FACTS AND FIGURES

KUALA LUMPUR: Following are some interesting facts and figures of the FIFA World Cup:

Twenty of the 32 teams qualified, will make back- toback appearances following the last tournament in Brazil in 2014.

Iceland and Panama will be making first appearances at a FIFA World Cup.

Iceland qualified for the fi rst time in 2018, becoming the smallest country (in terms of population) to reach the World Cup.

A total of 64 matches will be played in 12 venues - Samara Arena, Ni zhny Novgorod Stadium, Volgograd Arena, Ekaterinburg Arena, Mordovia Arena, Rostov Arena, Kazan Arena, Kaliningrad Stadium, Fisht Stadium, Saint Petersburg Stadium, Spartak Stadium and Luzhniki Stadium.

Cities involved in hosting the FIFA World Cup in Russia a re K a lining rad, K a zan, Krasnodar, Moscow, Nizhny Novgorod, Rostov- on-Don, Saint Petersburg, Samara, Saransk, Sochi, Volgograd, Yaroslavl and Yekaterinburg.

The fi nal will take place on July 15 at the Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow.

The official mascot is a wolf named Zabivaka, which means the one who scores in Russian.

Brazil is the team with most victories in FIFA World Cup (1958, 1962, 1970, 1994, 2002).

Only Brazilian legend, Pele has won three World Cups - 1958, 1962, 1970.

FIFA WorldCup2018: Gianluigi Buffon missed out on being a player with the most tournament participations ( six times) after Italy failed to qualify.

The oldest goal scorer in the FIFA World Cup is Roger Milla of Cameroon, who was 42 when he scored a goal against Russia in the 1994 World Cup in United States.

Germany forward, Miroslav Klose is the record scorer in FIFA World Cup history with 16 goals.

Legendary Italian footballer, Dino Zoft was the oldest player to win the FIFA World Cup at age 40.

The prestigious FIFA World Cup trophy, which was formerly known as Jules Rimet was stolen for seven days before the 1996 edition kicked off.

The World Cup were dominated by two continents – Europe (11 times) and South America (nine times).

World Cup 2018: At age 45, Egyptian goalkeeper Essam ElHadary is set to break the record as the oldest player to feature in a World Cup.

Former Northern Ireland striker, Norman Whiteside is the youngest player in history to make an appearance in a FIFA World Cup. During the 1982 World Cup in Spain, Whiteside made his debut at age 17 years, one month and 10 days in a game against Yugoslavia.

Brazi l ( 1970) and Spain ( 2010) are the only teams that have won the World Cup going in with a 100 per cent qualifying record.

Netherlands is the team who had the most appearances in World Cup final without a win (1974, 1978, 2010).

Worst discipline in a match with 16 yellow cards and four red cards went to a match between Portugal and Netherlands during the last of 16 stage at 2006 World Cup in Germany.

Most goals scored in World Cup match is 12 when Austria beat host, Switzerland 7- 5 in the quarter-fi nals 1954 World Cup.

Shirt swapping was once officially prohibited in the 1986 World Cup because FIFA did not want players to ‘bare their chests’ on the field.

No host country had ever been eliminated in the first round until South Africa did in the 2010 FIFA World Cup edition.

The largest attendance at a World Cup match was the final between Uruguay and Brazil with 173,850 spectators crammed into Rio de Janeiro’s Maracana Stadium on July 16 1950.

The quickest goal in a World Cup match was scored by Turkey’s Hakan Sukur after 10.89 seconds against host, South Korea in the third place play- off in 2002. – Bernama