The Qatar World Cup group stage and last sixteen games are over. This time the teams will play in the quarter-finals with the aim of winning the title. The eight teams in the quarter-finals are Croatia, Brazil, Portugal, England, Argentina, France, Netherlands, and Morocco. Who will win the title among these eight teams? According to US data analyst firm FiveThirtyEight, the five-time world champion Brazil is the most likely to win the title this time. Lionel Messi’s Argentina is nowhere near them.
The 8 teams that survived the race for the title advanced to the quarter-finals. From there, 4 teams will survive, then 2 teams and from the final of those 2 teams, 1 team will have the last laugh – the champion! Which team will be lucky this time?
The quarter-finals are done. Brazil will face Croatia in Al Rayyan’s first match on Friday. The Netherlands will face Argentina in another quarter-final that day. Morocco will play Portugal in two of the quarter-final matches on Saturday, while France will face England in the other.
5ThirtyEight adjudged Brazil as the clear favorite. The organization has calculated that the 5-time world champions have a maximum 33 percent chance of winning the World Cup. Brazil, champions from their group, did not allow South Korea to stand in the last sixteen. Scored 4 goals in the first half to win 4-1.
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5ThirtyEight gives Brazil a 77 percent chance of winning against Croatia in the quarter-finals. In other words, Brazil has a 77 percent chance of reaching the semi-finals from this match. And the company believes that Brazil has a 51 percent chance of reaching the final from the semi-finals.
5ThirtyEight sees Portugal and England as equally likely (14%) to win the World Cup. England and Portugal reached the last sixteen as champions from their respective groups and won their respective matches in the quarter-finals. England reached the quarter-finals by defeating Senegal 3-0.
Portugal defeated Switzerland 6-1 to reach the quarter-finals. FiveThirtyEight believes that Portugal’s chances of reaching the semi-finals after defeating Morocco in the quarter-finals are 68 percent.
The probability of England reaching the semi-finals after defeating France is 52 percent. Portugal has a 33 percent chance of reaching the final from the semi-finals and England has a 30 percent chance.
Argentina’s chance of winning the title is 13 percent. Argentina also reached the last sixteen as the champions of their group. There, Australia was defeated 2-1 in the quarter-finals.
Messi has a 58 percent chance of advancing from the quarter-finals to the semi-finals. FiveThirtyEight believes that the probability of reaching the finals is 24 percent.
France’s chances of winning the World Cup are 12 percent. FiveThirtyEight believes that the French have a 48 percent chance of reaching the semi-finals after defeating England. The probability of reaching the final is 27 percent.
Read More: Argentina vs Netherlands Match Statistics, Preview, Match Fixer
5ThirtyEight gives the Netherlands a 7 percent chance of winning the title, Croatia a 4 percent, and Morocco a 3 percent chance of winning the title. The organization sees a 42 percent chance of the Dutch reaching the semi-finals.
Note that Brazil will face Croatia, Argentina will face the Netherlands, Morocco will face Portugal and England will face France in the quarter-finals. Croatia and Brazil will play in the first match on December 9. Netherlands and Argentina will face each other on the same day. Morocco-Portugal and England-France will enter the field on December 10. The two semi-finals will be held on December 13 and 14. The final will be played on December 18.