Europe and South America dominate the World Cup every four years.
The other countries seem to content to having a decent run or just qualifying.
Africa gets 5 spots, Asia 4.5 and Concacaf 3.5. There is
always an argument on which continent is the strongest and who deserves more
recognition.
If we analyze each confederations performance since the
modern era (1990 World Cup), we will see how each of the Confederations stacks
against each other. For simplicity, let’s assume that a win (even in 1990) was
worth 3 points. Counting group stage alone, here is the percentage of points
won per confederation over the last six WCs.
It is worth noting that Concacaf hosted the WC in 1994, AFC
in 2002 (two host nations) and CAF in 2010 (South Africa did not make it past
the first round).
The analysis does not consider wins/loss in the knockout
stages because that would negatively affect teams that qualified and didn’t make
it pass the first round. It is important, however, to consider the percentage
of teams that have qualified to the second round per confederation. When
comparing the percentage of teams per confederation that made it past the first
round, we see a slight difference:
CAF = 27%, AFC = 25%, Concacaf = 57%
Africa has produced two quarterfinalists (1990 and 2002) and
Concacaf one (2002). Asia produced a semifinalist is 2002.
While more teams from Africa have made it to the later
stages of the tournament, on average, the Concacaf nations have done better
than their African and Asian counterparts. Mexico and the US have consistently
provided good results but countries like Costa Rica have also helped the average.
So which confederation is better? Math would say, that Concacaf is the leader
among these three.
