Press release No. 217 of 13 June 2018
WIESBADEN – The men's international soccer tournament will start in Russia on 14 June. 32 teams will compete for the title in the four weeks to come. According to United Nations (UN) data, Island with a good 330,000 inhabitants will be smallest country to participate in the World Cup and Brazil the largest with roughly 208 million. As reported by the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis), conditions in Brazil are more favourable than in all other participating countries when it comes to forming a strong team. Approximately 35 million young men between the age of 15 and 34 lived in Brazil in 2017. In contrast, there were 9.7 million men of that age group in Germany. Brazil has won the Cup five times, Germany four times. However, former FIFA World Cups have shown that population figures do not have much influence on a team's success. Only 6 million men of the respective age group lived in Spain when the country won the Cup in 2010.
The 2018 World Cup web page of the Federal Statistical Office provides information on all participating countries. You can directly compare two countries competing in a match - not only when it comes to sport but also in the fields of population, economy, labour market and communication.
