The World Cup is on free-to-air television in the UK, with BBC and ITV sharing the rights. The matches will also be available to live stream on BBC iPlayer/BBC Sport website and ITV Hub (scroll down for the schedule in full, with the knockout matches TBC).
England group games on TV
Wales group games on TV
It seems safe to say expectations have been lowered among England fans heading into the World Cup, but that is nothing a few positive results cannot turn around.
England will know the importance of a strong start against Iran, where they will be chasing a first win in seven after a winless Nations League campaign that resulted in relegation from their group.
Two defeats to Hungary (including 4-0 away), a draw and defeat to Italy, and two draws with Germany. It all ramped up the pressure on Gareth Southgate, who has faced the Wembley jeers this year, but the England manager is only focused on converting this “great chance” into silverware.
“I don’t think what it was for me is important at this stage,” he said. “My only focus is, how do I help this team to have a brilliant tournament? And I think we’ve got a great chance. We’ve perhaps, as we did before Russia, qualified and managed expectations at the same time.
“I know what this group of players have been capable of. They’ve been to the deep reaches of tournaments. They know what that feels like. They know they can do that again. What people say or think about me is irrelevant. My job is to free the players of any of that.”
Captain Harry Kane, meanwhile, believes lowered expectations could work to their favour. “I feel like if we won every game leading up to this tournament it would’ve been, ‘We’re guaranteed to win it,’ and ‘We’re going to win it’, and that can come with a different pressure,” Kane told Sky Sports.
“We feel like being judged on major tournaments is the main thing and the last two we’ve had have been good. We have a good confidence within ourselves that we can go and have a great tournament in Qatar.”
A first World Cup since 1958. It is the statistic you may have heard a hundred times already, and will likely will hear another hundred times during coverage of Wales’s matches.
But beyond this 64-year first, Wales are intent on making a mark at this World Cup, as they did when reaching the Euro 2016 semi-finals.
As he was then, Gareth Bale heads to Qatar as their talisman, but their first opponents are wary of their strengths beyond the former Tottenham and Real Madrid forward.
“I think Wales is underrated,” USA head coach Gregg Berhalter said. “When I look at their squad, it’s basically a Premier League squad.
“To me, it’s a really good squad, a formidable squad. They’ve been in international competition before, they know what it’s like. And it’s going to be a very difficult game.”
So what would Wales need to reach the last 16? With the top two qualifying from each group, recent history tells us four points is the minimum requirement – going by the 2018 World Cup.
With that in mind, Wales have little room for error. England are favourites to qualify as Group B winners, and though Wales will hope to shock their neighbours, it is perhaps the opening match against the USA that is most vital.
“The World Cup is so difficult and so complicated that anything can happen,” said a certain Lionel Messi, who will be playing at his fifth and potentially final World Cup this year.
The Argentine knows only too well how difficult this tournament is to win, having lost in the final to Germany in 2014, and so with the World Cup still evading him, for some his “GOAT” status remains questionable.
This time around, Argentina are among the favourites to win the World Cup, but narrowly trail Brazil with the bookmakers.
Argentina beat Brazil last year to win Copa America, and went on to draw 0-0 later in 2021 before their second World Cup qualifier was cancelled. In Qatar, they are on a collision course to meet in the World Cup semi-finals, providing both sides top their group, which means there is an opening in the other half of the draw.
And providing they win their respective groups, Belgium, England, France and Portugal are among the teams eyeing a run to the final without having to play Argentina or Brazil.
That has resulted in reigning champions France being placed as third favourites, with Spain and England trailing them – so too Germany, who are in Spain’s group.
Therefore, what Messi said. Anything can happen, and with Uruguay and Croatia the 11 th and 12 th favourites respectively, the nations capable of winning the World Cup are more than just a handful.
