The title of the highest order in the game of football is the championship. Whoever wins the World Cup becomes the champion of the Football World. The World Cup is the highest-level competition in the sport of football which was introduced in 1930 and played in Uruguay for the first time. It’s also called the FIFA World Cup as it was introduced by the Federation Internationale de Football Association (FIFA). FIFA came into existence in 1904 and administers international events of association football including the World Cup. The competition contested by senior men’s National teams of FIFA has been played every 4 years since 1930. The World Cup is the competition that decides who will get the World championship. The final winning country of the FIFA World Cup wins the title of Championship which is given every 4 years.
Only during the second World war, FIFA World Cup was not held due to the mass destruction. But it also gave way to an opportunity for a country to stay World football Champions for over a decade. It is such a challenging task for a team to win the World Cup defeating the other 31 best international teams. But once you get over it and win the world cup, you get the title of Championship with your name written in World sports history. This spectacular title stays with a team for four years in a row. But now the question arises who is the current world football champion? Or who has been the Champions in the past? Or how many times has a Country won this prestigious title? Let’s find out.
Who is The Current World Football Champion?
Since the announcement of World Cup 2022 has been made everyone is curious to know more about the football Championship. France is the current world football champion who won this title at the 2018 tournament in Russia for the second time. You will be amazed to know that the legendary Country of the football world, Brazil, has won 5 championship titles making it the World championship for 20 years.
The process of becoming a champion is not as easy as it seems reading this article. It involves numerous stages or phases. Currently, the format involves a qualification phase which is the first. It takes a brief look over the performance of teams in the preceding three years on its basis 32 teams get finalized for the tournament phase. One of these nations is automatically qualified, which gets the right to host the world cup. They compete over and over again for over a month passing many stages to get the title.
Championship Titles
Till now, twenty-one World Cups have been held including the FIFA World Cup 2018 and a total of 79 countries have participated. The World Cup and the title of champion have been won by only 8 Nations. The nation with the most titles in the Championship is Brazil which is also considered the legendary nation of football. Other countries who have become Champions four times are Germany and Italy. Argentina, France, and Uruguay, the inaugural country, have won the two championship titles each. The last two countries, England, the originator of football, and Spain have become the Champions once only.
Hosting Nations
There are 17 countries that have hosted the FIFA World Cups. These include France, Brazil, Germany, Italy, and Mexico who have each hosted the competition twice. While England, Spain, Uruguay, Switzerland, Chile, Sweden, United States, South Korea, and Japan (combined) Russia and South Africa have hosted the World Cup once only. Now, this lucky nation with this prestigious opportunity to host a World Cup in Qatar. Qatar is a middle east country that is rich in value and minerals. Due to excess temperature during the months of May, June, and July, FIFA World Cup 2022 is scheduled to be played from mid-November to mid-December. Qatar has been contesting to get this right to host since 2011. After facing so many protests from workers and accusations of corruption, it finally won the right to host the world cup 2022.
The FIFA World Cup 2026 is also scheduled to be played. It will jointly be hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico. It will give Mexico a distinction of being the first ever country to host games in three World Cups. The number of competing nations for the championship title from the 2026 World Cup will be increased to 48. The more the teams will be there, the more you will enjoy. The number of Nations participating in the tournament was extended to 24 in 1982 and then to 32 in 1998. Since then, it has stayed stable.
Other FIFA Tournaments
As the FIFA men’s World Cup is the most popular football competition in the world, most people assume that it is the only event held by FIFA. But it is not true because FIFA is an international Football event organising and governing body. It holds several other competitions other than FIFA men’s world cup. They include an equivalent event, the Women’s World Cup. This was inaugurated in 1991 in China. Though the scale and profile of the Women’s World Cup is smaller than the Men’s world cup, it is growing rapidly. Men’s Football has been included in the Summer Olympics since 1990 while women’s football joined the Olympics in 1996.
Did you know that the World Cup is not a pure idea? Yes, the tournament known as the FIFA Confederations cup was held one year before the introduction of the FIFA World Cup in 1930. It was like a dress rehearsal for the World Cup.
FIFA also organises events for Youth football. These tournaments include the U-20 World Cup, FIFA U-17 World Cup, FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup, FIFA U-17 women’s World Cup. The FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup is held twice in a year. FIFA also organises tournaments for some football variants such as beach soccer (FIFA beach soccer world Cup) and Futsal (FIFA Futsal FIFA World Cup).
