Didier Deschamps has been in charge of France since 2012. Alamy Stock Photo
Alamy Stock Photo
On paper, Spain, England and France appear to have the three strongest squads at the tournament.
What makes the French stand out is the depth of their attacking options.
For England to have a chance of winning, they likely need Harry Kane to stay fit – their alternative options for the main striker are Aston Villa’s Ollie Watkins and Al-Ahli’s Ivan Toney – good players but not on the Bayern star’s level.
Kane has also often struggled to dominate games in the business end of tournaments after long, hard seasons – he had poor matches in the final of Euro 2020 and 2024.
Spain, on the other hand, do not have a world-class striker of Kane’s calibre. Their main forwards are Ferran Torres (Barcelona), Mikel Oyarzabal (Real Sociedad) and Borja Iglesias (Celta Vigo), albeit no team in the tournament has better wingers than Lamine Yamal (Barcelona) and Nico Williams (Athletic Bilbao).
But France seem like the team best placed to cope if one of their most important players is ruled out.
For instance, if Kylian Mbappé (Real Madrid) suffers a tournament-ending injury, they still have an attack that can include any of the following: Ousmane Dembélé (PSG), Marcus Thuram (Inter Milan), Michael Olise (Bayern Munich), Bradley Barcola (PSG), Désiré Doué (PSG), Jean-Philippe Mateta (Crystal Palace), Rayan Cherki (Man City) and Maghnes Akliouche (Monaco). Three of the aforementioned footballers have just won the Champions League for the second season running, and at least one of those is unlikely to make the starting XI.
France’s defence is similarly strong, and while Spain and England probably have superior midfield options, the likes of Aurélien Tchouaméni (Real Madrid), N’Golo Kanté (Fenerbahçe), Warren Zaïre-Emery (PSG) and Adrien Rabiot (Milan) are still top-class performers accustomed to playing at this level with 178 caps between them.
2. Harry Kane to win the Golden Boot
Harry Kane is expected to lead England's attack once again. Alamy Stock Photo
Alamy Stock Photo
I’m not exactly going out on a limb here, but sometimes the most obvious predictions are the right ones.
At 32, Kane has shown no signs of slowing down, and even amid a highly competitive England squad, he is one of the first names on the team sheet.
In all competitions this season, he managed a remarkable 66 goals from 56 appearances.
For that form alone, the London-born forward deserves to be in the conversation for the Ballon D’Or.
If England win the World Cup, he will almost certainly claim this sought-after individual honour, unless Declan Rice or another of the Three Lions’ stars has an especially strong tournament.
Kane has already won the Golden Boot once, with six goals in the 2018 World Cup. However, he will be determined to make up for an underwhelming showing (by his high standards) in 2022, when he found the net just twice.
The ex-Tottenham player was also the joint top scorer at the last Euros (albeit with only three goals), and his four in 2020 were bettered only by Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo and the Czech Republic’s Patrik Schick.
At the very least, you would expect Kane to score against a side like Panama, who England face in the group stages, although that will be their third game, so the striker might be rested if Thomas Tuchel’s men have already secured their passage into the knockout stages by then.
3. Senegal to be the dark horses
Sadio Mane is among Senegal's key players. Alamy Stock Photo
Alamy Stock Photo
There are maybe six teams that have a realistic chance of winning the tournament. Beyond that, there are arguably five-to-10 teams that deserve the ‘dark horses’ tag. Senegal fall into the latter category.
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Yet only eight teams have ever won the World Cup, and only one of those is not considered a modern football superpower (Uruguay), albeit four-time winners and six-time finalists Italy have failed to qualify for the last three successive tournaments.
Only Europe and South America have ever produced winners of the competition.
African countries, though, have vastly improved over the last few decades, and if a third continent is to prevail, they look the most likely.
Their slow progress makes sense when you consider that only one African team competed at the World Cup from the tournament’s onset in 1930 up until 1970 (Egypt in 1934).
In addition, only one qualifying spot was allocated to African teams from 1970 until 1982, and three teams from the continent were allowed in for the first time in 1994.
1990 was the first significant breakthrough, when Cameroon became the first African side to reach the quarter-finals, narrowly losing 3-2 to England after extra time.
The continent had to wait until 2022, when Morocco became the first country from the continent to make the semi-finals, knocking out teams of the calibre of Spain and Portugal along the way.
