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| २०१४ को फिफा विश्व कपमा जर्मनी र अर्जेंटीना बीचको खेलमा जर्मनीले अतिरिक्त समयमा अर्जेंटीनालाइ १-० ले हरायेपछि खुसियाली मनाउदै जर्मनका खेलाडि हरु । फोटो :CNN |
The FIFA World Cup, often simply called the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior men's national teams of the members of Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), the sport's global governing body. The championship has been awarded every four years since the inaugural tournament in 1930, except in 1942 and 1946 when it was not held because of the Second World War. The current champion is Germany, which won its fourth title at the 2014 tournament in Brazil. The 20 World Cup tournaments have been won by eight national teams. Brazil have won five times, and they are the only team to have played in every tournament. The other World Cup winners are Germany and Italy, with four titles each; Argentina and inaugural winner Uruguay, with two titles each; and England, France and Spain, with one title each.
World Cups before World War II
Due to the success of the Olympic football tournaments, FIFA, with President Jules Rimet as the driving force, again started looking at staging its own international tournament outside of the Olympics. On 28 May 1928, the FIFA Congress in Amsterdamdecided to stage a world championship itself. With Uruguay now two-time official football world champions and to celebrate their centenary of independence in 1930, FIFA named Uruguay as the host country of the inaugural World Cup tournament.
The national associations of selected nations were invited to send a team, but the choice of Uruguay as a venue for the competition meant a long and costly trip across the Atlantic Ocean for European sides.Indeed, no European country pledged to send a team until two months before the start of the competition. Rimet eventually persuaded teams from Belgium, France, Romania, and Yugoslavia to make the trip. In total, 13 nations took part: seven from South America, four from Europe and two from North America. After the creation of the World Cup, FIFA and the IOC disagreed over the status of amateur players, and so football was dropped from the 1932 Summer Olympics.Olympic football returned at the 1936 Summer Olympics, but was now overshadowed by the more prestigious World Cup.
The issues facing the early World Cup tournaments were the difficulties of intercontinental travel, and war. Few South American teams were willing to travel to Europe for the 1934 and 1938 tournaments, with Brazil the only South American team to compete in both. The 1942 and 1946 competitions, which Nazi Germany and Brazil sought to host, were cancelled due to World War II and its aftermath.
1. Thirty-two teams participate in the World Cup. In 2026, the number of teams will increase to 48.
2. A phase called the "Preliminary Competition" takes place in the three years preceding each World Cup, where teams must compete in qualifying matches in order to be eligible for 31 slots. The host nation automatically qualifies to enter.
3. The teams are drawn into eight groups of four teams each at the beginning of the tournament. The top two teams in each group will advance to the second round group of 16 teams, which play in successive rounds to reach the finals.
4. There is also a third place game, where the two teams that lose in the semifinals play each other.
5. The Adidas Golden Ball award is presented to the most outstanding player at each World Cup finals, as decided by the FIFA Technical Study Group - 2014 Winner: Lionel Messi (Argentina).
6. The Adidas Golden Boot award is presented to the top goal scorer at every World Cup finals - 2014 Winner: James Rodriguez (Colombia).
7. 3.2 billion people worldwide watched the 2010 World Cup - 46.4 percent of the world.
8. 24.7 million US viewers watched the United States face Portugal in the group stage of the 2014 World Cup.
9. Most wins - Brazil has won the World Cup five times, in 1958, 1962, 1970, 1994, and 2002
