Argentina is the clear favourite, winning Group J73% of the time. Argentina (98%) and Austria (77%) are the likeliest to advance; Algeria carries the group's best third-place qualification hope (26%).
§ 01
Advancement matrix
Each team's group-stage fate, split into win-group · runner-up · best-third qualify · eliminated (the four sum to one). Ordered by P(win group).
§ 02
The six fixtures
Round-robin match forecasts — win/draw/loss, the single most-likely scoreline, and the over-2.5 / both-teams-to-score rates, marginalised from the locked ensemble scoreline grids.
- M19 17 Jun · 01:00 UTC Kansas City StadiumW 64.3 D 24.6 W 11.1 O2.5 39% BTTS 36% xG 1.70–0.56
- M20 17 Jun · 04:00 UTC San Francisco Bay Area StadiumW 61.4 D 24.5 W 14.1 O2.5 45% BTTS 44% xG 1.76–0.72
- M43 22 Jun · 17:00 UTC Dallas StadiumW 61.4 D 26.1 W 12.5 O2.5 38% BTTS 36% xG 1.61–0.59
- M44 23 Jun · 03:00 UTC San Francisco Bay Area StadiumW 15.4 D 26.1 W 58.5 O2.5 43% BTTS 43% xG 0.73–1.65
- M69 28 Jun · 02:00 UTC Kansas City StadiumW 30.3 D 31.1 W 38.6 O2.5 38% BTTS 45% xG 1.02–1.18
- M70 28 Jun · 02:00 UTC Dallas StadiumW 3.2 D 12 W 84.8 O2.5 59% BTTS 31% xG 0.39–2.65
§ 03
Where they finish
The simulated final-standings distribution: how often each team finishes 1st, 2nd, 3rd or 4th across 100,000 tournaments.
Fig. V4 100k sims · official tiebreakers · row sums to 100%
Group J — simulated finishing positions
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.
Argentina owns first place (73%); below the top two the third- and fourth-place mass is where qualification is really decided.
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.