how many teams go through group stages world cup
2018 FIFA World Cup knockout stage The top two placed teams from each of the eight groups qualified for the knockout stage.[2]
FIFA World Cup The current format of the competition involves a qualification phase, which currently takes place over the preceding three years, to determine which teams qualify for the tournament phase, which is often called the World Cup Finals. After this, 32 teams, including the automatically qualifying host nation(s), compete in the tournament phase for the title at venues within the host nation(s) over a period of about a month.
FIFA World Cup qualification The European qualification was unchanged from the 2010 system. The 54 national teams were divided into nine groups of six teams, with the group winners qualifying directly to the finals, and the best eight runners-up playing home-and-away ties for the remaining four places.[12]
FIFA World Cup The knockout stage is a single-elimination tournament in which teams play each other in one-off matches, with extra time and penalty shootouts used to decide the winner if necessary. It begins with the round of 16 (or the second round) in which the winner of each group plays against the runner-up of another group. This is followed by the quarter-finals, the semi-finals, the third-place match (contested by the losing semi-finalists), and the final.[54]
2018 and 2022 FIFA World Cup bids On 2 December 2010, Russia and Qatar were selected as the locations for the 2018 and 2022 FIFA World Cups respectively.
FIFA World Cup Each group plays a round-robin tournament, in which each team is scheduled for three matches against other teams in the same group. This means that a total of six matches are played within a group. The last round of matches of each group is scheduled at the same time to preserve fairness among all four teams.[57] The top two teams from each group advance to the knockout stage. Points are used to rank the teams within a group. Since 1994, three points have been awarded for a win, one for a draw and none for a loss (before, winners received two points).