It’s a debate as embedded in World Cup tradition as the action itself. Every four years for decades, fans argue about who’s best – the best player, the greatest tournament, the ultimate winner.
The questions survive so long because the answers are undeterminable. How can you judge different eras against one another without some level of ambiguity?
It’s no fun to simply admit defeat, though, so The Set Pieces has devised a way to get close to an answer by holding a tournament of our own. But without access to a functioning flux capacitor to travel back in time, we’ve used the tools at our disposal to find another way to find out who the World Cup’s best ever team is.
We’ve created a data set ranking the greatest national sides from World Cup history, made a detailed AI match simulation algorithm that puts them to the test in order to identify a champion.
In true TSP style, we’ve broken our World Cup of World Cup Winners into a mini-series of episodes to tell the story of the tournament and answer one of the biggest questions in football history.
(Psst.. If you like this, then you’ll love How to Win the World Cup: Secrets and Insights from International Football’s Top Managers, which is published by Bloomsbury, and updated for the 2026 tournament)
How it works
We’ve assembled a field of 24 teams drawn from World Cup history. The starting point is simple: every World Cup-winning side. But that only takes us to 22 and since the 1934 and 38 Italy sides – the only back-to-back winners to do it with the same manager – have a similar footprint, we’ve merged them together, we’re down to 21. Even FIFA can’t make that work.
So to complete the field, we’ve added a small number of iconic runners-up and non-winning teams (Hungary 1954, Netherlands 1974 and Brazil 1982) whose influence on football history was simply too great to ignore.
Rather than simply picking a winner and inventing a narrative around it, we’ve built a simulation model designed to test these teams against one another.
Each side has been assessed across a range of factors including attacking strength, defensive quality, midfield control, tactical organisation and mentality. Managers are part of the equation too, with ratings applied to areas such as tactical acumen, adaptability, tournament management and innovation.
Historical context also matters. Home advantage, tactical revolutions, iconic individuals and the qualities that made certain teams unique are all reflected within the model.
The result is what we hope is the closest thing to a World Cup of World Cup Winners that is possible, revealing what happens when the greatest tournament teams in history are forced to compete under the same conditions.
The draw
The 24 teams have been drawn into six groups of four, with the top two sides in each automatically qualifying for the knockout stage, alongside the four best third-placed teams. From there, it’s straight knockout football all the way to the final – exactly as World Cups should be.
As the idea of big televised draws with a host of seeding rules and permutations to keep certain teams apart is a relatively modern thing, we’ve gone a bit Football Manager and created a randomised group draw, one nation at a time.
Group A
Brazil 1970: Often considered the greatest team ever assembled, Pelé’s Brazil combined extraordinary individual talent with a collective fluency that remains the benchmark for attacking football.
West Germany 1990: Franz Beckenbauer’s champions were balanced, mature and relentlessly efficient. Tournament football distilled into its purest form.
England 1966: England’s only World Cup winners. Alf Ramsey’s famous Wingless Wonders challenged conventional thinking and delivered the game’s biggest prize on home soil.
Italy 1934-38: Vittorio Pozzo’s Italy remain the only side to win consecutive World Cups under the same manager. Organised, ruthless and foundational to football’s tactical history.
Group B
Germany 2014: The culmination of a decade-long rebuild. Intelligent, flexible and devastating when opponents lost their shape.
Brazil 1958: The team that announced Brazil to the world, a teenaged Pelé’s emergence helped create the country’s footballing identity.
Uruguay 1950: Forever remembered for the Maracanazo, La Celeste’s second champions were defined by resilience, belief and the ability to thrive under immense pressure.
Brazil 1982: Perhaps the most beloved World Cup team never to win it. Zico, Sócrates and Falcao led a side that became football’s enduring symbol of beauty over results.
Group C
Spain 2010: The peak of possession football. Vicente Del Bosque’s side suffocated opponents through control and became world champions while conceding just twice.
Argentina 1986: The winners of what became known as Diego Maradona’s World Cup, Argentina’s 86 champs are forever associated with one of football’s greatest individual performances, but had a pragmatic backbone too.
Italy 2006: Defensively magnificent and mentally unbreakable, Marcello Lippi’s side navigated turmoil at home to become world champions.
Netherlands 1974: The standard-bearers for Total Football, the Netherlands side of Rinus Michels and Johan Cruyff changed how the game was played – even if they never lifted the trophy.
Group D
Italy 1982: Enzo Bearzot’s side arrived under pressure and left as champions, through a formidable combination of tactical discipline, tournament intelligence and Paolo Rossi’s goals.
Brazil 2002: Ronaldo, Rivaldo and Ronaldinho formed one of the most devastating attacking trios in World Cup history as Brazil’s last winners triumphed.
Brazil 1994: Less celebrated than other Brazilian champions, but perhaps one of the country’s most effective tournament teams. Pragmatic, disciplined and successful.
West Germany 1954: The winners of the Miracle of Bern, causing one of football’s greatest upsets when they beat the all-conquering Hungarian side of the 50s to win – all to the backdrop of a country rebuilding following World War Two.
Group E
France 1998: A complete tournament team, Zinedine Zidane supplied the magic for French glory on home soil, but defensive authority and midfield control were their foundations.
West Germany 1974: Led by their captain, Franz Beckenbauer, this was a side of intelligence, authority and tactical sophistication.
Argentina 1978: Champions on home soil, La Albiceleste were intense, aggressive and a team shaped by the political atmosphere surrounding the tournament.
Hungary 1954: The Mighty Magyars that destroyed England, but failed at the last to claim a World Cup crown that seemed inevitably theirs. Revolutionary and brilliant, they’re one of the great non-winners.
Group F
Argentina 2022: Glory in Qatar in 2022 was Lionel Messi’s crowning achievement, but alongside their captain, they were a side built on emotional unity, adaptability and belief.
France 2018: Perhaps the ultimate modern tournament team, Didier Deschamps World Cup winners weren’t obsessed with possession or flair, but just on winning Les Bleus’ second title.
Brazil 1962: Less celebrated than 1958 or 1970, but every bit as effective, Brazil’s 1962 vintage retained their title from four years earlier, despite losing Pelé to injury.
Uruguay 1930: The first World Cup winners nearly a century ago, Uruguay were one of the game’s first great superpowers after taking back-to-back Olympic golds in 24 and 28.
Follow The Set Pieces on X/Twitter for all the twists and turns as we reveal the greatest World Cup winners ever.
And don’t forget to check out How to Win the World Cup: Secrets and Insights from International Football’s Top Managers, which is published by Bloomsbury, and updated for the 2026 tournament.
