2026 World Cup POWER RANKINGS

Let's dive straight into these rankings and show you how it's done. Of course, the strong teams are expected to be right now, and they're calculated on recent results, statistical models, and everything else in terms of the expectations around it. The goal is to estimate which teams are likely to be up against each other, and of course, where they determine in their overall rankings. Now we can dive in. Let's have some fun, right? All right, I'm going to go from... Let's go from bottom to top, yeah? Okay, let's do it. Let's go from bottom to top. So we were looking at it and saying we're going to go from 48. Oh, kill us out, man. I didn't want them to be last. I was going to be 48. You'd be giving me the same energy as Haiti or New Zealand. I would have. Shout out to my Haitian community. I can't wait to see them in the World Cup and what they're going to do. They're going to be giving nothing but colorful fireworks. But one team I know is immediately going to have some question marks. Nico, what are we doing here? It's a Marzonto tribe. What? The 45? Below Cape Verde? Below Bosnia? Below Iraq? Below Tunisia? Yeah. Ghana somehow find themselves at 45. Ghana being 45 out of 48 is alarming. Listen, they haven't been great internationally in tournaments as of late. But more recently, though, you grab their players and you see that they have individually a lot of quality. And I think perhaps being 45th of 48 also indicates the strength of their group. In fact, power rankings, these numbers over here that are all crunched up and put together, it is also an indication of who they're going up against. England. Croatia. I think England and Croatia are going to be in the top 12 probably. Top 10. I would anticipate both. And then Panama, which surprisingly is not here. So Panama is higher than Ghana. Yeah. OK, well, I'm just going to take that out. Shout out to Panama. They have one of the longest tenured managers in all of the World Cup, by the way. Consistency is important. My Zonto tribe, you know, I'm always going to fight for you. I don't believe that you should have been there. Panama does creep into 30th somehow within this list. Egypt is always going to be a surprise package. Algeria is going to be great in terms of what they've done. The Scottish Mafia, they're going to be incredible. Look out for the kilts and the tartan army coming strong. Anybody surprise you on here, anybody that you would move in terms of fluidity, especially when we're talking about the hosts. Canada, for sure, fair. And I think 26 is right about where they should be. I think they have the easiest group out of the entire World Cup, not specifically for Canada, but almost for everybody in the group. It's a fairly balanced, but with all due respect, if I had to choose one of the easiest groups, I think the easiest group would be Canada's. I think one of the hosts should always get one of the easiest. The competition is necessary. You need one of the hosts to go far. I'm surprised that Canada is the first host to come out, though, but credit to them on what they've done so far. When you look at their World Cup, in terms of their World Cup Group B, Bosnia, Qatar and Switzerland all ranked around them. Especially when looking at these two, these are definitely winnable games, these two especially. But Switzerland is going to be a little bit more of a difficult task. I think Qatar is the winnable game. Bosnia, they're back at the World Cup for just the second time in their history as a nation, back since 2014. They have a lot of fight. They showed a lot of grit and a lot of passion in that Italy game. And there's something about them that they have this X factor. There's almost a chip on their shoulder to prove that they can get it done. I'm not saying Canada is going to get out of that group. I'm saying anybody, any of the four could finish first place in that group. And I think that's an oddity amongst the 12 groups of the world. I just came from Toronto. I'm telling you now, the energy is right. They're going to come out of this group. The energy is right. Let's go into the top 24. I like this. Senegal, getting the respect that they deserve. We're not going to open that can of worms again. We know that you're still recovering. And I'm still classifying you as a champion, even though Nico will look at me something differently. We're going to go for... Legally, what's... Legally is one thing. The eye test and what we witnessed on the pitch is something completely different. Ecuador, great little outside. They're incredible in terms of what they've done in this Afro-American campaign. I'm sorry. I think 19 is low for Ecuador. So do I. I would even say right now at the moment, they're better than Uruguay. They're better than Mexico, better than Turkey. But you just, I guess you've got to consider the group that each of them are in. But they are also very close. The power rankings is 1791 to 1767. Shout out to Senegal. I think Senegal is a very, very good football team with an identity. A lot of people had them low on the power rankings that I saw out there. So France, number one within their group. Then Senegal, then Iraq and... Oh, sorry. Then Norway, then Iraq, right? Can I say something though? I'm going to tell you something now. I believe that they're going to cause a lot of problems in this World Cup. I really do think, you know, every year, every tournament we get one of those surprise packages that come through what Morocco was in the last time we sat down. Norway, what you've seen, you know, you've been there, you've lived on the ground. They're developing and they have a real understanding, both at club football and national football, that this might be one of their golden eras of trying to produce. And I just feel like when they look at this, they know it's a straight shootout. Effectively, no disrespect to Iraq, but it's effectively a straight shootout. You need to handle the rest of your business because France are going to be