World Cup Tiers: From the favorites all the way down to the dregs

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Ok, onto the column. No need for a big preamble, let's dive in:

Tier I: The Favorites

The way I see it there are three teams currently levitating above the rest of the field, and if you gave me these three teams vs. the field (which is a live bet on basically any of those degen apps you want), I'd take them.

It's Spain, who are the current Euro champions, and France, who are the 2018 Champions and defeated 2022 World Cup finalists. And of course there's Argentina, the reigning champs as well as two-time defending Copa America champs.

I initially didn't have Argentina in this group, and that's really through no fault of their own. It's just that Spain and France are so outrageously talented right now that sometimes it's hard to conceive of anyone actually beating them in a game they're taking 100% seriously. Spain, of course, do their damage with the ball. They elevated possession to an art-form 20 years ago during the Xavi/Iniesta/Busquets days, and while this current iteration maybe isn't quite so delightful, I actually think they're a little bit more ruthless and, when Lamine Yamal is healthy, way more dynamic in the final third.

There are questions about Lamine's fitness at the moment, but everything points to him being available by the third group stage game, and truth be told they probably won't need him until the Round of 16 at the earliest.

France are more linear – I mean, everybody's more linear than Spain, so that's not really saying much – but have worked, over the past year, to become more structured and repeatable with the ball. Their big advantages, though, tend to come when they can attack at pace in isolation, and they are extremely smart about how they go about orchestrating those moments.

Now, here's something I'm mildly concerned about:

L'Équipe: In recent weeks, Ousmane Dembélé has had discussions with Kylian Mbappé about his defensive efforts. Dembélé has told Mbappé that he needs to put in more defensive effort for the national team than he does for his club in order to align with the group's mentality & integrate into the team

It is good that Dembélé has had these conversations with Kylian Mbappé, whose defensive efforts for Real Madrid this year were "Zlatan with the Galaxy"-level embarrassing. But it's probably not great when your second-best player has to lecture your best player about the importance of giving a shit in the days before the tournament kicks off.

France probably has too much talent for that to matter against anyone except four or five opponents, though.