World Cup Preview, Part 2
Groups D, E, and F
It’s time for some of the most fun and random soccer of the 4 year cycle! Where your mental stereotypes of Norway, Egypt, Japan and New Zealand get tested on the pitch and a whistle on a handball from a ref from El Salvador decides the fate of Spain’s title push! It’s the World Cup! Preview coming up, but first…
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World Cup Fantasy, For the Not-So-Big Bucks
If you are interested in playing a World Cup salary game I created, either comment or message me here or email me at dustinw100@gmail.com. You have $100 fake dollars to pick 6 teams who score points based on wins and draws in group stage plus points for winning each knockout round.
You will have to trust me with a real $10 entry fee via PayPal or something similar with the winner taking all, unless we get 10+ people (at ~6 right now), then second gets a cut. Will be fun and the salaries are created to be as fair as possible so no Odds Wizards/Research Junkies get a big edge. Just a fun way to play along if interested! I have already make my picks and will let you know my squad as soon as you send me yours so I don’t get an advantage.
Click Here To See The Sheet and Lineup Builder!
Example of highest salary teams, Jordan at $8 is the cheapest.
What this will be
-a classic Saturdays Secret Sauce* breakdown of how teams have played, adjusted for schedule (ELO score here).
-full of the creative writing, analysis and analogies that show up here ever so sporadically to separate this site from the 90th percentile Claude analysis you will be able to get pretty soon.
-my favorite picks I will be “investing” in, since last World Cup I came out pretty well using this strategy and betting on the groups. Do not take betting advice as investment advice, if you want to make money with your money go put it on the stock market or bonds. I like betting on the World Cup and soccer in general as it gives me extra focus on the matches, adds entertainment and is a puzzle to try and figure out. I think it makes the pieces I write better, but I am a losing sports better overall and do not recommend blindly tailing me. It’s just explaining my thought process and how I use this research.
*giving teams a performance score for each match based on xG^, shots, deep touches, possession, and a bit more in these cases (corners and shots on target) since I don’t have nearly as detailed data
^when available
What this will not be
-player focused, I do not have the analysis skills to even judge 20% of the players in the World Cup and you do not have the reading and memorization skills to keep Iran’s key players in mind…also like 20% of the time they get benched or are minor parts of the team at the World Cup anyway. Last World Cup I was very successful simply looking at how the national teams had played in the 12-18 months leading up to the World Cup and assuming that would be mirrored going forward
-I will not be diving too much into the context of the matchups leading up. If there’s an early red card or they played a putrid minnow (Niger, Somalia, San Marino, Hong Kong, etc) I toss it out. If it’s a friendly or a meaningless qualifier, I leave it in. Good cases for weighting, but just not enough of a sample or a guaranteed return so we are just rolling averages here.
-focused on the knockout matchups: when we get there, we get there. Betting on how teams will run after the Group Stage takes an even higher rake and a great ability to read matchups and opponent quality well beyond the group.
-too much ranting against the format. 32 of the 48 teams advancing to a straight knockout is simply absurd. There are essentially no stakes on the group stage for the top teams, why can’t we have 24 make it from a 4 or 5 game Swiss-format group stage with minor benefits in qualifying for the bottom teams to keep them incentivized and byes to keep the top teams pushing hard…too simple I guess? Now we will see tons of teams rest players in the final group match I think as it’s unclear you will get a much easier opponent from 1st vs 2nd and you have to play anyway.
Group D
Average ELO Rank Among WC Teams: 22.5, 4th best group
Highest ranked team: Turkey at 14
The Analogy: You are deciding on what to eat and have a couple kebab shops you like but man deep down, in places you don’t talk about at parties, you want McDonald’s, you crave McDonald’s, you need McDonald’s. And you are going to crank Linkin Park, wear a novelty T-shirt and sandals and walk into McDonald’s and gorge yourself on 1700 deep fried calories of Red, White, and Blue Goodness.
The US are on a heater. A very weak 2025 summer has been basically erased as they have played like a top tier contender since in 8 matches against all above average opponents. There will be lots of eyes here on the USA-Germany match as the final tuneup before the World Cup. If you look at just the past 8 matches they look like a possible semifinal contender, no real poor performance despite 3 somewhat unlucky losses: only outshot and out-box-touched vs Belgium.
Paraguay basically never have the ball, an incredible 36% possession rate is not matched by struggles elsewhere. They allow under 9 shots per game despite giving up so much possession, combine that with their impressive strength of schedule and you have the makings of a great tournament shutdown team. Only Brazil topped 30 box touches against Paraguay, with Ecuador, Morocco, Uruguay, Greece, and South Korea winding up at 11 or below. Their highest single game possession number is 48% vs Japan in the 12 games in the sample.
Australia have topped 51% just once in their 9 game sample (56% vs Cameroon) and also are under 40% total. Who will have the ball when they play Paraguay is interesting. Australia are rated by ELO (and a bit by the bookies) more like an average WC team but they have just 1 average or better performance in the last two years: a 1-0 win (8-7 shots, 15-7 box touches) vs Cameroon. They have double digit shots just twice in 11 games: 11 vs Curacao and 13 vs New Zealand. There is an incredible lack of attacking pop here, you’d associate it with some of the worst teams in the field. In their 5 games vs average to above average opponents the shot average is Australia 5.8, Opponents 14. They will be playing those types of opponents here.
