Gerrez, until the end of the world cup can you change my rank from "senior member" to "Japanese MILF" please?
Nigeria!!!!! FFS Then again, Pele predicted that an African nation will win the World Cup before the year 2000. I reckon he meant before the year 3000. This could be Nigeria's year. "Brown Ideye scorin' goals tra la la la. Brown Ideye scoring goals tra la la la la" "Come on yooooo greeeeeeens"
To win modern world cup you need three things. In order of importance: 1) Large pool of players. More players more chance you will do well. How far back do you have to go to find a winner from a country < 40 million? Probably Uruguay many moons ago. South America has advantages too in that way higher % of population take playing seriously. 2) Money for facilities and training. This is advantage Europe. Don't think we have any third world winners do we? 3) a good manager. There arnt as many African nations that are as highly populated (with people who have access to facilities). Nigeria happens to be one though. African nations typically don't have as much money as Europe or SA. Some are getting wealthier.... Nigeria again being one. Not sure about coaching staff... ... but I would see Nigeria as most likely to win world cup for Africa before the others based on size... and now, oil wealth.
7 African nations have over 40 million population. Half are politically unstable or wouldn't have as much access to football... Ethiopia, Congo, etc. 8 European nations over 40 million population. All wealthy with access to facilities. As these gaps close African will start to win some.
China has population and now has wealth (India too... India has larger young population than China). If either take the sport seriously in future could be a major threat. Cricket and Kabbadi is saving us from India winning the world cup now.
Japan has population double the size of UK and a larger economy. If Japan was a focused on footie as Argentina they would smoke Argie arse on the field. Messi would be outclassed by someone named Fuji or Takagi.