With stars like Brahim Diaz (Real Madrid) and Achraf Hakimi (PSG) at their disposal, the Moroccans will fancy their chances of having a similar impact this time, although Senegal would also vie for the status of Africa’s strongest team.
The two met in the highly controversial 2025 Africa Cup of Nations final.
The match was won 1-0 by the Senegalese after extra time, but it was eventually awarded as a 3-0 victory to their rivals as the game was delayed following a temporary walk-off by Pape Thiaw’s side in protest at a contentious VAR decision.
Both sides will fancy their chances at this tournament.
Senegal arguably have the stronger squad overall. There is quality and solidity in every position.
Former Chelsea player Édouard Mendy will be in goal.
Expect the back four to comprise El Hadji Diouf (West Ham), Kalidou Koulibaly (Al-Hilal, formerly of Chelsea and Napoli), Moussa Niakhaté (Lyon) and Krépin Diatta (Monaco).
In midfield, Pape Gueye (Villarreal), Idrissa Gueye (Everton) and Habib Diarra (Sunderland) are in line to feature.
And up front, they will have ex-Liverpool star Sadio Mané (Al-Nassr), Nicolas Jackson (Chelsea) and Iliman Ndiaye (Everton).
They have decent depth too, with Ismaïla Sarr (Crystal Palace), Pape Matar Sarr (Tottenham) and Mamadou Sarr (Chelsea) also part of the squad.
Beyond the usual contenders, some of the less-heralded South American sides, such as Uruguay and Colombia, also have the potential to surprise people.
4. Germany to disappoint
Jamal Musiala is among the Germany players to have had a difficult season. Alamy Stock Photo
Alamy Stock Photo
At the World Cup, there are usually at least one or two of the fancied nations who end up flopping.
This has been true of Germany since they won the World Cup in 2014, failing to make it out of the group stages in the two tournaments since then.
History probably won’t repeat itself in that regard. Julian Nagelsmann’s side have been paired in a weak-looking group alongside Curaçao, Ivory Coast, and Ecuador.
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But of the past champions who have qualified, Die Mannschaft look among the weakest.
They already suffered one shock defeat last September, losing their opening fixture 2-0 to Slovakia in an otherwise straightforward qualifying campaign.
But if you look at their squad, many of the players expected to start have had difficult club seasons owing to form or injury-related issues, including Kai Havertz (Arsenal), Florian Wirtz (Liverpool), Jamal Musiala (Bayern Munich), and Leon Goretzka (Bayern Munich).
Nagelsmann is widely regarded as one of Europe’s top coaches, and he needs to live up to that reputation if Germany are to avoid being consigned to yet another tame World Cup exit.
5. Kylian Mbappé to win the Golden Ball
Kylian Mbappe has scored 12 goals in 14 World Cup appearances and could easily be taking his tally to 20 in this expanded tournament. Alamy Stock Photo
Alamy Stock Photo
In case there is any confusion, the Golden Ball is awarded to the tournament’s best player as opposed to the Golden Boot for the top scorer.
So Mbappé won the latter accolade, though Lionel Messi came away with the former at the 2022 World Cup.
Since then, the French superstar’s career has not panned out as well as he would have hoped.
After signing a five-year deal with Real Madrid in June 2024, Mbappé has won only two trophies – the Uefa Super Cup and the Fifa Intercontinental Cup.
In the last two seasons, Barcelona have beat Real Madrid to the La Liga title.
In the Mbappé era, the record 15-time winners of the European Cup/Champions League have suffered back-to-back quarter-final exits in Europe’s premier club competition.
The level of disillusionment is so strong that a recent online ‘Mbappé out’ petition has received over 70 million signatures.
All these issues do not bode especially well for this summer’s World Cup.
But consider this important caveat. When in form, there is arguably still no greater individual footballer in the world than Kylian Mbappé.
The ex-Monaco youngster backed up this assertion in the 2022 World Cup against Argentina, when he became the first player since Geoff Hurst in 1966 to score a hat-trick in the final.
There were similarly memorable moments in 2018, when Mbappé was a key figure as France emerged as champions.
The biggest criticism of the 27-year-old is that he is not a team player and doesn’t work hard enough off the ball – that is part of the reason why he fell out with former manager Luis Enrique, and PSG have gone from strength to strength since his departure.
But international football is far less systematised than the club game.