Turkey’s raw numbers are a bit juiced because I included the Hungary match over two legs as one match but the ratios should be untouched. They have some decent signs: 24 shots in 2 matches vs Spain (though they did concede over 5 xG in the 2 matches) and only 2 games under 10 shots in 11 tries, which sadly passes for a decent attack in the World Cup. In the past year Spain are really their only solid competition: Georgia, Bulgaria, Romania and North Macedonia are not that close to average opponents. They came out a bit ahead in their doubleheader vs Mexico and the USA last year, the question is it an improved US team now that has moved a bit ahead of the Turks?
My Picks: I feel pretty strongly about Australia to finish last at +105, I like the trend and want to be a patriot with the USA to win the group at +125 and like Paraguay to finish 2nd at +270. Why not Turkey to finish 3rd? Well, I already stretched out for Paraguay and the edge looks just a bit smaller there…so no real good mathy or gambling reason.
Group E
Average ELO Rank Among WC Teams: 25.8, 4th worst group
Highest ranked team: Germany at 7
The Analogy: It’s a bit like a NCAA Tournament pod with a 1 seed vs 16 in Germany and Curacao and then the 8/9 matchup with Ecuador/Ivory Coast.
Curacao has some truly horrific performances on their card (22 total box touches vs 44 from Trinidad and Tobago over 2 total matches and 14 total shots) the main bad ones. The average opponent has been really, really bad and they are averaging just 8.4 shots. They are a great example of the World Cup gone way too mad. Some sort of decent performances in there if you squint but the entire profile is just a really bad team.
Germany are a giant. No team so far has anything like their offensive profile, no one is within 10 box touches per match among the 20 teams we have looked at so far. No one is within 2.5 shots and they have played a reasonable schedule: France, Portugal, Switzerland and Italy are on the list and the Germans have averaged nearly 17 shots per against those teams. There isn’t really a good reason they aren’t among the top favorites to win it all, other than a couple fluky results the past two WC’s. I love Germany’s profile and love Deniz Undav to win the Golden Boot at +6500. He scored 2 in the most recent friendly and is a much better player than Havertz and Woltemade, a guy with long histories of >.6 xG numbers lined up to possibly start on a territorially dominant team…but the reason I don’t get too into individuals here is Havertz will probably start.
The interesting battle is between Ecuador and Ivory Coast for the 2/3 spot. Pure numbers wise Ivory Coast looks better, but the schedule is a bit in Ecuador’s favor. The South Americans played 4 consecutive 0-0 draws last year and have a utterly dull draw vs Brazil where they outshot the Selecao 7-3 buoying up some of their record. They have more than 11 shots once in their past 8 matches (24 vs New Zealand).
Ivory Coast have won their past 3 friendlies vs France, Scotland and South Korea and have played pretty repeatedly like an average World Cup team. They were quite dominant in games against other African sides, I don’t see really a good reason to put them behind Ecuador.
The Picks: I am feeling a bit frisky here and put a bit on Ecuador to finish last at +1600 and Ivory Coast to finish 2nd at +175.
Group F
Average ELO Rank Among WC Teams: 23, 5th worst group
Highest ranked team: Netherlands at 8
The Analogy: We have a pair of big guns here, you are watching golf and we have Jon Rahm and Xander in one grouping with Russell Henley and Sepp Straka in the other pairing.
Japan have not lost since last September, winning 6 straight with Scotland, Ghana, Brazil and England amongst the vanquished. Not all amazing performances, but they have looked certainly the part of a quarterfinalist over the last year. A key part is they’ve thrashed the mediocre teams, giving them little hope.
Netherlands have played an easier schedule than Japan have, the games against Spain were classics and great performances but were in March 2025. They have played solid teams like Algeria, Norway, and Poland since but no one above average and the performances have been just quarterfinalist-ish during that time. Very similar to Japan, the Spain games give Netherlands an edge, but I don’t see a massive one that the bookies suggest.
Sweden have been quite a poor team against a nothing special schedule. I don’t have them down for a single good performance since 2025 began, their big offensive outputs are 13 and 14 shots in goal-less performances vs Kosovo. Slovenia outshot them 26-17 over 2 matches and they had 33% possession in their run through the playoffs vs Poland and Ukraine. Just a nothing team really.
A nothing team that is very lucky they are in a group with the really bad Tunisians. Tunisia have
-taken 6 shots vs Uganda
-allowed 16 shots vs Namibia
-got outshot 11-5 by Equatorial Guinea
-had 39% possession vs Haiti
-got out box-touched 38-7 vs Canada
Their best performance was a win over Uganda where they had less of the ball.
The Picks
Japan to win at +280, Sweden 3rd at +185 and Tunisia last at -125. I think at this point I am basically double betting so many things it can’t be ideal but the numbers are the numbers, right? Anyway, for entertainment purposes only unless I come out +4%, then my investment advice becomes proven research.
Let me know what you think and any requests, comments or criticisms. I appreciate the comments, likes and shares very much. Thanks for reading and hope you enjoy reading as much as I do putting this together and learning.