The draw for the 2026 World Cup will take place on Friday December 5. Until then, if you’re impatient, curious, or have a lot of time to waste, a simulator can give you an idea of what it might look like.
To find out a little more about the possibilities awaiting Didier Deschamps’ Blues, we carried out five simulations. At each occurrence, the menu changes drastically for the French team. And the mission doesn’t seem so obvious…
Simulation 1: France, Colombia, Türkiye, Tunisia >> Not easy!
Simulation 2: France, Switzerland, Cape Verde, Paraguay >> Not easy either
Simulation 3: France, Norway, Japan, DRC >> Solid!
Simulation 4: France, Ghana, Paraguay, Croatia >> Solid too
Simulation 5: France, Iran, Ghana, Paraguay >> Perhaps the simplest of our five tests..
Clarification: The teams in hat 2 are not necessarily placed in position 2 in the groups, the same goes for hat 3 and hat 4.
Who is the group of death for?
To establish the group of death, we are mainly watching for the “big guys” in hat 3, like Norway and Algeria, or in hat 4, which would be Italy if it qualifies. Finally, it is Denmark (which would be hat 4 as a barrage) which appears most often in our death groups, which are subject to an element of subjectivity, in addition to chance. But here are a few examples, for all intents and purposes.
Simulation 1: Portugal, Denmark, Ivory Coast, South Korea
Simulation 2: Portugal, Iraq, Norway, Morocco
Simulation 3: Argentina, South Korea, Denmark, Algeria
Simulation 4: England, Colombia, Denmark, Saudi Arabia
Simulation 5: England, Italy, Algeria, Australia
What does that mean for Algeria?
Placed in pot 3, Algeria can fear a fairly difficult draw, with a top seed, and a few scarecrows in pots 2 and 4. In our simulations, the menu is quite varied. And far from simple.
Simulation 1: Spain, Uruguay, Curaçao, Algeria
Simulation 2: Brazil, Austria, Curaçao, Algeria
Simulation 3: Argentina, South Korea, Denmark, Algeria
Simulation 4: Argentina, Algeria, Switzerland, Jordan
Simulation 5: England, Italy, Algeria, Australia