Individual brilliance counts for more in this environment, while the type of flaws Mbappé has exhibited are not always exposed so ruthlessly.
It is for these reasons that the France star is arguably a better international player than a club one, and why it is easy to envisage him guiding Didier Deschamps’ men to glory for a second time.
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5 key predictions ahead of the 2026 World Cup
1. France to emerge triumphant
On paper, Spain, England and France appear to have the three strongest squads at the tournament.
What makes the French stand out is the depth of their attacking options.
For England to have a chance of winning, they likely need Harry Kane to stay fit – their alternative options for the main striker are Aston Villa’s Ollie Watkins and Al-Ahli’s Ivan Toney – good players but not on the Bayern star’s level.
Kane has also often struggled to dominate games in the business end of tournaments after long, hard seasons – he had poor matches in the final of Euro 2020 and 2024.
Spain, on the other hand, do not have a world-class striker of Kane’s calibre. Their main forwards are Ferran Torres (Barcelona), Mikel Oyarzabal (Real Sociedad) and Borja Iglesias (Celta Vigo), albeit no team in the tournament has better wingers than Lamine Yamal (Barcelona) and Nico Williams (Athletic Bilbao).
But France seem like the team best placed to cope if one of their most important players is ruled out.
For instance, if Kylian Mbappé (Real Madrid) suffers a tournament-ending injury, they still have an attack that can include any of the following: Ousmane Dembélé (PSG), Marcus Thuram (Inter Milan), Michael Olise (Bayern Munich), Bradley Barcola (PSG), Désiré Doué (PSG), Jean-Philippe Mateta (Crystal Palace), Rayan Cherki (Man City) and Maghnes Akliouche (Monaco). Three of the aforementioned footballers have just won the Champions League for the second season running, and at least one of those is unlikely to make the starting XI.
France’s defence is similarly strong, and while Spain and England probably have superior midfield options, the likes of Aurélien Tchouaméni (Real Madrid), N’Golo Kanté (Fenerbahçe), Warren Zaïre-Emery (PSG) and Adrien Rabiot (Milan) are still top-class performers accustomed to playing at this level with 178 caps between them.
2. Harry Kane to win the Golden Boot
I’m not exactly going out on a limb here, but sometimes the most obvious predictions are the right ones.
At 32, Kane has shown no signs of slowing down, and even amid a highly competitive England squad, he is one of the first names on the team sheet.
In all competitions this season, he managed a remarkable 66 goals from 56 appearances.
For that form alone, the London-born forward deserves to be in the conversation for the Ballon D’Or.
If England win the World Cup, he will almost certainly claim this sought-after individual honour, unless Declan Rice or another of the Three Lions’ stars has an especially strong tournament.
Kane has already won the Golden Boot once, with six goals in the 2018 World Cup. However, he will be determined to make up for an underwhelming showing (by his high standards) in 2022, when he found the net just twice.
The ex-Tottenham player was also the joint top scorer at the last Euros (albeit with only three goals), and his four in 2020 were bettered only by Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo and the Czech Republic’s Patrik Schick.
At the very least, you would expect Kane to score against a side like Panama, who England face in the group stages, although that will be their third game, so the striker might be rested if Thomas Tuchel’s men have already secured their passage into the knockout stages by then.
3. Senegal to be the dark horses
There are maybe six teams that have a realistic chance of winning the tournament. Beyond that, there are arguably five-to-10 teams that deserve the ‘dark horses’ tag. Senegal fall into the latter category.
Yet only eight teams have ever won the World Cup, and only one of those is not considered a modern football superpower (Uruguay), albeit four-time winners and six-time finalists Italy have failed to qualify for the last three successive tournaments.
Only Europe and South America have ever produced winners of the competition.
African countries, though, have vastly improved over the last few decades, and if a third continent is to prevail, they look the most likely.
Their slow progress makes sense when you consider that only one African team competed at the World Cup from the tournament’s onset in 1930 up until 1970 (Egypt in 1934).
In addition, only one qualifying spot was allocated to African teams from 1970 until 1982, and three teams from the continent were allowed in for the first time in 1994.
1990 was the first significant breakthrough, when Cameroon became the first African side to reach the quarter-finals, narrowly losing 3-2 to England after extra time.
The continent had to wait until 2022, when Morocco became the first country from the continent to make the semi-finals, knocking out teams of the calibre of Spain and Portugal along the way.
