2026 Quarter-Finals

FIFA World Cup quarter-round teams since 1986

The quarter-final round of the FIFA World Cup was only added in 1986. Looking at the countries with the most quarter-final appearances shows us who the titans really are in this tournament. Past the hype and the patriotism and the only paying attention to world football every four years, you’ll find the countries who actually have a shot at winning the World Cup.

Uruguay is the only country to have won it all and appeared in less than four quarter-finals. They are a constant outlier when looking at the metrics of the world cup however. They pretty much started the tournament, dominated it early and haven’t really done much since then.

1986

Argentina, England, Belgium, Spain, Brazil, France, Germany (West), Mexico

1990

Argentina, Yugoslavia, Ireland, Italy, Czechoslovakia, Germany (West), Cameroon, England

1994

Brazil, Netherlands, Sweden, Romania, Bulgaria, Germany, Italy, Spain

1998

France, Italy, Brazil, Denmark, Netherlands, Argentina, Germany, Croatia

2002

England, Brazil, Germany, United States, Spain, South Korea, Senegal, Turkey

2006

Germany, Argentina, Italy, Ukraine, England, Portugal, Brazil, France

2010

Netherlands, Brazil, Uruguay, Ghana, Argentina, Germany, Paraguay, Spain

2014

France, Germany, Brazil, Colombia, Argentina, Belgium, Netherlands, Costa Rica

2018

Uruguay, France, Brazil, Belgium, Sweden, England, Russia, Croatia

2022

Croatia, Brazil, Netherlands, Argentina, Morocco, Portugal, England, France

2026

France, Morocco, Spain, Belgium, Norway, England, Argentina, Switzerland

2025 MLS Kits

I don’t think that other leagues do this but MLS kits have names. This is like naming a sword or a guitar I suppose. Ice, Blackie, The Connector. Okay fine. The other thing to know about MLS kits is that a team is only allowed to change their kit every two seasons. Some teams are allowed a third kit and apparently the permission to do this is based on previous shirt sales. Needless to say, Inter Miami have a third kit for the second season in a row this year.

And ADIDAS makes all of the kits…using the same basic template for most teams. You’d think the supposed deep hatred of socialism in the US would be that last thing American soccer would adhere to but there you go.

The netherlands, Portugal, & Scotland

League overview pages for the Dutch Eredivisie, the Portugese Premier League, and the Scottish Premiership are up today. Individual club overview pages to follow.

USL first division

Some pretty big news announced today as The United Soccer League (USL) revealed plans to launch a new division one men’s league in the US in 2027. Currently, the USL fields two professional leagues: the second-division USL Championship and the third-division USL League One. The new First Division will operate as a D1 entity intent on rivaling Major League Soccer (MLS).

The new league will give the USL a three-tier pyramid system that would institute promotion-relegation for the first time in the history of US soccer.

What clubs will feature in this new top-flight league hasn’t been determined but we thought we’d provide you with an overview of the current 2-tier USL league pyramid.

More to come as this story develops.

Check out the USL page here.

Swag

Good morning! As promised yesterday, all of the clubs competing in the 5 major European leagues are up and running in the atlas. Today, we continue rolling out the MLS teams. The LA Galaxy page was uploaded first because they’ve won the most MLS titles and after that we just started attacking the list alphabetically. DC United is up next.

The MLS pages are a little different because they don’t have to be completely reworked every season since there is no promotion and relegation in the US soccer system like there is EVERYWHERE ELSE IN THE WORLD, but that’s a different dead horse to beat on a different day.

The big news today is that we have some WFA merch for sale over on ETSY so go snag a hat or a sticker and rep the Atlas!

Back to work.

The “big five”

All of the Ligue 1 club pages will be uploaded by the end of the day. This means that Phase 1 of the big five leagues is complete!

The Major League Soccer season commences in a little over a week so finishing those pages up is next on the list. After that, the “To Do List” gets trickier as we need to focus on where to focus next.
There are expansions to the existing club pages to consider as well as expanding each league overview page. Not to mention, most of the nation pages have not been designed or uploaded.

Regardless, those three areas will be next. We’re just not sure in what order they will be accomplished.

Thanks for reading! Back to the grind.