WC 2026 · Forecasting Oxford Football Forecasting

Spain is the clear favourite, winning Group H76% of the time. Spain (99%) and Uruguay (90%) are the likeliest to advance; Saudi Arabia carries the group's best third-place qualification hope (21%).

  • Spain UEFA
    99% adv 7.3 pts
    win76% 2nd20% 3rd-q2% GD+5.5
  • Uruguay CONMEBOL
    90% adv 5.2 pts
    win21% 2nd57% 3rd-q11% GD+1.5
  • Saudi Arabia AFC
    35% adv 2.3 pts
    win2% 2nd12% 3rd-q21% GD−3.3
  • Cabo Verde CAF
    27% adv 1.9 pts
    win1% 2nd10% 3rd-q16% GD−3.7

Fig. V4 100k sims · official tiebreakers · row sums to 100%

Group H — simulated finishing positions

🇪🇸 Spain Spain — finish 1st: 76.5% 76% Spain — finish 2nd: 20.4% 20% Spain — finish 3rd: 2.7% 3% Spain — finish 4th: 0.5% 0% 🇺🇾 Uruguay Uruguay — finish 1st: 20.8% 21% Uruguay — finish 2nd: 57.5% 57% Uruguay — finish 3rd: 16.8% 17% Uruguay — finish 4th: 4.9% 5% 🇸🇦 Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia — finish 1st: 1.6% 2% Saudi Arabia — finish 2nd: 12.5% 12% Saudi Arabia — finish 3rd: 43.6% 44% Saudi Arabia — finish 4th: 42.4% 42% 🇨🇻 Cabo Verde Cabo Verde — finish 1st: 1.2% 1% Cabo Verde — finish 2nd: 9.7% 10% Cabo Verde — finish 3rd: 36.9% 37% Cabo Verde — finish 4th: 52.2% 52%

Top two qualify automatically (left of the line). Third place advances only as one of the eight best third-placed teams across the twelve groups.

Spain owns first place (76%); below the top two the third- and fourth-place mass is where qualification is really decided.

Source · Oxford Football Forecasting model
Reading the matrix and the heatmap

Both the advancement matrix and this heatmap are tallied from the same locked 100,000-tournament simulation that produces the forecast. Each row of the heatmap sums to 100% (a team finishes somewhere); each column sums to 100% across the four teams (exactly one team takes each position). The dashed line sits between 2nd and 3rd: the top two qualify automatically, while third place advances only if it ranks among the eight best third-placed teams across the twelve groups — which is why a team's P(advance) exceeds its P(top-two) by its best-third qualification chance.