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How losing can still be winning at a 48-team World Cup

Steve Clarke and his Scotland players have a solemn moment following defeat by Morocco Catherine Ivill - AMA/Getty Images

By Jordan CampbellJune 24, 2026 Updated 3:09 pm EDT

The Athletic has live coverage of Bosnia & Herzegovina vs Qatar and Morocco vs Haiti at the 2026 FIFA World Cup.

In the 97th minute, chasing an equaliser from a corner kick, Scotland hit the first man, botched the clean-up job and found themselves on the retreat.

Achraf Hakimi squeezed past Anthony Ralston and a three-v-one situation unfolded as Morocco approached the halfway line. With the situation looking close to a certain goal, Ralston committed the most cynical of fouls and pretty much rugby-tackled Hakimi. The referee simultaneously blew for a foul and full time. Scotland lost by one goal at Gillette Stadium last Friday rather than two.

In any other World Cup, it would have been a frustrating ending in a costly defeat. At this expanded 48-team edition, in which eight of the 12 third-placed teams progress to the knockouts with the 24 first- and second-place finishers, Ralston’s act of sabotage may be the difference between qualification and elimination.

Scotland’s Anthony Ralston grabs Achraf Hakimi to halt a late Morocco break (Mattia Ozbot/Getty Images)

With three points and a neutral goal difference after two of their three matches, Scotland can now likely afford another narrow defeat by Brazil on Wednesday and still reach the World Cup’s knockout stage for the first time at their eighth attempt. Had they conceded again against Morocco, the margin for error would have been more precarious.

In the final knockings of that match, if there had been a buzzer available to press which guaranteed a goal but did not reveal which side it would be for, few Scotland fans would likely have triggered it. Indeed, a 1-0 defeat had been widely agreed upon as a palatable outcome going into the game.

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And so those last 25 minutes served as a bizarre risk-management experiment that is likely to be a harbinger of what is to come in this tournament.

In fairness, Scotland did press higher and committed men forward in their desire to gamble on the point that would have virtually guaranteed progression. But they still attacked with an element of insurance and even some Tartan Army members in the stands could be heard shouting not to leave themselves too exposed when breaking forward.

Is this healthy jeopardy or a perverse reward for failure? Should manager Steve Clarke’s motto of “Don’t get humped” really be enough for them to make it through? Scotland will not care one jot if they reach the knockout stage but when losing two games out of three in your group is no longer terminal, it does fundamentally lessen the stakes and alter the psychology of winning and losing.

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It looked like Scotland may be on course for a ruinous evening in Foxboro, near Boston, when Ismael Saibari pinged in the opener for Morocco after just 71 seconds. Clarke’s team looked spooked and enfeebled, barely engaging with the opposition until they had to.

Perhaps that explains why, despite the whole message from the camp the past two weeks has been about not leaving this tournament with a sense of regret, like the last two meek European Championship finals campaigns, Scotland have displayed a similar passiveness and lack of expression in the United States. Having won the must-win game against Haiti, the task was as much about avoiding a heavy defeat as it was finding a way to score.

They face the same predicament today (Wednesday) in Miami. As per The Athletic’s projections model, a 1-0 defeat against Brazil gives Scotland an 89 per cent chance of making the knockout stages. A 2-0 loss still gives them a 77 per cent chance of getting through to the round of 32. Even a 3-0 reverse gives them a 62 per cent chance.

What may that do to the team’s mindset?

“Absolutely nothing, because we want to win the game; and if we can’t win the game, then we don’t want to lose it,” said Clarke.

Austria are another nation who could progress to the knockout stages with a matchday three defeat (Michael Steele/Getty Images)

But the number of teams still able to progress opens up the possibility of non-aggression pacts in this final round of group games, evoking memories of West Germany vs Austria at the 1982 World Cup.

Playing the day after Algeria had completed their three group games, leaving them tied on four points with Austria, both teams knew that a West Germany win by fewer than three goals would see them both qualify at the expense of the North Africans. After Horst Hrubesch scored in the 10th minute, the match in Gijon, Spain, did not witness another goal. Both sides had little reason to risk attacking with any purpose and in Algeria, the game became known as the ‘Disgrace of Gijon’.

FIFA has changed the rules so that head-to-head records decide placings when points are tied in the group stage rather than goal difference. Even with that modification, however, there is the opportunity for Algeria to be on the right side of their cruel 1982 fate this time. Their final Group J game against Austria, along with Group D’s Paraguay-Australia match, looks ripe for inaction.