World Cup Soccer Structure

The World Cup soccer tournament takes place every four years. Each country that wishes to participate enters a national team for the tournament. The structure of the tournament has varied over the years, as a greater number of countries are admitted to the final tournament segment, which takes place over the course of a month during the summer. A different country hosts the World Cup every four years.

  1. Preliminaries

    • Preliminary tournaments take place globally over the course of the three years prior to the final tournament. Each continent or regional area (such as South America or Europe) plays a series of games, and the teams that finish in the top segment of that region's preliminary are sent to the final competition. Each region is allotted a different number of entrants, according to the strength of the teams in the region. Currently, Europe has the most teams sent to the finals. The country hosting the World Cup gets an automatic berth.

    Finals Group Play

    • The finals are played by the 31 national teams that prevail in the preliminaries plus the host country. The teams are divided into eight groups of four. Each team plays the other teams in its group once. Three points are awarded for a win, one for a tie. The top two teams in each division go to the elimination round. If the top teams have the same number of points, there is a complex tie-breaker process based on goal differential, goals scored and head-to-head competition to see which team advances.

    Round of 16

    • The round of 16 commences the elimination rounds. Group winners play second-place finishers from a different group. From this point on in the tournament losers are out of the competition and winners advance. If the score is tied after regulation, an extra 30 minutes are played. If the score is still tied, a penalty kick shootout determines the winner.

    Quarterfinals and Semifinals

    • The eight survivors from the round of 16 face off in the quarterfinals; the four winners go to the semi-finals. The two winners of the semifinals meet in the final game to determine the tournament winner.

    Final and Consolation Game

    • In the final weekend of the tournament, a consolation game is played between the losers of the semifinals. The next day, after almost a full month of competition, the final game is played between the semifinal winners to see who will hoist the World Cup trophy and reign as soccer champions for the next four years.