Convinced football is coming home? Lumping on Germany after scoring seven? Tipping Lionel Messi to retain it? Telling yourself that Sweden are dark horses? Writing off Spain, Brazil and Cristiano Ronaldo? Hold fire. Because the World Cup is an epic.
Never more so than this time around in which the group stage will reduce the number of participants down to the 32 that were involved previously. It is what happens in the eighth game not the first that will dictate which team will lift the famous trophy.
The lessons from history are there. Most famously, of course, the reigning champions Argentina were beaten by Saudi Arabia in their opening game in Qatar in 2022. Spain also lost to Switzerland in 2010. That is two of the last four World Cup winners losing their first match.
This detail should be seen as more than a mere quirk. It is an indication that even over the course of a hectic summer, teams can evolve and emerge. Coaches find solutions. Sometimes the answers just present themselves. Player seize their opportunities.
Alexis Mac Allister did not start Argentina's first game in 2022 but was man of the match by the third - the same game in which Enzo Fernandez and Julian Alvarez made the starting line-up for the first time. All three were pivotal in the team's eventual triumph.
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That Spain team in 2010 came to realise that they needed Pedro's runs in behind to stretch the opposition, dropping David Silva to accommodate him. Go through World Cup history and there are so many examples of winners looking very different by the end.
Sir Geoff Hurst must be the most famous example, not making his bow until the quarter-final stage when he came in for the injured Jimmy Greaves. But not since Brazil's masterclass in 1970 has the winners' line-up been the same for the first game as the last.
For West Germany in 1974, Rainer Bonhof came in and was instrumental in setting up the winning goal in the final. Four years on, Argentina changed both of their wingers with one of them, Daniel Bertoni, scoring the goal that sealed their 3-1 victory in the final.
Italy changed personnel and formation in 1982, having not won any of their games in the first group stage. Famously, Paolo Rossi would go on to win the Golden Boot and the Golden Ball that summer in Spain despite not scoring in any of Italy's first four matches.
Argentina's legendary 1986 triumph was all about Diego Maradona and the way that Carlos Bilardo built the team around him but even that was a system that developed out in Mexico rather than before. Going into the tournament, they were not fancied at all.
Speaking to Pedro Pasculli, a striker in that squad, he made that clear. "The media in Argentina did not just underestimate us. Above all, they denigrated us saying that the team was too weak and did not have a chance of even getting out of the group."
Pasculli started the opening game with Argentina deploying him and Jorge Valdano ahead of Maradona. He was still playing - and scoring the winner - in the round of 16 against Uruguay. But Bilardo opted to bolster the midfield for the game against England.
"He had to sacrifice a striker in order to do it. That striker was me," Pasculli told Sky Sports . "The unpredictable change of system was important against England. Hector Enrique, a midfielder with defensive skills, took my place, and Valdano moved up."
Bilardo and Argentina stuck with the new 3-5-1-1 formation all the way through to beating West Germany in the final. "I can tell you that many of those journalists who did not believe in us, at the end they were the ones shaking our hands to congratulate us."
The newly unified Germany also went more defensive during the course of their success at Italia '90, Thomas Berthold beginning in the back three but finishing at wing-back. Brazil even changed their captain from Rai to Dunga during the course of their victory in 1994.
France started Thierry Henry in their first two games in 1998 with him scoring three goals in those matches. In fact, he was his country's top scorer at the tournament and had featured in all six games prior to the final. Henry found himself an unused substitute that night.
Juninho lost his place in Brazil's team in 2002 with Kleberson preferred by the end. Italy changed four of the team in 2006. Mario Gotze began 2014 in the Germany team but was on the bench for the final - and still came on to score the extra-time winner.
And those are just the winning teams. Argentina made the final in 1990 after being humiliated by Cameroon in the opening game. Salvatore Schillachi won the Golden Boot that summer despite not forcing his way into Italy's side until their third match.
Then there are those who burn brightly before fading. Brazil won as many games as Italy in 1982 but lost the one that mattered. Denmark lit up Mexico '86 before being blown away. Argentina thrilled us in 2006, the Netherlands in 2014. Neither made the final.
And even if you do get there, the narrative can shift under your feet. It was Ronaldo not Zinedine Zidane who was the best player at France '98. Indeed, Zidane was sent off during the group stage, missed the next two games and did not score until the final.
What people remember is not Ronaldo's Golden Ball but his anxiety-induced nightmare in Paris. In 2014, it was Messi who endured the awkward experience of being awarded that prize after a final in which he not only lost but missed his team's best chance.
The point is that the story of a World Cup sometimes has not yet emerged even on the morning of the final itself let alone a third of the way through the group stage one month prior. Plenty of time for hopes to be dashed. And for heroes to reveal themselves.
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Sources: Sky Sports
