What is the “curse” that persecutes the teams that are chosen as the best in the world in the Fifa ranking?
Being named the best National Team in the world and occupying the first position in the Fifa ranking seems like a dream come true for any national team…until we review the repercussions and even curses that this entails!.
In order to explain in detail about this curse we have to go back in time to the World Cup. United States 1994, when two years earlier Fifa began to publish the list of the best ‘ranked’ teams globally, with Germany occupying first place.
For this reason, Germany came as one of the candidates to win the title in the United States after achieving it four years earlier in Italy 1990, with quality players such as Lothar Matthaeus, Rudi Voeller and Juergen Klinsmann. However, the curse claimed its first victim, Germany was eliminated in the quarterfinals against Bulgaria by a score of 2-1 in New York and Romário’s Brazil lifted the title.
In 1998, Brazil arrived in almost the same way as Germany four years before, as champion and dominating the Fifa ranking, but they had to settle with the runner-up by losing the final against the hosts, France, by a 3-0 win.
In 2002, the Gauls fared worse when they were prematurely eliminated in the group stage of the World Cup held in Korea-Japan, while Brazil repeated as first place in the ranking during the next two World Cups (Germany 2006 and South Africa 2010) being eliminated in the quarterfinals on both occasions.
end of an era
For his part, Spainafter a golden age in which she was crowned champion of the Euro 2008 and 2012 as well as the World Cup in South Africa in 2010arrived as the best Selection ranked by Fifa in 2014 but couldn’t even get past the group stage.
Germany was champion of that World Cup and led the list for Russia 2018 but the curse played a trick on him again, saying goodbye to the World Cup in the group stage.
In this 2022, in Qatar, Brazil has the mission to break all the forecasts and become the first National Team in history to be champion, being the first in the Fifa ranking. Surely it won’t be easy, but with a team full of stars like Neymar Jr., Vinícius Jr and Casemiro the curse could finally have its hours numbered.
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