- The 2014 FIFA World Cup was the 20th FIFA World Cup, the tournament for the association football world championship, which took place at several venues across Brazil.
- It began on 12 June, with a group stage, and concluded on 13 July with the final. It was the second time that Brazil has hosted the competition, the first being in 1950.
- Brazil was elected unchallenged as host nation in 2007 after the international football federation, FIFA, decreed that the tournament would be staged in South America for the first time since 1978 in Argentina, and the fifth time overall.
- The national teams of 31 countries advanced through qualification competitions that began in June 2011 to participate with the host nation Brazil in the final tournament.
- A total of 64 matches were being played in 12 cities across Brazil in either new or redeveloped stadiums.
- For the first time at a World Cup finals, match officials are using goal-line technology, as well as vanishing foam for free kicks.
- All world champion teams since the first World Cup in 1930 – Argentina, Brazil, England, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Uruguay – qualified for this competition.
- The title holders, Spain, were eliminated at the group stage, along with previous winners England and Italy.
- Uruguay were eliminated in the Round of 16 and France were eliminated at the quarter-finals.
- In the final between two former champions Argentina and Germany, Germany won the title by defeating Argentina 1–0 after extra time, thus becoming the first European team to win a World Cup in the Americas.
- Despite the hosts Brazil finishing in the last four, their presence of the tournament was overshadowed by their record-shattering 7-1 loss to eventual champions, Germany, in the semi-finals.
TOURNAMENT DETAILS:
- Host country: Brazil
- Dates 12 June – 13 July 2014 (32 days)
- Teams 32 (from 5 confederations)
- Venue(s) 12 (in 12 host cities)
- Champions Germany (4th title)
- Runners-up Argentina
- Third place Netherlands
- Fourth place Brazil
- Matches played 64
- Goals scored 171 (2.67 per match)
- Top scorer(s) Colombia James Rodríguez (6 goals)
- Best player Argentina Lionel Messi
- Best young player France Paul Pogba
- Best goalkeeper Germany Manuel Neuer
ABOUT FIFA WORLD CUP:
- The FIFA World Cup, often simply called the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior men’s national teams of the members of Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), the sport’s global governing body.
- The championship has been awarded every four years since the inaugural tournament in 1930, except in 1942 and 1946 when it was not held because of the Second World War.
- The current format of the competition involves a qualification phase, which currently takes place over the preceding three years, to determine which teams qualify for the tournament phase, which is often called the World Cup Finals.
- 32 teams, including the automatically qualifying host nation(s), compete in the tournament phase for the title at venues within the host nation(s) over a period of about a month.
- The 20 World Cup tournaments have been won by eight different national teams.
- Brazil have won five times, and they are the only team to have played in every tournament.
- The other World Cup winners are Italy and Germany, with four titles each; Argentina and Uruguay, with two titles each; and England, France and Spain, with one title each.
- The 2014 World Cup took place in Brazil. The next two World Cups will be hosted by Russia in 2018 and Qatar in 2022.
