{"id":4048,"date":"2026-06-18T20:48:35","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T20:48:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/?p=4048"},"modified":"2026-06-18T20:48:35","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T20:48:35","slug":"world-cup-2026-who-could-england-and-scotland-face-in-knockouts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/?p=4048","title":{"rendered":"World Cup 2026: Who could England and Scotland face in knockouts?"},"content":{"rendered":"


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The group stages of the World Cup are still in their infancy – but attention will inevitably already be turning to potential knockout round match-ups as fans plot their nation’s potential route to glory.<\/b><\/p>\n

Now the first matches in each group have been completed, you can see the current bracket for the knockout stages here.<\/a><\/p>\n

The page updates while group matches are in-play and automatically updates every 15 seconds.<\/p>\n

As it stands, Group L leaders England face a daunting last-32 meeting with Cristiano Ronaldo’s Portugal, who sit third in Group K after drawing their opening match against DR Congo.<\/p>\n

That would be the first meeting between the two nations at a major men’s championship since Portugal beat England on penalties in the quarter-final stage of the 2006 World Cup, two years after doing so at the same stage of Euro 2004.<\/p>\n

Scotland, as leaders of Group C after their opening victory over Haiti, are on course to meet Japan, who are second in Group F following an opening draw with the Netherlands.<\/p>\n

Among the other eye-catching fixtures based on the latest results, Germany would come up against Brazil, who they thrashed 7-1 on their way to the title in 2014.<\/p>\n

Erling Haaland’s Norway, top of Group I, would also meet the Netherlands – captained by Liverpool’s Virgil van Dijk’s side and currently third in Group F.<\/p>\n

The top two teams from the 12 groups, plus the eight best third\u2011placed nations, will advance into an expanded knockout phase that will begin with a round of 32.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The group stages of the World Cup are still in their infancy – but attention will inevitably already be turning…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4049,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4048","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\/4048","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=4048"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4048\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4049"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4048"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4048"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4048"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}