With stars like Brahim Diaz (Real Madrid) and Achraf Hakimi (PSG) at their disposal, the Moroccans will fancy their chances of having a similar impact this time, although Senegal would also vie for the status of Africa’s strongest team.
The two met in the highly controversial 2025 Africa Cup of Nations final.
The match was won 1-0 by the Senegalese after extra time, but it was eventually awarded as a 3-0 victory to their rivals as the game was delayed following a temporary walk-off by Pape Thiaw’s side in protest at a contentious VAR decision.
Both sides will fancy their chances at this tournament.
Senegal arguably have the stronger squad overall. There is quality and solidity in every position.
Former Chelsea player Édouard Mendy will be in goal.
Expect the back four to comprise El Hadji Diouf (West Ham), Kalidou Koulibaly (Al-Hilal, formerly of Chelsea and Napoli), Moussa Niakhaté (Lyon) and Krépin Diatta (Monaco).
In midfield, Pape Gueye (Villarreal), Idrissa Gueye (Everton) and Habib Diarra (Sunderland) are in line to feature.
And up front, they will have ex-Liverpool star Sadio Mané (Al-Nassr), Nicolas Jackson (Chelsea) and Iliman Ndiaye (Everton).
They have decent depth too, with Ismaïla Sarr (Crystal Palace), Pape Matar Sarr (Tottenham) and Mamadou Sarr (Chelsea) also part of the squad.
Beyond the usual contenders, some of the less-heralded South American sides, such as Uruguay and Colombia, also have the potential to surprise people.
4. Germany to disappoint
At the World Cup, there are usually at least one or two of the fancied nations who end up flopping.
This has been true of Germany since they won the World Cup in 2014, failing to make it out of the group stages in the two tournaments since then.
History probably won’t repeat itself in that regard. Julian Nagelsmann’s side have been paired in a weak-looking group alongside Curaçao, Ivory Coast, and Ecuador.
But of the past champions who have qualified, Die Mannschaft look among the weakest.
They already suffered one shock defeat last September, losing their opening fixture 2-0 to Slovakia in an otherwise straightforward qualifying campaign.
But if you look at their squad, many of the players expected to start have had difficult club seasons owing to form or injury-related issues, including Kai Havertz (Arsenal), Florian Wirtz (Liverpool), Jamal Musiala (Bayern Munich), and Leon Goretzka (Bayern Munich).
Nagelsmann is widely regarded as one of Europe’s top coaches, and he needs to live up to that reputation if Germany are to avoid being consigned to yet another tame World Cup exit.
5. Kylian Mbappé to win the Golden Ball
In case there is any confusion, the Golden Ball is awarded to the tournament’s best player as opposed to the Golden Boot for the top scorer.
So Mbappé won the latter accolade, though Lionel Messi came away with the former at the 2022 World Cup.
Since then, the French superstar’s career has not panned out as well as he would have hoped.
After signing a five-year deal with Real Madrid in June 2024, Mbappé has won only two trophies – the Uefa Super Cup and the Fifa Intercontinental Cup.
In the last two seasons, Barcelona have beat Real Madrid to the La Liga title.
In the Mbappé era, the record 15-time winners of the European Cup/Champions League have suffered back-to-back quarter-final exits in Europe’s premier club competition.
The level of disillusionment is so strong that a recent online ‘Mbappé out’ petition has received over 70 million signatures.
All these issues do not bode especially well for this summer’s World Cup.
But consider this important caveat. When in form, there is arguably still no greater individual footballer in the world than Kylian Mbappé.
The ex-Monaco youngster backed up this assertion in the 2022 World Cup against Argentina, when he became the first player since Geoff Hurst in 1966 to score a hat-trick in the final.
There were similarly memorable moments in 2018, when Mbappé was a key figure as France emerged as champions.
The biggest criticism of the 27-year-old is that he is not a team player and doesn’t work hard enough off the ball – that is part of the reason why he fell out with former manager Luis Enrique, and PSG have gone from strength to strength since his departure.
But international football is far less systematised than the club game.
Individual brilliance counts for more in this environment, while the type of flaws Mbappé has exhibited are not always exposed so ruthlessly.
It is for these reasons that the France star is arguably a better international player than a club one, and why it is easy to envisage him guiding Didier Deschamps’ men to glory for a second time.
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Harry Kane looking ahead Soccer England France Germany Spain World Cup 2026