{"id":2770,"date":"2026-06-12T04:09:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-12T04:09:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/?p=2770"},"modified":"2026-06-12T04:09:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-12T04:09:10","slug":"world-cup-2026-any-early-shocks-chris-suttons-score-predictions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/?p=2770","title":{"rendered":"World Cup 2026: Any early shocks? Chris Sutton’s score predictions"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n

Los Angeles \/ Tuesday, 16 June \/ 02:00<\/i><\/p>\n

I read an amazing stat about New Zealand, which is that they only have around 60 professional footballers across the world. <\/p>\n

As a nation, just by getting to this World Cup they are punching well above their weight, and it would be massive for them to get their first win in their third finals. <\/p>\n

They have got some decent players, too, like ‘the Wood-chopper’ Chris Wood up top and their playmaker, Sarpreet Singh, and I am also looking forward to seeing Motherwell midfielder Elijah Just, who is a good footballer.<\/p>\n

They are up against an Iran team with a lot of off-field issues, and won’t even be based in the United States where they play their three group games, but in Mexico.<\/p>\n

A lot of their players play in the Persian Gulf League, which has been suspended since March, and they are an ageing squad anyway. <\/p>\n

So, it won’t be easy for them and I am going to back ‘the Wood-chopper’ to get the winner.<\/p>\n

Sutton’s prediction:<\/b> 0-1<\/p>\n

AI’s prediction:<\/b> 1-0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Los Angeles \/ Tuesday, 16 June \/ 02:00 I read an amazing stat about New Zealand, which is that they…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2771,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2770","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2770","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2770"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2770\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2770"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2770"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2770"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}