As I further research UEFA WCQs most teams who have qualified for the Qatar WC only played 8-10 games.

Aus played 18 games with two further play offs - one against UAE and the other again Peru. This is a total of 20 games. Twice the number of Denmark!

We have twice the experience in qualifiers  as a team unit than the UEFA teams do.

Debate raging in Germany today as Cameroon coach said CAF is way too hard and the Europeans have too much. It's been quickly argued that UEFA has plenty of success to build a strong case whereas the CAF hasn't exactly advanced to where they claim they could get.

Another bit of info I picked up after researching Italy's unsuccessful Qatar campaign. They played in a group of 5 teams, which Switzerland won.

Each team only played 8 WCQs.  Italy played 9 games, being knocked out in the sudden death play off.

Didn't Australia play 20 WCQs to qualify for the WC? It means we are a battle hardened and experienced unit at playing together, even it was tough getting to Qatar!

Amazing stats, Grazor!

Very informative. Thanks for posting.

Anomalies are Belgium and Croatia  on the one hand, and Italy on the other.

If I subtract the big 5 teams from europe you get the following winning percentages from the group games

1998  30%
2002: 33%
2006 47%
2010 41%
2014 50%
2018 50%

Europe has grown in dominance to the point where it threatens the global status of the game. Add to this that Europe has won 5 world cups in a row. It is interesting comparing where the 5th best south american team knocked out by australia in 2005 and 2022 and where both teams played their club football. It is probably as competitive these days playing in the eredivisie as it was 20 years ago playing in the epl

My intuition is that the country that exports talent to a big league actually gets harmed by the trade, whereas the country having the best domestic league is at an advantage (not that this is the only factor but might be becoming the dominant factor in predicting a national teams success). 

Good stats. There are 2 massive games to come in Saudi Arabia v Mexico and Iran v USA.  It could still end up a good World Cup for CONCACAF and a poor one for Asia (or the other way around). 

I think its strong enough that if we ever get to the level we can consistently beat the top teams away from home that is good preparation to try and win the whole thing

Yeah, and I reckon this WC so far has reflected that. Let's wait to see if any of us get out or if someone goes deep, which doesn't look likely. 

At the end of the day, Asia is strong enough and can take on big teams on their day...but they're not on that next level, yet.

over 20 years they are roughly on par with CAF and Concacaf, perhaps slighly behind caf and slightly ahead of concacaf

Korea should of won last night they had a few great chances early then conceded from corner and it fell apart.

Asia not really showing itself as underrated so far...maybe pretty much just like you'd expect. 

I had a look at the 2 lowest (FIFA) ranked teams from each confederation from 1998 until now. Each confederation have at least one of them get out of the group fairly regularly, which suggests to me that the ratio is about right. It's a moot point now anyway with the next WC having 48 teams, but I'd prefer the intercontinental playoffs be a slightly larger mini-tournament. Say 16 teams competing for 4 spots (completely off the top of my head, no idea how it'd work). That would allow teams who deserve it to go through regardless of their confederation. Looks like next world cup it will be similar, but just the 2 spots, with 6 teams competing.

Edited to fix mistake about the number of inter-confederation spots available next world cup.

Yes, I agree based on the results. AFC is either outperforming in certain games or underperforming in others. 

The only reason the AFC isn't as recognised as say CAF when it comes to continental cup competitions is because of the lack of 'Star Power'. 

Son Heung-min is easily the most recognisable face in Asian Football.

However, the Africa Cup of Nations had Sadio Mané facing Mo Salah in a dream clash that most of the football world would have tuned in for. 

Japan has produced a huge amount of players plying their trade in Germany, Spain & England yet none of them are Stars. Just very good players.

Isn't CONCACAF rated ahead of Asia. Looks like they headed Asia in 2002 (AFC reasonable) and 2014 (AFC abysmal) and Asia led them the rest of the time. CAF consistently first or second 

Agree, clearly CAF is the biggest disappointment of all, and by a long way.
They have the players, spread across a lot of countries, but once they get to the WC, they can never put it together.
They have never made a semi-final in the history of the WC.
They nearly all bombed out early in the only WC ever held in Africa.
And you think back of the excellent WCs Cameroon had way, way back in 1982 and1990, and the success the bigger countries have had at the under-age world cups, it shows something is seriously wrong when they get to this level of competition.

As for Asia, it's not under-rated at all, overall, it's proceeding pretty much bang on what you would expect, not better and not worse.

2002 CONCACAF did very well (42%). Asia only did ok (29%) because although SK and Japan did well, China and Saudi Arabia lost all of their games.

Thanks, barely any difference between the federations with concacaf a bit behind. Im guessing 2002 was good for afc as well. Would be interesting to see the total over the last 20 years to see which federation comes on top

would also be interesting to see europe minus the big five since there is an argument they are not getting enough spots

I'm surprised by CAF the most out of the 3 confederations. 

Say what you will, but CAF arguably produce the most players in the Big 5 leagues if you include those that have defected to France/Belgium and the like. 

it seems their biggest issue is probably support from their local federation.

It's quite common for CAF players to have dust-ups with their representative officials & coaches at World Cups.

Thanks for posting these stats, Tom.

2006 (W,D,L) %
CAF - 3,3,10 - 19%
AFC+OFC - 2,5,9 - 13%
CONCACAF - 1,3,9 - 8%

2010 (W,D,L, Pen Loss) %
AFC - 4,2,7,1 - 29%
CAF - 4,5,10,1 - 20%
CONCACAF - 2,4,5,0 - 18%

2014 (W, D, L, PW, PL) %
CONCACAF - 5,3,6,1,1 - 31%
CAF - 3,3,11 - 18%
AFC - 0,3,9 - 0%

2018 (W,D,L) %
AFC - 4,3,9 - 25%
CAF - 3,2,10 - 20%
CONCACAF - 2,1,7 - 20%

2022 (W,D,L) % (After 2 games each)
AFC - 4,1,7 - 33%
CAF - 3,3,4 - 30%
CONCACAF - 1,3,4 - 13%

Qatar was always going to struggle.

Iran could go either way. 

I didn't expect Saudi Arabia to beat Argentina.

Japan beat Germany and lost to Costa Rica. I expected the other way around of Japan losing to Germany and Japan beat Costa Rica.

South Korea will struggle.

Australia was expected to lose to France. I expected a draw vs Tunisia at best and Australia beat them. Would be epic if Tunisia either loses or draws to France and Australia snatches a draw vs Denmark to get round of 16 

I hear yah!

I hate the Japan result and not just because I had money on them.
Nothing about that game said Japan should have lost, but they did because they didn't convert.it the randomness of the game that I love and hate at the same time.

The worst part is Japan went from the easiest to the hardest in 90 minutes

The worst part is Japan went from the easiest to the hardest in 90 minutes

Moroco were brilliant and Japan unlucky to lose IMO.

Best showing for the number of teams in Asia doing well.

Happy for the underdogs to keep going.

Forget Qatar - they are there as host. But the 5 that qualified via the AFC are all still in the mix. All of them face a tough task but Japan and the Saudi Arabia probably the toughest route. 

So Qatar is out.
Iran probably just need a draw
Saudi's probably need to win
Japan need to win
Australia probably need just a draw
Sth Korea: too early to say.

Could end up with as many as 4 getting out or as little as none.

Would be interested to see those stats

Just looking at some historical numbers, and I was surprised to see that all but one (2014) world cup since 2006 (if we include Australia in the AFC), AFC nations have a better win % than CONCACAF. Three (including Qatar so far) we've done better than CAF. CAF however are consistently at 20-25%, whereas AFC and CONCACAF vary wildly.