World War. Argentina won their third title at the 2022 tournament in Qatar, making them the reigning champions.

The format involves a qualifying phase that takes place in the previous three years to determine which teams qualify for the tournament phase. In the tournament phase, 32 teams compete for the title for about a month in host nation venues. The host nation(s) is/are automatically qualified.

A total of 79 national teams participated in twenty-one final tournaments before the 2018 World Cup. There have been eight national teams that have won the trophy so far. The Brazilian team has won five times and is the only one that has taken part in all tournaments. Germany and Italy won four titles each, Argentina won three titles, France, and Uruguay won two titles each, and England and Spain won one title each.

There is no doubt that the World Cup is the most prestigious association football tournament in the world, as well as the most watched and followed sporting event in the world. The cumulative audience for all matches in the 2006 World Cup was estimated at 26.29 billion, with the final watched by an estimated 715 million people, a ninth of the entire population of the planet.

It has been hosted twice by Brazil, France, Italy, Germany, Mexico, once by Uruguay, Switzerland, Sweden, Chile, England, Argentina, Spain, the United States, Japan and South Korea (jointly), South Africa, and Russia. Qatar will host the 2022 tournament and in 2026 Canada, the United States and Mexico will co-host. This will make Mexico the first country to host matches at three World Cups.