FIFA’s preferred World Cup tiebreakers differ from those used in other competitions, such as UEFA’s European Championship.
If two or more countries finish level on points in the World Cup group stage, overall goal difference is the chief tiebreaker used by FIFA, global football’s governing body, to separate the teams. The rule has been in force in the tournament since 1962, and remains in place despite many other football competitions now instead opting to use sides’ head-to-head record to decide points ties.
UEFA, European football’s ruling authority, has a clear preference for head-to-head, for example. It’s the number-one tiebreaker in major UEFA tournaments such as the European Championship and the Champions League. Fans of the Spanish game will also be used to comparing teams’ head-to-head records, as it’s used to split clubs level on points in LaLiga. It is also a potential tiebreaker at the World Cup, but only after other avenues have been exhausted.
World Cup: group-stage tiebreakers
The World Cup currently has a list of seven group-stage tiebreakers, which can be divided into four groups: overall record; head-to-head; fair play; and luck of the draw. Starting with goal difference, and in descending order of priority, the methods for deciding points ties are:
Overall record
1. Goal difference
Since a group stage was first implemented at the World Cup in 1950, 13 teams have been knocked out of the tournament on overall goal difference. The most recent nation to succumb to this rule was Portugal, who at Brazil 2014 were edged out by the US for second place in Group C.
FIFA began using goal difference as a tiebreaker at World Cups after playoffs were needed to separate teams level on points in three out of the four first-round groups at Sweden ‘58. The winners of two of those playoffs - Wales over Hungary, and Northern Ireland over Czechoslovakia - had actually registered an inferior goal difference.
Three decades later, in one of the World Cup’s most infamous episodes, goal difference came into play to eliminate Algeria from 1982. After beating Chile 3-2, the North Africans finished Group 2 with four points, but their future then depended on the outcome of West Germany and Austria’s meeting the following day.
It was a game that become known as the ‘Disgrace of Gijón’. With the Germans and the Austrians aware that goal difference would take them both through if the former won by a one or two-goal margin, West Germany claimed a 1-0 victory in which the sides clearly adopted a non-aggression pact after the opening goal. The match prompted FIFA to schedule the final group games of future World Cups at the same time.
2. Goals scored
If countries score an equal number of points and have the same goal difference, the team that has scored the most goals comes out in top. This has eliminated sides from the World Cup on four occasions. Most notably, Italy went on to win the trophy in ‘82 after edging out Cameroon by virtue of the fact they had netted one goal more than the Africans.
And in a memorable four-way tie at USA ‘94, goals scored separated Mexico, the Republic of Ireland, Italy and Norway when they all finished with four points and the same goal difference. The Mexicans, the Irish and the Italians all qualified (the World Cup was a 24-team tournament at this point, so some third-placed finishers went through). The Norwegians were the one side that went home.
Head-to-head record
3. Points won in head-to-head clashes
4. Goal difference in head-to-head clashes
5. Goals scored in head-to-head clashes
None of these three criteria have yet been used at a World Cup.
In 1978, Scotland were knocked out in the group stage after losing out on goal difference to the Netherlands, who went on to reach the final. If FIFA used head-to-head points as its main World Cup tiebreaker, however, it’s the Scots who would have progressed. Helped by a famous solo goal by Archie Gemmill, Scotland beat the Dutch 3-2 when the sides met in the final round of Group 4 fixtures.
Fair play
6. “Team conduct score”
If a points tie still can’t be decided after taking into account goal difference, goals scored and the three head-to-head criteria, FIFA turns to teams’ fair-play record. The sides are each given a “team conduct score”, which is calculated by deducting one point for every yellow card; two points for every red card resulting from two bookings; four points for every straight red card; and five points for every yellow card and straight red card. The nation with the highest score wins out.
This method has been used once at a World Cup: at Russia 2018, Japan’s fair-play score of -4 sent them into the last 16 at the expense of Senegal, who got -6.
And finally… luck of the draw
7. Drawing of lots
Should none of the first six tiebreakers work, FIFA’s final resort is to draw lots.
No team has yet been eliminated from a World Cup by this method, but it’s not completely without precedent at the tournament, either. In 1990, the Netherlands and the Republic of Ireland both qualified from Group F, but lots had to be drawn to decide which side came above the other, as they had identical records. The same also happened in 1970, when the Soviet Union and Mexico finished level on points and had the same goal difference (at this point in World Cup history, goals scored and head-to-head were not used as tiebreakers).