It has been happening for 20 years when France did not pass the group stage, Spain suffered it in 2014 and only Brazil escaped it in 2006
If there is a team that will be closely watched in the first matches of the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, it is France. The current world champions arrive at the event as one of the favorites along with Brazil and Argentina. And it is likely that if it were not for their internal problems, they would be the main candidates to lift the cup on December 18.
But France must overcome an important hurdle during the first week of the World Cup: getting out of the group stage. It may seem like a joke but in the last 20 years only one world champion -Brazil in Germany 2006- got past the first round. France itself started this kind of curse in 2002 when Korea and Japan fell to the first change in a group with Senegal, Denmark and Uruguay.
Six years later, Italy recovered the curse. The transalpines were unable to advance to the round of 16 after facing Paraguay, Slovakia and New Zealand. South Africa saw the birth of a new world champion, the eighth in history. Casillas raised the first World Cup in Spain to the sky of Johannesburg.
And, precisely, it was the great captain of the national team who left an image to remember four years later in Brazil. Casillas, on his knees and with a contorted face, transmitted the end of a historical cycle for La Roja. Spain fell 5-1 to the Netherlands and days later certified its elimination after losing to Chile. The win against Australia was useless. Spain was also ‘cursed’.
The last to suffer the curse was Germany. The Germans said goodbye to the World Cup in Russia at the first change in a group made up of Mexico, Sweden (the only rival they beat) and South Korea.
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