16 mildly interesting World Cup '26 stats

What percentage of Curaçao's population are behind the ball again?

(Credit: rawpixel)

1. With a population of 156,000 people, when Curaçao are defending, they are doing so with approximately 0.007% of their population behind the ball

2. Crystal Palace (12) have more players at the World Cup than Real Madrid (11)

3. More than 8% of all managers at the tournament have at one time or another managed Chelsea

4. Having conceded a goal to Curaçao, Germany have not kept a clean sheet at a World Cup since Narendra Modi became prime minister of India

5. While 51% of English people hope Scotland perform well in the World Cup, Scots are more likely to hope England do badly (32%) than hope they succeed (27%) according to YouGov

   

   YouGov

6. The No. 1 FIFA-ranked team has never won the World Cup. Bad news for Argentina, who only secured top spot a week before the tournament when France lost to Ivory Coast and Spain drew with Iraq in pre-tournament friendlies

7. Cristiano Ronaldo has appeared in 62.9% of all World Cup matches played by Portugal. That figure is expected to rise in the coming weeks

8. Uzbekistan is the first double–landlocked nation to qualify for the World Cup (there are only two, the other being, erm, Liechtenstein.) Just eight landlocked teams had previously qualified for the tournament.

9. Curaçao manager Dick Advocaat became the oldest to take charge at a world cup, at the age of 78. I mention this only because my reaction is “gosh, that’s old, I hope he’s getting some down time” and then remember he’s younger than the last two US presidents