reflecting on fifa: canada and belgium

We all know that Canada lost against Belgium last week during their World Cup debut, but don't despair, they can still make a comeback. What needs to happen for Canada to be successful and what went wrong last game? 

Here is some (slightly depressing) news from the world of sports.

looking back on the game

(Analysis by "sportingnews.com")

Canada did everything they could to pick up a result against Belgium, but just came up short in a 1-0 defeat Wednesday. They dominated the match, especially in the first half, but just could not find the back of the net. A goal against the run of play from Michy Batshuayi was enough to earn the winning point for the Belgians.

Despite failing to pick up points in the opening match, Canada still has a decent view toward qualifying for the knockout stage, but will need to pick up points against both Croatia and Morocco in their remaining group stage games.

Given the way they played against Belgium, that's certainly not out of the question, but the margin for error has decreased significantly. Here's what Canada will need to secure advancement into the 2022 World Cup knockout stage for the first time in the nation's history.

What does Canada need to qualify for the World Cup knockout stage?

Canada is not eliminated from knockout stage contention despite the defeat to Belgium — in fact, far from it. The Canadians are very much still in contention. 

With two games to go, plenty can happen. Canada will have put up a great performance against the group's best team, and now they look ahead to games against Morocco and Croatia.

Six points is the target, and that's still very much in play if they win their final two games. Six points does not mathematically guarantee a team a spot in the knockout round, but it's a clear threshold. No team in the history of the FIFA World Cup has been eliminated from a group stage with six points.

Theoretically, it's possible for three teams to finish on six points and therefore leave one team on the outside looking in with tiebreakers, but it almost never happens. It has happened in the World Cup — in 1994, Nigeria, Bulgaria and Argentina all finished with six points, with Greece on zero, but in that tournament, the highest third-place finishers reached the knockout stage as well, so Argentina was safe. Famously, at the 2001 FIFA Confederations Cup, South Korea was eliminated in a three-team, six-point mash-up behind France and Australia, but that's an extreme rarity at all FIFA tournaments.

Five points still does the trick. No team in World Cup history has been left out of the knockout stage with a five-point haul from a four-team group in the modern format. In 1978, Brazil finished second in their second-round group with five points, but in that year, second-place finishers advanced to a playoff, so they moved on to the third-place match.

Four points is where things start to get dicey. In the 2018 World Cup, two teams were eliminated with four points, although one of them was down to fair play points to solve a vicious tiebreaker. Two teams were also eliminated with four points in the 2014 World Cup. Often, with four points, tiebreakers like goal differential can get involved, and that's not where a team wants to be.

Three points is a near-impossibility. To advance from the group stage with just three points, it requires one team to dominate the group and steal all the other possible points. Mathematically, it's tough to envision a scenario where this works out a path toward qualification, as it requires either three points via draws, or three points plus a tiebreaker advantage over one of the teams that defeated the country in question.

Three points has not been enough to qualify for the World Cup knockout stage since Chile did so in the 1998, using three draws to skate past Austria and Cameroon, while Italy dominated the group.

Odds of Canada qualifying for knockout stage

Canada was a longshot to win the group with two European powers, but they were given a shot to qualify for the knockout stage, and that is still very much in play.

John Herdman (head coach of Canada's National Team) believes they can win the whole World Cup tournament, and they'll surely still feel that way after going toe-to-toe with the world's No. 2-ranked nation. They did everything but score a goal in that match, and now will look forward toward games against Morocco and Croatia.

Access the full article here:

https://www.sportingnews.com/ca/soccer/news/canada-out-world-cup-scenarios-knockout-stage-qualification-2022-fifa-qatar/e6mskzws4emuurkzkmc1gxny