World Cup
World Cup Groups 2022
When and where is the World Cup 2022?
The World Cup 2022 takes place in Qatar, with stadiums spanning the length of the country. It is the first FIFA World Cup taking place in the Middle East and is billed to be one of the most eye-catching World Cups of recent years due to the magnitude and visual opulence of the themed purpose-built stadiums.
The 2022 World Cup in Qatar gets underway on Sunday November 20 at the Al Bayt Stadium when hosts Qatar take on Ecuador.
The tournament will run until the final on Sunday December 18.
Learn more about the World Cup with our World Cup guide.
World Cup 2022 Qualifying Groups table
The World Cup is split into two stages: the group stages and the knockouts. The knockouts are played from the round of 16 through the semi-finals to the final, where the tournament winner will be crowned.
Before the knockouts can be reached, the 32 teams must qualify from their groups.
The groups at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar are as follows:
| Group | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Group A | Qatar | Ecuador | Senegal | Netherlands |
| Group B | England | Iran | USA | Wales |
| Group C | Argentina | Saudi Arabia | Mexico | Poland |
| Group D | France | Australia | Denmark | Tunisia |
| Group E | Spain | Costa Rica | Germany | Japan |
| Group F | Belgium | Canada | Morocco | Croatia |
| Group G | Brazil | Serbia | Switzerland | Cameroon |
| Group H | Portugal | Ghana | Uruguay | South Korea |
World Cup 2022 group of death
You have probably heard the saying ‘group of death’. The group of death is the group at every World Cup that is considered by fans, players and pundits alike as the standout and most difficult group to escape from. Usually, this means it will have two or more of the World’s best nations, for example teams like Brazil, France, Argentina, Germany or Spain.
This year’s group of death is…see if you can spot it. That’s right, it’s…Group E.
Featuring Spain, Costa Rica, Germany and Japan, Group E will see two of the best nations in the world, Spain and Germany, likely dominate and qualify for the knockout stages leaving the other two nations struggling for points and almost certain to be eliminated. Hence the name the ‘group of death’.
How are the groups for the 2022 World Cup formed?
To be drawn into one of the World Cup groups, first, every nation must qualify for the tournament over a series of matches in the years leading up to the tournament. These fixtures are called qualifiers and are played in a group format, much like the finals of the World Cup itself.
Each continent’s football governing body coordinates its respective qualifiers and, depending on the size of the continent, splits the nations into groups.
In Europe, for example, due to the size of the continent and the number of nations near the top of the FIFA rankings, the qualifiers were split into ten groups of five or six teams, with 13 sides qualifying for the World Cup finals.
There are slightly different qualification processes for each continent, depending on the number of teams contending and the number of World Cup qualifying slots each continent has.
In total 31 teams qualify for the World Cup in Qatar, with host Qatar given automatic qualification.
At the 2026 World Cup there will 48 teams at the tournament for the first time.
The first round of the World Cup
The first round of the World Cup is the group stage which sees each of the 32 teams play every team in their group once, with the top two teams going through to the knockout stages. These teams are decided by points accumulated and goal differences.
