The Group of Death. It sounds so ominous, so dark, so final.
If you didn’t know it was a soccer phrase, you’d be forgiven for thinking it was used to describe a group of political dissidents or rebel guerrillas sent to rot in some unholy and treacherous den by corrupt Latin dictators.
It’s not that. The phrase is used to refer to what is generally considered by pundits and fans as the hardest and most competitive group at the World Cup and other international tournaments—a group comprising four top teams, making it difficult to predict which two might survive and advance to the knockout round.
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It’s silly, of course, to give such a foreboding title to something that, in the grand scheme of things, is so trivial. But don’t try telling soccer fans that. Go Google “The Group of Death.” More than 2.2 million references pop up. Avoiding the Group of Death matters to soccer supporters who eagerly chart and map out their team’s potential progression to the World Cup final after the official draw takes place.
All focus on Friday will be on the resort of Costa do Sauipe in the Brazilian state of Bahia, site of the draw for next summer’s FIFA World Cup in Brazil. The 32-team field will be divided up into eight groups of four, and as millions from around the world watch the drama unfold and finds out who their country will play, you can bet one thought that will be racing through their minds is, “Please Lord. Please don’t draw us into the Group of Death.”
All of which raises the question: Who came up with the name, Group of Death? It’s not an easy question to answer.
The “Group of Death” phrase was popularized by Uruguay manager Omar Borras when his team was drawn into a group with West Germany, Denmark and Scotland at the 1986 World Cup in Mexico.
The term soon caught on and was adopted by the media, and soon entered the soccer lexicon to refer to the toughest World Cup group, with subsequent World Cup tournaments provoking the query, “which group is the Group of Death?”
But it’s believed the term was first used in the buildup to the 1970 World Cup, also staged in Mexico. When reigning champions England was drawn with two-time winners Brazil, 1962 runners-up Czechoslovakia and Romania in the group stage, Mexican journalists were quick to christen the group as the “el grupo de la muerte.”
Brazil went on to claim a record third World Cup title that year, winning the only group at that tournament that exclusively featured teams from Europe and South America, traditionally soccer’s strongest regions.
Both the 1974 and 1978 World Cups offered up tough groups, but nothing like that 1982 quarter-final, three-team group that brought together Argentina (reigning champions featuring a young Diego Maradona), Brazil (the tournament favourites) and Italy (two-time World Cup winners).
Italy and Brazil both beat Argentina to open up the group, setting up a winner-take-all showdown between the two sides in the final match. Brazil only needed a draw against the Italians to advance to the semifinals by virtue of scoring more goals against Argentina.
This, of course, was the famous match—described by many historians and noted commentators as the greatest in tournament history—where Paolo Rossi netted a hat-trick in a 3-2 win by Azzurri, who eventually went on to claim their third World Cup in Spain. In 2007, The Guardian called this the deadliest-ever Group of Death.
The rules for the 1986 World Cup had changed, allowing for as many as three teams to advance out of the group into the knockout stage. Despite this added safety net, Omar Borras still called it the Group of Death, as it was the only group to be made up entirely of teams from Europe and South America.
Uruguay managed to make it to the next round with two draws—they were hammered 6-1 by Denmark in their other group stage game—but quickly bowed out to eventual winners Argentina in the round of 16.
The tradition has lived on ever since, with each subsequent World Cup featuring, to varying degrees, one group being declared the Group of Death. It’s a tradition that, no doubt, will live on in the aftermath of Friday’s draw.
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