one of the standards regardless. You don't think Senegal could surprise France? They could. I've seen Senegal surprise France before. Quality is all the way through. And we've seen it before, right? Was it not the opening of the 2002 World Cup? Where Papadumidou won all the rest of it and they decided to do what they needed to do. I don't think we can look over Norway, look over Senegal in those group stage matches. I think that group specifically is lucky that a third place team is going to get out. Because Norway, Senegal and France having the hardest group at the World Cup, if you want to call it the group of death, maybe a third place team might get out of that group. Oh, we need to make sure we have a group call. That game, I'm going to make sure I'll give you a call. I want to make sure you hear your breakdown. Let's go into the top 12. Some of the expected names and some of the expected nations you could probably imagine are going to be in there. Some of the big hitters. I just want to go to number one, first of all. You happy to see Spain there? Do you think Spain is definitively the best team in the world right now according to the power rankings? According to the power rankings? Look at the Argentinian coming out. You hear it? You heard the question mark. I think there's a best team in the world that is the defending World Cup champion and has won their two continental titles back to back. You know where I think the power rankings work against Argentina? The quality of the opponent that they have faced in friendlies. I don't think Argentina themselves know where they are at with the best teams in the world. They know they're somewhere here, but when you play with all due respect, Mauritania and Zambia and the long list of frankly uncompetitive friendlies, it's not a good litmus test. It's not a good litmus test to see where you are at as a squad. It's not a good litmus test to try other players that want to break into the squad. And Argentina just has a couple of friendlies left. It's against Honduras, for example, who is not going to the World Cup. And it's right before the World Cup. So I don't know if Argentina has gotten better or worse than Qatar. So I personally myself have some question marks about Argentina, whereas I see Spain and I've seen them go against European competition naturally and produce and still be there at that top level, especially after coming off of that Euro. I'm going to let my heart leave my head for half a second. I never really do this on this show, but I'm going to say it. I didn't think I was going to say it. It's coming home, people. It might be coming home. Why are you laughing? My heart pick is Argentina. My mind pick is England. I'm telling you, I'm going to explain to you why. Because I genuinely believe England might have the best player in the world right now. I think Harry Edward Kerr... They do have the best player in the world right now. Definitively. And when you have the best player in the world, you can do anything in major tournaments. There's a lot of quality around them. You now have a manager who understands what it takes to win in major competitions, who has a history of demanding in major competitions. I think England now, for the first time in a long time, are fully equipped to win a national competition of the highest accord. And the World Cup is going to be a sensational moment for them to stand out. Now, I'm going to tell you some of the question marks that have been around England before. Okay. Whether or not they can handle the weather and the physical conditions, right? You already know where we come from in terms of 100 or 300 days worth of rain. Whether or not they were going to be exhausted and too tired because of the exerts that's put on those teams at club level. Yeah. And most importantly, do they have the quality to handle those massive occasions and the pressure? I'm not going to do what 99% of the English media do and turn around and be like, it's coming home and then pound on them if it doesn't. There's some real quality teams in this competition. They are not the favourites. Do I think they're in the top four? Yes. And if you're in the top four of any conversation, because I do believe this is the four best teams in the world, you have every chance of winning it. Now, one of those sleepers though, is your boys. You know, we've got to tuck in at some point because you do want to call them the AFCON champions now. Yeah. Morocco. Morocco with a new manager though. And I think beyond Regraghi, I think they had moments where they realised that they could have been playing better with the amount of quality that they have on their squad. But I do think they're right there. And when you look at the rest of the teams, like above them, right? Colombia, they were great. But then in these friendlies, where they played Croatia and France, struggled big time, right? And that put some severe question marks against Colombia. I didn't have Belgium that good. They tore apart the United States in the second half. Obviously, there's caveats here, a lot of substitutions and whatnot. I don't think Germany are at an eighth best in the world right now. It's still a process that is not near 100%. Can Germany surprise you? Yeah, of course, because it's Germany and there's experience as a nation to be in these big moments. But beyond the top four? From five to eight, they're all wild cards. Don't have any idea what they're going to do in tournament. That doesn't happen often at World Cups. Usually one through 12 or maybe one through eight are strong, JD. They're wild cards. The most important thing is, do you agree with the power score, the power rankings? Especially now, we're only 50 days to the World Cup. Can you imagine? When we blink, it's going to be here and this is going to be the centre stage. So make sure you're involved in the conversations. Do you agree in the rankings, top to bottom? And most importantly, Nico Cantor, JD, numbers don't lie. You know what time it is, baby.